Posts Tagged ‘mythology’

How does it feel when you take the plunge and go out on your own? Is there a mix? One day it’s, “Thank God! I am on my own!” The next it is, “Oh God, no! I am on my own!” It can feel you’ve been set adrift having cut the mooring line to the familiar. Learning how to simultaneously capitalize on opportunities and deal with the existential angst in this entrepreneurial state is the fourth purpose of mythology, i.e., dealing with the psyche or one’s personal psychology. How the psyche develops is critical for making it through threshold experiences.

The psyche forms the foundation for building/discovering needed leadership tools mentioned previously in the first leadership blog, Navigating with an Executive Map and Compass. The path associated with this process is very much a quest. Friedrich Nietzsche expresses it well in Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Let’s see how it works in business.

The Camel, The Lion, and The Baby

When entering the business world one works like a camel dutifully and unquestioningly carrying a workload that gets bigger and bigger. It can lead to promotions. It gets puzzling though, since a limit will eventually be reached beyond which the camel will collapse. The first threshold is met. In order to progress change is required.

What was once exciting, providing a reason to get up in the morning, steadily becomes oppressive and the urge to cry “Enough!” starts forming. Crossing the threshold The Camel surprises others by transforming into The Lion. It attacks the giant beast “Thou Shalt,” which is covered in shiny scales each of which has a rule that must be followed if one is to stay in the current situation. The beast fights furiously since, after all, its rules have brought about the success experienced.

Once the beast is devoured another threshold is reached. The Lion is free, completely free. There is nothing left to fight, to stand against. The Lion stands alone. Movement forward means The Lion must change.

Another extraordinary and extremely demanding transformation must now take place in order to thrive and grow. The Lion transforms into The Baby. In mythology a baby signifies spontaneity, movement from within free of concern for consequence, free of rebelliousness. It is aware, bringing forward all experiences from the past. (See Buddhism or 2001: a Space Odyssey for more.)

Similar to The Baby Nietzsche writes about The Wheel. The Wheel is unique. It moves from within. It is neither pushed nor pulled. It seeks its own path without knowing where it will go. We know it in business as The Entrepreneur.

You’re So Lucky

How challenging and threatening can this be? This story may sound familiar. On one assignment there was a client employee who constantly complained about how lucky I was because of hourly rate, freedom to move from client to client, etc. This grew tiresome. When it started to interfere with my position on the project I said, “You are right. I’ll sit here while you tell your boss you quit. We can go have coffee and talk about how you can be completely on your own.” After that, he stayed with just doing his part of the project.

If you have indigestion from eating beasts or your wheel is beginning to wobble send me an e-mail at gwmonti@mac.com or visit www.ctrchg.com.

Tagged as: active garage, ActiveGarage, baby, center for change management, Change Management, clients, employees, gary monti, leadership and mythology, management, mythology

Ever have a resistant client? They want you to provide desired services but question and double-guess the recommendations and actions you make. Why would they behave that way? It has to do with the second function of myth, the Physical , also called the Cosmological. What it refers to is the beliefs (myths) one has as to how the world turns. In this case how the business world turns.

Cosmology, Clients, and Solar Eclipses

Having a cosmology is an important part of sense-making.  It provides a cause and effect framework for decisions. As long as it functions well there are eccentricities that will be accepted as “fact” when there really are just some coincidences in the system.

There’s a story about a cultural anthropologist who comes across a village right before a solar eclipse. The chief and village elders could not be distracted. They were preparing to save life itself. The anthropologist asked what was going on. The chief simply said, “Come and watch.”

As the moon began to creep in front of the sun the shaman began to direct the men of the village to beat the drums exactly as they had been taught – the way their fathers before them for many generations had done. As the eclipse progressed the drumming intensified and all the villagers were frozen in place wondering if the drumming would work this time. Eventually, the eclipse passed and the sun returned much to everyone’s relief.

The anthropologist felt it his duty to teach the villagers the rudiments of the Newtonian cosmology and explain how gravity worked along with drawing the orbits of the sun, the moon, and the earth. To his delight everyone listened intently and he left the village feeling proud.

He returned with the next eclipse and, much to his surprise, the drumming ritual was repeated. Exasperated he looked at the chief and said, “The theory I told you works!” The chief calmly looked at him and replied, “And if it doesn’t?”

Helping Clients Change

Bertrand Russell, the Nobel Prize winning 20^th Century mathematician-philosopher, felt that cosmologies aren’t refuted they simply are abandoned. In other words, don’t argue with clients to put down their drums. Look for their hot buttons and pressure points. If there is enough pent up emotion over how their current methods aren’t working then they might consider the solution(s) you are offering. If not, then listen to their drumming and be patient.

I’ve learned it is important to let go of judging the client. Out at the edges everyone’s worldview starts to unravel. Maintaining a degree of humility is important in keeping a levelheaded approach.

If you need help in working through solar eclipses either in-house or with clients contact me at gwmonti@mac.com or visit www.ctrchg.com.

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Tagged as: active garage, anthropologist, center for change management, clients, cosmology, customers, gary monti, judging, Leadership, leadership and mythology, mythology, patience, physical, solar eclipse

How do you cross thresholds in business life? This can be a daunting question. Boiling everything down to key components and making a balanced, constructive decision is the goal of a good leader. There is a drawing on both personal and group mythology to arrive at a sustainable goal.

So what’s this “mythology” stuff about? Sounds touchy-feely, fuzzy, and far removed from business. It is anything but that. It is about surviving, thriving, and protecting your business especially if social networking is important. How so?

Time to dive in and take a look

The previous blog mentioned four aspects to mythology:

• Mystical
• Physical
• Sociological
• Psychological

Here we will tackle the first one – mystical – and look at a form it commonly takes in business – Co-opetition.

Is It Really So Mystical?

The mystical really isn’t so…well…mystical, as in transcendental. It actually is very practical – close to the ground. The word “mystical” is used to describe both the awe felt and stance taken with regards to business life. This stance is based on simultaneously accepting the rough and tumble aspects of an environment that also provides opportunity to not just survive but to grow and thrive. Finding a way to balance cooperation and competition, co-opetition, is a good example.

Co-Opetition

In their classic book, Co-opetition, Brandenburger and Nalebuff apply game theory and view the business world in terms of PARTS (Players, Added value, Rules, Tactics, and Scope).  First there is a collective effort to add value and build a bigger pie (cooperate). At the same time, as the pie grows and benefits to all increase we might work to control the pie and get as much as possible (competition) without driving out needed stakeholders. Sustaining this environment is co-opetition.

Another radical idea Brandenburger and Nalebuff introduced was the concept of a complementor.  A player is a complementor when a customer values your product more when in the presence of that player’s product. Think hot dogs and mustard at a baseball game. One promotes the other.

But can a complementor also be a competitor? (Here’s where you give the classic project management answer, “It depends.”) Go beyond hot dogs and mustard and think of Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Apple, Intel, etc., and their relationships.

Is there a version of Office for the Mac? Does QuickTime run on PCs? What about Adobe and Apple regarding Flash?

Imagine describing all this to the uninitiated at a party. It is a bit awe-inspiring and finding a fundamental view for explaining everything consistently can be a big challenge… OR you might even say, It’s mystical!

Have Some Fun!

Can you see how important the mystical is? You can have some fun with this. Have a discussion with a group of friends based on the following. Imagine three people. One believes is cooperation-only. Another believes in competition-only. The third believes in co-opetition. Now, ask the question, “What paths could their businesses take?” Watch and see what you show each other about your fundamental beliefs.

Share you comments! I’d like to know what you think. In addition to commenting on this blog you can also send a response via e-mail to gwmonti@mac.com or visit www.ctrchg.com.

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Tagged as: active garage, business, center for change management, competition, cooperation, coopetition, gary monti, Leadership, mystical, mythology, Project Management, projects, team, www.ctrchg.com

An earlier Change Leadership blog asked if you have an internal compass.  Later, a Leadership Cancer blog asked you to list your tribes and associated role in each. These are part of a broader, critical question, “What is your personal mythology?” This new series will explore this question and how various answers impact us, people around us, and our business.

The importance of this question in everyday life was explored by the American mythologist, Joseph Campbell, who saw 4 distinct aspects to it:

• The mystical
• The physical
• The sociological
• The psychological

Mythology – What It Is And Isn’t

Before jumping into the 4 levels, lets try to understand what mythology is. We all go through dramatic, catastrophic periods in life, e.g., birth, death, marriage, parenting, establishing careers, etc., and have a desire to make sense of it all. This is what myth is – sense-making. We enter the world of mythology when we develop stories about our experiences. When there is a collective, tribal effort to develop one story combining all the truths presented the mythology takes shape by transcending the individual story.

So, mythology is simultaneously personal and communal. Teams work well when they share a common mythology and can tell stories that have powerful, emotional truth. Leaders excel when they can tap into these myths and awaken the team into seeing how moving forward with the project is in the individual and collective interest.

As used here mythology is a desire to find a simple narrative in the chaos of life. This is in contrast to “myth” being used negatively as a way to spin a situation, which is essentially distorting the context for personal gain (lying). Even at that, though, by looking beneath the spin a leader can see the mythology that provoked the distortion. This is very valuable information to have in capitalizing on opportunity, holding a team together, dealing with conflict, and responding to adversaries. When we understand the myth behind a statement we give ourselves a chance to let go of emotional reactivity and moral judgments and can respond in our best interest.

Mythology – Who Needs It? Why Bother?

Let’s bring this down to earth. Try this. Ask someone, “Would you give me an update on your project (or work)?” Sit back and listen. Later, come back and ask the same person, “Would you describe the best day you’ve ever had on this project (or at work)?” When they have finished ask, “Would you describe the worst day you ever had on this project (or at work)?”

Contrast the two methods: the progress report versus best/worst narrative. Which has more information? Which has more meaning? Which will convey a richer context? Which will give you a better sense of how the project is faring and what it is really about?

Don’t get me wrong. I am a huge believer in earned value and other methods that provide succinct accurate information. I also believe, though, that those reporting methods get meaning from the mythology that underpins them. That is why risk management is so important. It gets the story out. But I digress.

In the next blog we will start looking at those 4 levels of myth and why they are important to a businessman or -woman.

Share you comments! I’d like to know what you think. In addition to commenting on this blog you can also send a response via e-mail to gwmonti@mac.com or visit www.ctrchg.com.

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Tagged as: active garage, business, Joseph Campbell, Leadership myths, management, mystical, mythology, physical, Project Management, project statusing, psychological, Risk Management, sense making, sociological, status reports, www.ctrchg.com