Creative Leadership Coaching

Scrooge’s Metanoia and Organizational Conscience Hi Lisa, Wikipedia describes metanoia (changing one’s mind) as “embracing thoughts beyond its present limitations or thought patterns.” Ebenezer Scrooge’s metanoia seems to support this definition. But Scrooge’s “shift of mind” also appears to have been a group experience. Could metanoia have occurred apart from the Spirits? To illustrate, Scrooge [...]

Carman, Sorry for the long delay! My executive and career coaching practice includes working with people in career transition, and, unfortunately, many people are needing this kind of support right now. Regarding transformation, you wrote:  “It changes ‘how’ we know. Change thus appears to involve the re-perception of reality. [It...] involves the ‘deconstruction of a [...]

More gems from Carman de voer. I hope to respond to these excellent posts this weekend… Hi Lisa,  How do we define “transformation”? Dictionary definitions are nebulous at best. Here is one example from the Free Dictionary: transform – change or alter in form, appearance, or nature; “This experience transformed her completely”; “She transformed the [...]

Carman writes: Hi Lisa,  I’ll try to paraphrase your questions: 1. Is emergent (bottom-up) organization compatible with goals and direction (top-down)? 2. When is the imposition of limits appropriate? Morgan explains that “the intelligence of the human brain is not predetermined, predesigned, or  preplanned. Indeed, it is not centrally driven in any way. It is [...]

If you are interested in how Partnership approaches to leadership can unleash collaborative power in the workplace, I encourage you to check out Cynthia King’s Creating Partnerships: Unleashing Collaborative Power in the Workplace (2005).    See more at: http://www.creating-partnerships.com/

Another interesting and educational post from Carman! Lisa writes: “I wonder what it would do for us to consider organizations as creative, intelligent energy? I wonder if it would lead us to open up to these qualities, to the creative intelligent energy of others?” Two excellent questions Lisa. Employers may not understand the Brain metaphor’s enormous potential [...]

Carman, regarding: your post: http://www.creativeleadercoach.com/2009/01/07/metaphors-of-organization-organization-as-brain/ I completely agree. This is a good example of how our metaphors can limit our thinking. The mind-body dichotomy, in which mind is usually seen as separate from and superior to the body, has been a fundamental cultural metaphor. Related metaphors include: God-World, spirit-flesh, and the misogynist male-female dichotomy in which men [...]

Carman writes: Perhaps we could begin with “Brain.” While many are inclined to see the brain as somehow separate from and higher than the rest of the body, Morgan proposes that “intelligence” is, in fact, distributed throughout the entire body—such as the legs hands, feet. In short, there is no master, centralized intelligence. The brain, [...]

Carman in Vancouver, BC writes, ”I’m very interested in Gareth Morgan’s metaphors of organization: 1) machine 2) organism 3) brain 5) culture 6) political system 6)  psychic prison 7) instrument of domination Flux and Tranformation.  Each metaphor has enormous explanatory utility and each is worth discussing in some detail, if you like.” That sounds very interesting! Let’s [...]

If you enjoy this blog, you might also enjoy this creative and potentially very fruitful approach of considering leadership and organizations using the lens of mythology: http://www.freewebs.com/mythologyoforganization/index.htm