By Róger Méndez Benavides
Key words: Principle of Self-reference, the Quantum Phenomenon, the Propulsive Phenomenon, Leadership, Behavior, and Quantum-Propulsive Leadership. They sum up: The new paradigms of the science, they allow to reconsider, under phenomena’s parallelisms, the theory of the leadership from four basic principles: the quantum phenomenon, the phenomenon of the propulsion, the principle of self-reference, and the human behavior like energy. This article treats about the re-interpretation of the theory of the leadership for the management of intelligent organizations.
Article [Original article was written in Spanish language and appeared on April 29th, 2007]
What is the quantum-propulsive leadership?
On this topic very little is spoken by the authors of the intelligent organization theory, except the case of Peter Senge (1998: p. 418) who shows in the chapter eighteen: The New Function of the Leader, in his work Fifth Discipline. Senge declares that the leader must be a designer of the governing ideas of the organization, butler of the vision of the organization and teacher of the organization. Another author who shows something on the topic is Drucker (1998), who makes sure that the new way of leading the organizations of the knowledge society is enduring like an orchestra director. The authoress Margaret Wheatley (1994) dedicates the last chapter of his work to this topic, names it “The new scientific management”, in this work, Margaret affirms the following thing in relation to the new type of leadership, based on the principle of self-reference:
"[...] a new conceptualization has arisen. The leadership is always dependent on the context, but the context is established by the relations that we value. We cannot hope to influence any situation without respecting the persons' complex network that they contribute to our organizations. Is this an innovation, a mania? Or is it the plot of the universe that begins feeling in our work life?..., Here we are seated in the Age of the Information, besieged by more information than the one that any mind can handle, trying to find the sense to the complexity that keeps on growing around us..., If the universe is not anything more that the result of the information, this might tell why the quantum physicists observe connections between particles that come out the space and the time, or why our observation acts change what we see. The information does not have to obey the laws of the matter and the energy; it can assume diverse forms or communicate instantaneously in any part of the universal picture. In the organizations, we are not enduring for information surcharge owed only the technology, and can escape to our information quandaries in spite of only using more sophisticated skills of computer classification. Slightly much bigger he is asking us. We are moving irrevocably towards new relations with the creative force of the nature..., if we fail in recognizing his generative properties, we will be incapacitated to lead this new world..., in any part of the nature, the order is supported in the middle of the change because the autonomy exists in the local levels. The sub-units absorb the change, answering and adapting. What arises from this one to flow constant is this wonderful state of global stability..., the nature believe the flow and movements ebb in all the levels. These movements fuse in everything that can resist most of the demands for the change on a global scale because the system has invested enough internal movement. The movement of these systems is supported in harmony by means of a force that we begin to understand: the capacity self-referential. Instead of turning in circles towards diverse directions, every part of the system will have to stay consistent with itself and with all the parts of the system at the time that this one changes..., the self-reference looks like to me [scientific beginning] of major impact. It evokes a vision different from the management and promises solutions to many of the quandaries that importune us: control, motivation, ethics, values, changes... [...] ”Wheatley (1994: p. 199-202) [The former citation is a translation from Spanish to English and is mine with the best of my abilities].
There is need to re-interpret the theory of the leadership, because we are penetrating slowly to a new way of managing companies, entities, intelligent organizations, we are leaving slowly the bureaucratic models of managerial companies, and are taking every day major forces the management of intelligent organizations in the middle of a society named: society of the knowledge.
In such a way that the theories of leadership known up to today and that have worked to explain the management phenomenon [Transformational Leadership, Situational Leadership, Transactional Leadership, Level Five Leadership, among others] can be re-interpreted or extended; I think that, after knowing the theorems, postulates and axioms that sustain the theory of the intelligent organizations, we must consider a reinterpretation of the leadership for the management of intelligent organizations.
Taking an analogy borrowed the "quantum" concept of the quantum physics [The "quantum" and his Latin plural “quanta“, theory of the quanta, according this theory the energy is expressed, propagates and is absorbed by the atoms and molecules, not in continuous form, but discontinuously, in the shape of impulses or bundles of energy called quantum’s. Consequently, the quantum is constituted conceptually in each of the small quantities in which the light and the energy are expressed and propagate. In case of the light, receives the name of photon] from Galiana Mingot (1979: p. 316.)
Taking a resemblance borrowed the concept of “propulsion“of the physics [The propulsion: it is the action to urge forward, to promote it is to push forward with some mechanism propellant] Of Galiana Mingot (1979: p. 841). In the phenomenon of the propulsion play his roll two entities, first an accelerating particle that drives a force in a certain direction and the intensive particle that reacts or moves in direction opposite to the accelerating particle. Namely the propulsion steadies itself in the beginning of the action and of the reaction.
Using the scientific principle named “self-reference“ which incubate the phenomenon of the dynamic interaction between everything and the individuality, as well clear Wheatley (1994: p. 201) “[...] still in the simplest of the cells, exists an unequivocal recognition of the intention of the system, a deep relation between the individuality and everything [...]”.
I propose to the scientific community the reinterpretation of the theory of the leadership, thinking about the administration of intelligent organizations in the society of the knowledge. The leadership for this type of organizations is the quantum -propulsive leadership [QPL]. It is quantum as the human behavior is an energy, one needs to lead the human potential of the intelligent organization, so that the individual competitions gather together in particular competitions or of teams and these competitions of the groups or teams, assembled in everything, they shape the competitive prerogatives of the entity like a general body, thanks to the movement and interactive dynamism.
It is propulsive because the leadership must be observed like a phenomenon with two constitutive elements, the leader as particle or accelerating entity and the led ones like particles or intensive entities. The phenomenon of the quantum -propulsive leadership is a vision different from the management, as the conflicts or situations on what ones the leadership is invigorated, they adhere at the principle of the self-reference. This beginning contains the idea of that in the nature, the order supports in the middle of the change, thanks to the fact that in the local, individual and particular levels autonomy exists. Wheatley (1994) argues that the phenomenon of the management creates a series of flows and ebbs of movements in all the levels and of diverse natures [human, material, information, financials, among others], these movements support the harmony thanks to his self-reference capacity, who recognizes the differences among every part, for example between living organisms and machines; but it identifies the open systems that progress for autonomous repetitions and the mechanical systems that act of better form in balance terms.
The quantum-propulsive leadership supports that the heterogeneity moves the climate organizational and not the homogeneity, in this case, the consensus does not constitute a big virtue. The emotional system of the organization recognizes to every subject, the interpersonal relations, the teams, the intergroup relations, the organization and the environments of the organization, the micro-environment, the meso-environment and the macro-environment. The principal assignment of the quantum – propulsive leadership consists of the fact that the leader is unfolded in the group, that the leader could create or repeat others equal or superior to him or her; the leader multiplies in the team and it comes to be invisible, the invisibility of the leader is an indicator of the quantum – propulsive dynamism of his or her organizational management.
In the previous theories of the leadership, a transverse thread exists, this thread is that the leader handles power and the power is a social subjection, in such way that the leader has the function to legitimize the status quo or to change the status quo. This is like that, because the society is conceived like a dynamism of interests of class, individual, normative and rolls, which do requirable a profile of the leader under a representation of force of subjection.
One of the challenges of the society of the knowledge and of the intelligent organizations takes root in solving what seems to be a contradiction of the times, which takes root in that the supreme value of the society of the knowledge is the competitiveness, nevertheless, this competitiveness is necessary to forge it in the middle of the suspense or uncertainty, and the uncertainty hinders and makes to feel bad to those who feel comfortable with an administrative management for the stability. The question is: How to manage and to reach a stable competitiveness, in the middle of the suspense?
The reality of the society of the knowledge and of the intelligent organizations is that the events are temporary, specifics of a context, developed by means of the interpersonal relations and circumstances, which indicates that the fixed bosses are absent. The understanding is achieved as it leaves this it stems this way from the nature of the reality, which changes form and meaning in reason of our activity, Wheatley (1994); and since the activity is constantly new, new is the meaning that stems from the interpretation of the reality.
The quantum -propulsive leadership is a social construct, it is defined by the dynamic interaction of the parts of the team or group. The leader is a social subject before a group, he or she moves away with relative autonomy, but he or she guides other individuals. The real quantum -propulsive leader nullified his individuality before the others. That is like this because, the quantum – propulsive leadership is constituted in a figure of service, instead of being a figure of social subjection par excellence. The capacity or the yield of the quantum – propulsive leadership is according to the acceptance that his group does of him or her.
Less visible is the leader in the group more powerful in his leadership: How is it possible to decapitate a leader if one does not see? The quantum – propulsive leader looks for the growth of the intelligent organization by means of the self-reference, the harmony of the parts, and the sustainability of the organization in the time.
The quantum – propulsive leadership for the management of intelligent organizations has like target, the incessant growth of the knowledge of the organization and of his respective teams and individualities, without running the risk that given situations of zero sums, in the cognitive appropriation and in the construction of meaning.
In the previous theories of the leadership, the leader is a particle that transforms his activity into a species of religious cult led by a human being, icon of the organization. The quantum – propulsive leadership, the leadership is an intra-subjective and inter-subjective feeling of the members of the organization.
The human conduct is energy, in every act of quantum - propulsive leadership there is transmitted and is transmuted the energy of the leader [accelerating agent] to the led ones [intensive agent].
The conditions of the contexts [macro-context, meso-context, micro-context], among the quantum-propulsive leadership is evident, they are characterized for being complex; this means that the phenomena are interconnected and that they affect mutually; consequently, the act arisen from a certain addressing, takes the intention of creating a set of forces tending to favor the determinants needed by the intelligent organization.
The quantum-propulsive leadership is characterized for being assertive in not consuming or evaporating his accelerating capacities, by which the intelligent organization is propel; but it preserves them and increases them in every act and behavior of management.
The information is an agent of impulse or of rest. The knowledge is assimilated information, that is to say, knowledge acquired for having processed the information in the sieve of learning, the meaning that arises from learning is a factor that generates a certain action or rest in the intelligent organization.
The stability of the organization is not synonymous of inertia [without activity nor energy], it is of rest, which means that the meaning that arises from the interpretation of the reality and in accordance with the development of the intelligence of the organization itself, will indicate if the organization must move towards a direction or must avoid the interpreted act of the reality.
So that, in the quantum – propulsive leadership, the interpretation that does the leader of the chaotic act, complex and stuffed with amphibology that is evident in the ambience or in any of the environments, constitutes the raw material for the action of leadership. How does he interpret the quantum – propulsive leadership the opportunity concept? When an organism, that is part of some of the environments of the intelligent organization, produces in excess a certain component or when this organism falls ill, or loses the balance of his components, a problem is generated, which in his inverse part constitutes an opportunity, already is to act from the interior of the affected organism or to act from the exterior of the above mentioned system.
The quantum – propulsive leadership invigorates his action across the creation of a collective mind in the intelligent organization, so that if the leader disappear, does not eliminate the effect orientate in the mind of the group. It is a leadership unfolded in the members of the organization. This is one of the characteristics of the quantum-propulsive leadership, the construction of a nature of group. The leader makes to join several brains in a mind. It can be said that it is a cognitive post-rationalist phenomenon. It is for the previous thing that it is part of the theory of the quantum-propulsive leadership the conceptual and artistic mastery of the theories of learning, of the theories of the motivation, without which, the leader of the intelligent organization will not be able to carry out his finished work. The quantum-propulsive leadership is in this measurement one more technology of the intelligent organization.
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