Of Rogue Waves and Leadership by Jodi Guerra

Don’t you want to just stand up and cheer? They made it. But it was far from over. They had landed on the side of the island that was uninhabited. They could sail around to the other side, but the ship was so battered by the storm that it was impossible to sail. After a few days of rest, Shackleton decided that he, Worsley and Crean would cross the interior of South Georgia, a journey of about 29 miles.

Now, this sounds very innocuous. After all, these guys have just crossed 800 miles of open ocean. What’s another 29 miles on land? The truth of the matter is that the interior of the island had NEVER been crossed before. The whalers thought it was impassable. No one had ever done it. Lansing describes South Georgia:

“A few of the peaks on South Georgia rise to somewhat less than 10,000 feet, which certainly is not high by mountain-climbing standards. But the interior of the island has been described by one expert as ‘a saw-tooth thrust through the tortured upheaval of mountain and glacier that falls in chaos to the northern sea.’ In short, it was impassable.”

(Lansing, 158)

Now, these guys are sailors and explorers, not mountain climbers. They didn’t have all the fancy equipment or materials. They had 90 feet of rope, an adze (which is a small ax) and some food supplies. Their clothes were worn. The carpenter put screws in the soles of the boots. That was it.They didn’t even carry sleeping bags.

It was a treacherous journey. Often they had to retrace their steps as they came to crevasses, sheer faces of glaciers, etc.

Late in the afternoon, they were stuck at about 4,500 feet. They would freeze to death at night. What could they do?

Here’s the story:

“After thirty minutes, the ice-hard surface of the snow grew softer, indicating that the grade was not quite so steep. Shackleton stopped short. He seemed to realize all at once the futility of what he was doing. At the rate they were going it would take hours to make the descent. Furthermore, it was probably too late to turn back.

“He hacked out a small platform with the adz, then called to the others to come down.

“There was no need to explain the situation. Speaking rapidly, Shackleton said simply that they faced a clear-cut choice: If they stayed where they were, they would freeze –in an hour, maybe two, maybe more. They had to get lower – and with all possible haste.“

So he suggested they slide.

“Worsley and Crean were stunned – especially for such an insane solution to be coming from Shackleton. But he wasn’t joking…he wasn’t even smiling. He meant it – and they knew it.

“But what if they hit a rock, Crean wanted to know.

“Could they stay where they were, Shackleton replied, his voice rising.

“The slope, Worsley argued. What if it didn’t level off? What if there were another precipice?

“Shackleton’s patience was going. Again, he demanded – could they stay where they were?

“Obviously they could not, and Worsley and Crean reluctantly were forced to admit it. Nor was there really any other way of getting down. And so the decision was made. Shackleton said they would slide as a unit, holding on to one another. They quickly sat down and untied the rope which held them.

“Altogether it took a little more than a minute, and Shackleton did not permit any time for reflection. When they were ready, he kicked off. In the next instant their hearts stopped beating. They seemed to hang poised for a split second, then suddenly the windwas shrieking in their ears, and a white blur of snow tore past. Down…down…They screamed – not in terror necessarily, but simply because they couldn’t help it. It was squeezed out of them by the rapidly mounting pressure in their ears and against their chests. Faster and faster – down…down…down!

“Then they shot forward onto the level, and their speed began to slacken. A moment later they came to an abrupt halt in a snowbank.

“The three men picked themselves up. They were breathless and their hearts were beating wildly. But they found themselves laughing uncontrollably. What had been a terrifying prospect possibly a hundred seconds before had turned into a breath-taking triumph.

“They looked up against the darkening sky and saw the fog curling over the edge of the ridges, perhaps 2,000 feet above them – and they felt that special kind of pride of a person who in a foolish moment accepts an impossible dare – then pulls it off to perfection.(Lansing, 266-268)

 

 

 

 

 

 

An organic Superstructure will provide the most effective platform for Superperformance and its future sustainability. An organic framework is an Agile framework, delivering information faster, more accurately, and ubiquitously, allowing an organization to gain deeper insights into the activities and events that occur at the very edges of their operations. This architecture will enable an organization to execute against new knowledge autonomically, virtually, and collaboratively, without the friction of traditional management systems.

Exciting new attributes of this Superstructure include:

• A High Degree of Openness
• Dramatically Increased Agility
• New Levels of Adaptability
• New Organic Degrees of Freedom
• Fully Integrated Operations
• Speed vs. Mass
• Distributed Decision Rights
• Revolutionary Culture
• Self-Organizing Catalytic Sets of Synchronization
• Nonlinear Peer to Peer Relationships
• Anticipatory vs Reactive Decision Making
• Tailored and Precise Responsiveness
• Maximum Flexibility
• Autonomic Functioning

This is accomplished through the design and implementation of a new approach to an organization’s primary system of work, along with the rigorous integration of the business processes that make up an organization’s driver, mainstay and support processes.  Such integration is an important step toward consolidated process controls across platforms and functions. Integrating critical processes is necessary, but more importantly, selecting the appropriate processes for automation and redesigning others based on the functionality requirements of the business owners is a vital step.

Another important step toward achieving an Organic architecture is leveraging advanced technologies that today allow intelligence to be embedded at the very edges of the system.  Through an Organic Superstructure, organizations can now understand and weed through opportunities to construct an efficient portfolio for their businesses. This includes understanding system requirements, as well as constructing detailed designs and selection of appropriate software. Across the information technology space a new generation of tools is emerging. From the latest advancements in network infrastructure to the newest social networking applications, a forward view is called for.

It is important to note, however, that a critical success factor for instituting Organic architectures is an organizational commitment to nothing less then a cultural revolution. The “next generation” characteristics of a truly intelligent operation require an evolution in management and leadership thinking, as new understanding will drive new behaviors. Within the new optimization aim of the organization (i.e. Superperformance)  it is necessary to provoke the change experience from the inside out, and institute new organizational and governance structures that effectively align business, technology and knowledge processes.  Ultimately, the intelligent operation becomes the new definition for operational excellence, as primary value levers are improved and the financial measures of gross margin, cost and asset productivity are positively impacted.

The discovery of Superperformance introduces a shockingly simple, reliable approach to optimizing performance. This discovery identifies a steady state, a sweet spot described by complexity scientists as the location of maximum fitness in a system. This location refers to a balance point precariously perched between order and chaos. It is more of a continuously shifting space than a static location: a dynamic, energetic, catalytic space. It is the place where all new ideas, change and self-organization emerge. All of Superperformance occurs in this space – and what’s more, any system can be tuned to this higher level of organizational consciousness and operational performance.

This is why Agile is the new normal. Navigating in this zone is called surfing the edge of chaos. Here the tension between order and disorder is at the highest level possible. Too much chaos will marginalize or dilute an idea or project. Too much order is likewise unhealthy, giving rise to rigidity and stasis. Work groups, project communities, and entire organizations can leverage the edge of chaos to maximize performance and to find a way forward in these uncertain times. People in organizations are beginning to see that this disequilibrium is effective and important to organizational survival. Within this fitness state, people and projects self-organize and work achieves a flow state punctuated by agility, novelty and innovation. It may seem incredible or illogical, but superperformance is tied to tolerating and even encouraging this persistent disequilibrium.

This 21^st Century approach reinvents management and leadership and advocates for a shift away from a Machine View to an Organism View of organization. It is being applied by an increasing number of project teams, organizations, and communities to produce unprecedented customer outcomes, operational excellence, breakthrough innovation, joy in work, and shareholder return on investment.