Geoffrey Fountain asked for an example of deconstruction and the next
communication I received was from Ivan Blanco that provided a wonderful
opportunity to do just that. (I've waited until I had time to do it
justice.) Wonderful because he provides rich and valued thinking and at
the same time displays a number of the metanarratives and the way that
they operate in organisational and management thinking that I want to
reveal by the process of deconstruction. (I apologise in advance for any
unintended offense which might be taken by such an approach - but it
seemed "fair" because Ivan was responding to my communication.)
The process of deconstruction is one of taking a text in great detail and
seeing what assumptions are made and revealing what is being said so that
the contradictions become apparent. This is not an ordinary process of
revealing contradictions to show that some thinking is wrong or flawed.
It is a process of uncovering hidden assumptions and relationships that
are not apparent at the level of the original writing. It is a tenent of
deconstructionism that this is a characteristic of all texts and that the
value is in what is revealed, not in the destruction of the writing or the
ideas. Some may be seen to be more profound, some may reveal completely
unexpected insights and some may be seen to have hidden contradictions
that invalidate the original or render it unattractive.
One of the things to watch for is how the thing being talked about,
proved, revealed is already assumed in the thinking. That is, the
comments about vision will presuppose that vision exists, will presuppose
its nature, and will presuppose how it occurs - and the arguments for it
will tend to rest on the _already_ acceptance of the presuppositions.
I said (I show part of my text to make sense of Ivan's references),
>
> > I also think that we are misled by such things as vision. (snip)
> > I notice that there are people who get
> > along fine without them. (snip)
> > I also notice that many organisations have spent fortunes and enormous
> > energy and produced nothing but conflict or the suppression of conflict
> > by agreeing to "pablum" statements of vision. (snip) What is often
> > valuable when conducted for its own sake rather than for purposes of
> > shared vision, are the dialogues centered in questions about "What are we
> > here for?" and "What's possible?"
> >
Ivan responds,
> I would say that when organizational members engage themselves in
> dialogues about these questions, then they are define some kind of vision.
There is a great difference between engaging in dialogue centered in
certain questions and engaging in dialogue for the purpose of producing a
result. A dialogue that talks about values can be had for the sake of
insight or for the sake of common understanding or for other purposes
which have nothing to do with creating a vision.
Also, "define some kind of vision" is part of the problem in this arena.
It suggests that vision is a vague term that needn't be specified. Will
it produce a vision or won't it? Is a "kind of vision" the same thing as
a vision? The looseness indicates that we are not ina rigorous
conversation.
The aspect of the metanarrative of vision that is most directly revealed
here is that the word refers to a singular or particular vision. That is,
he is not talking about a _capacity_ for vision and he is not talking
about many, varied and ever shifting visions. He is talking about
"defining _a_ vision". Vision will become more a concrete "thing" as he
proceeds.
> As they ask these questions, the answers are telling them "what we look
> like today," and also "what we may look like tomorrow."
This passage reveals that Ivan considers that even dialogue "centered in
such questions as 'What are we here for?'" to be for getting to answers.
While dialogue may be part of an exercise where the purpose is getting
answers, dialogue itself is more for exploring ideas to see what will
emerge. The idea of answering questions is far too limited for the use of
the term dialogue. If the questions are engaged with for the finite
answers that they provide, then they aren't worth asking IMHO.
He has presumed that we agree that vision requires "what we look like
today" as being part of its development. But surely visions can be of any
possible future and need not have any referent to current conditions.
What we may look like tomorrow is far beyond what we can imagine.
Certainly it is far beyond any particular picture and will be different
from an particular picture that we create. Hidden in "what we may look
like tomorrow" is that is the idea that a single vision is possible. Part
of the problem with vision in the context of corporations is that there
are any number of possible "visions" and they will not agreed with each
other nor with the actual entity at some future time. The more specific
we get, the more likely we are to disagree.
It is also possible to have powerful dialogues in the area of the
questions asked without approaching any particular form. We might
consider values in great depth but never approach what the expression and
realisation of those values will look like.
The assumption of creating a gap between present and possibility may have
some value but I suggest its the gap itself rather than the specifics of
any vision that has the value.
> I know that
> getting to a shared vision, specially if done the bureaucratic way, is an
> almost impossible task.
Here we get into another of the metanarratives that are imbedded in the
"vision approach". The assumption that "dialogue" occurs when "done in a
bureaucratic way" is even dialogue is questionable. Some kind of
conversations take place but they can hardly qualify as dialogue. Worse,
the idea that a "shared" anything can be arrived at when the operational
approach is one of command and control is a contradiction in terms.
Getting to a shared vision in this manner is not possible if we are
talking about something that involves intelligent, free human beings. If
not, then a shared vision is itself a fraud. It isn't "almost impossible"
its impossible.
Ivan says that even in a free environment we are dealing with an almost
impossible" task. That implies that while he thinks its possible, he
doesn't know how to do it and that such results are mainly accidental. I
suggest that it is an impossible task even in a free environment. Why?
Because there are more possible futures than we can imagine let alone
agree on. We can only agree by compromise or by generalities which lose
all claim to worthwile statements. The best we can expect is that we
agree on what is already (tacitly) agreed on. But even this won't happen
because some of us will demand that we have a vision beyond the common
agreement or understanding. (Or what's the use of vision?)
> But if we just learned to listen to those "flows"
> that you talk about it here, then it will so easy to get to a common
> vision, or at least to a common macro-purpose for the organization.
>
"what we will look like tomorrow" has turned into " a common
macro-purpose". I consider these very distant relatives at best.
Ivan says that "if we just learned to listen to those flows" then its easy
to get to a common vision. I didn't say that and I don't think that is
obvious. It seems valid to say (in may experience) that if we have the
kinds of dialogues that I am talking about - not dialogues intended to
"answer" deep questions and arrive at particular "visions" - then we will
increase understanding, that affinity and alignment will increase, and
that our coordinated action will be enhanced. None of this suggests that
we share a vision - or even talk about one.
Marketplaces are wonderful examples of places where there is no shared
vision, no common dialogue and a wide variety of individual interests
expressing themselves but where the result is a functioning system which
support all participants and generates its own character.
The larger the group, the less likely a common vision will emerge. Beyond
a fairly small size in organisational terms, even commensurate or aligned
visions are not all that likely except at such a general level as to not
be worth putting into words.
The looseness with which Ivan is using the term "vision" is revealed
here. He says "or at least a common macro-purpose". There are few who
talk about vision who are willing to let it be reduced to such a phrase.
I think the passion that is expressed in the matter could not be mustered
for such a term. This is providing an escape hatch which removes the
meaning of vision and leaves us with nothing worth defending. A
macro-purpose hardly requires a vision.
It's valid to say that developing the ability to listen will increase our
ability in any dialogue - whether for vision or other things - but saying
it is now "easy" is an unlikely leap. I want to be clear that the
listening is of a unique quality that demands "listening to the unfolding"
to borrow from Heidegger or "listening to what life wants" to borrow from
the Budhists.
> I have been in organizations with no common vision (my former
> university, for instance), and they are going nowhere. It is doing it very
> slowly, but it will get there! I have also worked for organizations that
> whose members have a clear idea of where they are going, and it is a
> different type of experience. It is a great journey!
>
I too have had the variety of experiences that Ivan reports above.
However, the source of the experience and the occurrences which give rise
to that experience are not as obvious as he implies. Here we see that he
assumes the nature and existence of vision to make the case that he is
making to prove vision is important. If we look through a lense that says
vision exists and is the key, then we see the situation as he reports it.
If we look through other lenses (if we escape this metanarrative) then we
do not arrive at the same conclusions or even have the same experiences.
For instance, we could say that they were going nowhere because they had
insufficient dialogue, because they were asking the wrong questions,
because they had personality conflicts that prevented them from
communicating sufficiently to coordinate their action. While we can make
the case, if we start from where Ivan starts (as do many others), that
vision can somehow be created in the face of all this and will then
overcome it, that is a far from proved case.
We can say that those organisations where the different type of experience
occurs is a result of vision. But we can as easily say that it is the
result of certain practices (Quaker ones, for instance) or sufficient
listening to each other, or a history that provides guiding principles
which we may be unaware of. Many explanations are equally valid and we
will choose vision only if we already assess the world with that model.
Appealing as it is, it hasn't produced much in the way of results. And
most of the results that have been produced can be explained in at least
as powerful a way without vision.
What the above serves is to remove "vision" from the field of
metanarrative - unquestioned and unchallengeable - and bring it into the
domain of conversation, analysis, challenge, experimentation and discovery
what has previously been assumed.
My case is that we needn't introduce vision, the reductionist and
mechanistic psychology that goes with it and the ingoring of corporate
structures of power and control that are avoided by such statement as
"they lack commitment", "if only we had a commmon vision", etc. We cna
return to the real world of dialogue, relationship, communication and
continuous flows.
The one thing that is implied but not clearly stated in Ivan's
communication and is usually explicit when the "vision argument" boils, is
"we are talking about a flexible, moving, changing, alive vision" not some
static thing. But then what does vision mean? And why do you talk about
"_a_ vision"? By the time it just represent everybody and is constantly
moving, what is left?
What I said was that the dialogue was valuable and worthwhile for what it
produced. What it produces is more dialogue and more alignment. If it
also produces a specific vision, then watch out. If it produces
commensurate values, then I expect value has been produced.
The above was designed to have deconstruciton seen as a useful tool more
than to destroy vision. Secondarily, it was to challenge the
metanarratives of business and reductionist psychology and used vision as
an adequate entree for that.
--
Mike McMaster <Michael@kbddean.demon.co.uk>
"Postmodern society is the society of computers, information, scientific
knowledge, advanced technology, and rapid change due to new advances in
science and technology." Postmodern Theory, Best & Kellner