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Every single organization is describing the unprecedented levels of complexity that are being faced in the world today. Driven by technology, globalization, and large-scale changes, organizations are doing their best to promote the idea that they need to be agile and adaptive in a changing world.
What I feel that many organizations are missing though, in their attempt to become agile, is that you will never cultivate an agile organization unless the people who work within that organization are agile. Now, what organizations face here is a conundrum. Complexity leads to particular cognitive styles: black-and-white thinking, very quick driving to decision-making. It can often lead to focused choices that don’t bring other teams or other interested stakeholders into the picture. It can lead to massive levels of strain, panic, and guilt. And right now what organizations are facing is this: By 2030 depression is targeted to be the single biggest cause of disability globally and I do not think that organizations are ready for that reality.
So what organizations are facing is a paradox. The very complexity that they are asking people to respond to with collaboration – with thoughtfulness, with inclusiveness, and with the capacity to really think through decisions – that same complexity evokes in our cognitive systems: shutting down, being very transactional, being exclusive, and being very quick to come to decisions. Because I’ve got 300 other emails that I’m trying to write today.
I do not believe that organizations will be able to cultivate the agility that they are seeking and that they are needing in complex times unless the people within those organizations are able to be agile, are able to deal with their emotional stresses and strains, are able to navigate change and ambiguity. And these are not things that can be written into a job description, these are internal skills that need to be cultivated in us as employees and in as leaders.