It's been a while since I've written in here because my life has been kind of crazy. I had to submit my comprehensive exams and grade my students' rough drafts, which is the most demanding grading project of my semester. However, I have handed all of those back and this is a holiday weekend, so I have time to catch up on my blog.
I read Quinn's (2008) Deep Change book, chapters nine and ten. Chapter nine is the final chapter on personal change, and chapter ten is the first chapter on corporate change.
In chapter nine, Quinn states that we need to "build the bridge as [we] walk on it." He states that we often don't know where we will go, but we need to believe that we are sufficient to get ourselves there. He says, "When we pursue our vision, we must believe that we have enough courage and confidence in ourselves to reach our goal." This statement is troubling to me because it seems to imply that we are our own measure of what we can do, and I don't think that measure is very reliable.
I attend a church service that is designed as an outreach to students. In a recent lesson, we were asked to reflect on the quality of truth. My student friend suggested that truth was whatever we agreed that it was. I noted that by his definition, any community could establish truth and as long as everyone agreed that it was truth, it was true. I pointed out that many wars start this way--when two large communities with different truth claims encounter each other. Terrorism is only the most recent focus of that kind of conflict. By his definition, the truth claim of a fundamentalist Muslim terrorist, that the death of the innocent is justified in order to protect and promote Islam, is legitimate because it is agreed upon by his community.
He then stated that truth was something we had to establish for ourselves. I asked him, "If I claimed as my truth that I no longer have to eat, does that make it true?" Answer was "no." I asked, "What would happen to me if I lived by this truth?" All of the students admitted that it would not be good for me... that I would eventually die. I observed that truth is not establish on a personal level but as a law in the world. One law that is generally recognized is "You must eat to live." Another one is that "if you drop your phone, it will likely break." This last law is called the law of gravity. The world does not really conform to suit us. We have to know its laws.
Quinn is suggesting that there is a law that says, whatever you set out to do, you will be able to do it--as long as you think you can. I don't really think that is true. The problem with truth is that if you get it wrong, you'll die. If I decide I don't have to eat, when I actually do, I will die. If I decide that I can jump off a five story building because the law of gravity doesn't apply to me, I will also likely die. Getting it right is important... but there is something to what Quinn says. I actually only think it makes sense within a Christian paradigm.
Quinn tells the story of Ghandi, saying that Ghandi wasn't surprised when resources started to show up because the thing he was trying to do was "right." This story reminded me of a well-known character in my own faith tradition. George Mueller was a English orphanage director who decided to take God at His word when He promised to provide. For years he ran an orphanage without any source of income or fundraising and God did provide. I think that Quinn's idea should be revised to say, "God will build the bridge that we are willing to walk." That undertaking is scary enough. I don't think I would want to try it if I was my own sole resource.
Social Justice and Equity
In chapter 10, Quinn begins to talk about how goals are formed and pursued in organizations. He notes that all organizations are made up of coalitions. The organization might state a public goal, but usually the operative goal of an organization is different. He notes, "The operative goals are usually congruent with the interests of the dominant coalition." As an example, he says that universities say they exist for their students but generally they exist for the interest of their faculty and administration. Recently, I've been helping with reform efforts in my own program, and I know what he says is very true. We spend very little time talking about how to improve things for the students. Most of our focus in on the faculty and their working conditions.
Quinn goes on to describe how this dynamic works in a business school that he worked with. I thought it was interesting that the dominant coalition was not willing to change until they realized that their survival was on the line, and even then, the change that they implemented was a matter of balancing their interests with those of the students. Quinn states:
Organizations are coalitional. The dominant coalition in an organization is seldom interested in making deep change. Hence deep change is often, but not always, driven from the outside. In the future, great business schools will still be built by hiring great researchers, but they are also likely to be expected to meet the needs of other constituencies. This will mean that they will have to meet a wider and often competing set of expectations. Competition and the motivation for survival will remain intense.
I wonder if this is one of those immutable laws, like gravity. Is it possible for a dominant coalition to put the interests of a coalition with less power before their own? Or is it always a matter of balancing interests? Social justice advocates often try to make dominant coalitions change without considering this instinct for self-preservation. In fact, such self-preservation is despised. Are advocates such as this breaking themselves against a natural law? How can outside forces be used to create this impetus for change? Or are those forces already in play?
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