Management Salt: What is the problem with Visioning Process and how do you deal with it?

There are 2 key elements in a Visioning Process.

The first point is Whose Vision is it?

Is it a Vision or a flaky statement of desire? If it is a Vision, is it an EGO Vision or an ECO Vision? i.e. is it about some small group of people or is it about all the stakeholders including the marginal ones. Is it connected to people’s logic OR is it also connecting to their heart? How many people in the organization are inspired and given by the Vision? How many people have co-created that Vision and have a sense of authorship and ownership of that Vision?

The second point is Is that Vision in alignment with the Future that wants to emerge?

Mostly Vision’s are about What a group of people want to will into existence. If it is not in sync with the Future that wants to emerge, the universe is not going to support the fulfillment of such a Vision.

Theory U by MIT Prof. Dr. Otto Scharmer

How do you address the 2 challenges in the Visioning Process?

1. When the leadership team listens deeply to all the stakeholders and sees the world from their eyes, then they can develop the ability to sense what is needed and wanted.
2. When the organization as a collective is listening deeply to all the stakeholders, then they can develop the capability to sense the future that wants to emerge
3. When the culture of the organization is of authentic collaboration and co-creation within and outside the organization then one can sense the future that wants to emerge and also the appropriate pathway for the same.

Blindspots and Barriers to being aware of and transform are:

1. Listening: Everyone thinks that we are great listeners, but most people don’t experience that they have been listened to and their world is gotten by others.
2. Open Mind: Most of us have an open mind, open enough to fit things that we understand and agree upon.
3. Open Heart: Most of us have an open heart, for people who think like us OR think in the way we want them to think.
4. Open Will: Yes, we are open for new possibilities, new ideas, new actions till the time we are comfortable with them.

Hope you got the joke…

What can we do?

1. It might be helpful if we can train ourselves to be authentically curious, curious enough to be able to suspend our opinions and judgements.
2. May be develop some compassion, for people who don’t see the world the way we do.
3. May be, also, let go of the past, stop holding the past, such that there is space for some new futures to emerge.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to contact: Manoj Onkar manoj@managementinnovations.co.in for any clarification on the above OR any Organizational Development and Leadership Transformation Challenge.

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