Business wisdom – moving beyond organisational learning to wisdom leadership
THINK PIECE REVIEW | Maret Staron, TAFE NSW ICVET
This paper comprises extracts from the research report Life Based Learning: A strength based approach for capability development in vocational and technical education. The researchers are Maret Staron, Marie Jasinski, and Robby Weatherley.
Also see Wisdom Leadership: exploring its relationship to spirituality (PDF 131 KB) - a paper by WC Miller & DR Miller, one of 5 thought pieces commissioned by TAFE NSW ICVET to inform a national research project on Designing Professional Development for the Knowledge Era.
How important is leadership in the Knowledge Era? What kind of leadership do we need? According to research recently undertaken into professional development for the Knowledge Era, leadership emerges as an imperative at all ‘levels’, particularly wise leadership. No longer can we simply rely on others to lead. We must all engage in wise thinking and acting in a complex, contradictory, diverse and rapidly changing environment.
Business wisdom is built on the principles and practices of organisational learning and knowledge management. It is usually associated with knowledge, intelligence and experience. However wisdom is greater than these attributes which many organisations already have in abundance. It is how they are linked and leveraged and how they work together to promote learning and wisdom that makes the difference. It involves common sense, insight and ability to discern what is true, right or lasting: ‘Organisational wisdom transcends organisational learning in its commitment to doing the right thing over doing things right’ (Hays 2005, p1).
It appears to be an unavoidable consequence of our times of uncertainty and turbulence that there is an increasing focus on areas such as wisdom in organisations. As Margaret Wheatley says, ‘As our world grows more chaotic and unpredictable, we are forced to ask questions that have, historically, always been answered by spiritual traditions’ (Wheatley 2002, p1). People often want the chaos to stop, to find more certainty and, at times, to be sheltered from the impact of change. As we search for answers many find that it’s through thinking and acting wisely that we can find ways of moving forward together. Wisdom is a key value for the knowledge era.
What is wisdom?
Research on positive psychology has classified six virtues that enable humans to thrive. These virtues are endorsed by almost every culture across the world (Seligman and Steen 2005). One of these virtues is wisdom. The others are courage, humanity, justice, temperance and transcendence. Attached to each virtue are particular strengths of character.
The strengths of character for wisdom are:
- creativity – thinking in novel and productive ways to do things
- curiosity – taking an interest in all experience and being tolerant of ambiguity
- open-mindedness – thinking things through and examining them from all sides
- love of learning – mastering new skills, topics, and bodies of knowledge
- perspective – being able to provide wise counsel that makes sense to self and others (Seligman and Steen 2005, p412)
In addition to the work done in positive psychology, which shows how wisdom clearly contributes to human wellbeing, Baltes, the founder of the field of lifespan psychology, analysed ‘everyday snapshots’ of common beliefs about wisdom and how it is used in everyday language (Baltes 2004). He identified seven properties from both modern and ancient literature that are ‘generally accepted in any definition of wisdom’ (Baltes 2004, p17). He offers this list as a work in progress:
- Wisdom addresses important and difficult questions and strategies about the conduct and meaning of life.
- Wisdom includes knowledge about the limits of knowledge and the uncertainties of the world.
- Wisdom represents a truly superior level of knowledge, judgement and advice.
- Wisdom constitutes knowledge with extraordinary scope, depth and balance.
- Wisdom involves a perfect synergy of mind and character: that is, an orchestration of knowledge and virtues.
- Wisdom represents knowledge used for the good or wellbeing of oneself and others.
- Wisdom, though difficult to achieve and specify, is easily recognised when manifested (Baltes 2004, p17).
Baltes also examined 20th century philosophers’ writings about the meaning and consequences of wisdom, identifying six attributes of wisdom-related knowledge and behaviour:
- Wisdom is life-orientation and action-guiding knowledge dealing with a good life.
- Wisdom is holistic, integrative, and balanced knowledge regarding mind and human excellence.
- Wisdom is knowledge about limits and uncertainty.
- Wisdom involves pluralism and tolerance of diversity.
- Wisdom is experiential knowledge.
- Wisdom is justified knowledge and needs to consider multiple sources of knowledge including scientific ones (Baltes 2004, pp132–33).
While wisdom is almost impossible to define precisely, and there are variations in interpretation, these grassroots and academic perspectives encompass a number of common themes. A key theme is that wisdom is multi-dimensional and emerges from a synergy between knowledge, understanding, judgement, reflection, creative thinking and practice. In practice, wisdom means a high level of interest in self and others, a deep understanding of self and others, and acceptance of difference, as well as continual learning, reflection, empathy, metacognition, a holistic perspective and judgement.
What the researchers found was that:
- Wisdom is strength based – it contributes to human wellbeing and the common good.
- Wisdom contributes to synthesis – wise thinking and actions pull components together into an integrated whole.
- Wisdom is achievement-oriented – it has a very practical orientation and serves to guide thinking and action.
Organisational wisdom
Wisdom plays a key role in capability development and organisational life in the Knowledge Era and is critical for achieving in a business environment. This involves a greater emphasis on wise thinking and wise actions to help businesses achieve their goals.
Wise organisations tap into their accumulated wisdom and understand their body of knowledge and capability. As wisdom is hard to define and measure it is usually ignored in organisations. To overcome this, businesses must:
- anticipate and preempt problems and capitalise on potential opportunities
- mobilize and engage organisational members
- evolve from a reactionary organisation to a proactive one
- remain viable and sustainable while serving as stewards to our communities and the environment (Hays 2005, p2)
Hays offers a ‘tentative’ model of organisational wisdom that ‘incorporates accepted theory’ and ‘provides a framework for understanding learning in organisations’. The model comprises 24 elements (see Figure 5). Those highlighted in bold are considered to be the core variables that ‘push the limits of organisational learning’ (Hays 2005, p14).
Figure 5: The 24 elements comprising the organisational wisdom system (Hays, 2005, p5)
The heart of Hays’ model is that wise thinking and wise actions create a synthesis between the elements and this synthesis contributes to organisational success. Organisations need to improve processes that promote the synergy between intelligence, knowledge and experience and allow employees at all levels to exploit the synergy. Hays places learning (activated by reflection) at the heart of the model:
Wisdom is not knowledge, intelligence, values, or even, as commonly believed, experience, though it is a synergistic amalgam of them, fueled by learning. And, while curiosity or need may motivate learning, it is inspired by and activated by reflection.
(Hays 2005, p14)
Wise thinking and wise actions are the glue that connects the different elements of a learning organisation into a more integrated and productive whole, strengthening what is already working.
Wisdom leadership
In a challenging think piece, William and Debra Miller (2006) suggest that a new guiding ethic for business leaders is ‘wisdom leadership’:
…where wisdom is more than the sum of our knowledge, intelligence, experience, and innovative thinking. True wisdom is the ‘deep understanding, keen discernment, and sound judgement’ that draws from a level of self-insight, personal and organisational values, and cultural broad-mindedness.
(Miller and Miller 2006, p1).
This is especially important in a complex business world characterised by globalisation, evolution of knowledge-based enterprises and global and local competition.
Wisdom leadership is required to address the pressing issues that characterise contemporary business environments:
What may appear to be purely business or technology decisions are really human choices that require our highest wisdom. These decisions mirror our consciousness and values. The partnership of business and human values requires a high level of wisdom in our leadership.
(Miller and Miller 2006, p2)
They offer a balanced view of the diverse sources and contexts that inform and influence a leader’s wisdom by providing four distinct frames of reference for wisdom leadership that have emerged over the last 100 years:
- Paternal–mechanical: From this view business is ‘survival of the fittest’ and competition is a ‘win–lose’ game. Business leaders operating from this perspective adopt a command and control approach to serve the overall goals of efficiency and productivity. Employees are cogs in the wheel of a big machine and expected to perform within clearly defined parameters.
- Humanistic: From this view, the goal of business is still wealth creation, but from a ‘win–win’ perspective. Employees are resources to be managed sensitively and are encouraged to invest in their talents for personal and organisational benefit.
- Holistic: The focus here is wealth creation for the optimal benefit of all stakeholders, including shareholders, employees, customers, competitors, community, society and future generations. Leadership is about having a common purpose and value system. This view recognises that people are the principal assets for wealth creation, especially in knowledge-intensive learning organisations.
- Spiritual: This view sees people as spiritual in nature with a particular spiritual purpose in life along with ‘gifts’ to fulfil that purpose. Leadership focuses on assisting people to fulfil their life’s purpose while integrating that with the organisation’s ‘life purpose’. The purpose of spiritually based leadership is to bring forth the wisdom found in the other three contexts.
While each of these four frames is distinct, representing a progression from the paternal-mechanistic to the spiritual, ‘each completes and expands the other’ (Miller and Miller 2006, p10) . They all operate to some degree in every organisation; leaders may operate from any one of them, and a single leader may use all four. They are the reference points from which leaders draw on their wisdom for conducting their day-to-day business. Which reference point is used influences how that business is conducted.
Wheatley has observed that many leaders choose to exert more control as the challenges they face increase. However she says that ‘leadership through command and control is doomed to fail … Instead, as leaders, we must help people to move into a relationship with uncertainty and chaos.’ She goes on to say that ‘we must enter into the domain of spiritual traditions if we are to succeed as good leaders’ (Wheatley 2002, p3). To do this Wheatley provides what she believes are some essential principles for leaders to embed in their work. They come from spiritual thinking and traditions, and they are:
- Life is uncertain.
- Life is cyclical.
- Meaning is what motivates people.
- Service brings us joy.
- Courage comes from our hearts.
- We are interconnected to all life.
- We can rely on human goodness.
- We need peace of mind
(Wheatley 2002, pp3–6)
As Wheatley emphasises, it’s more important to access your own wisdom than to look for it in other people. She believes that as leaders, when we play a part in something more purposeful than anything our own egos could describe, we become ‘leaders who are peaceful, courageous and effective’ (Wheatley 2002, p8).
Implications for professional development
What is the role of wisdom in professional development for the Knowledge Era? Baltes and Staudinger suggest that the concept of wisdom has a pragmatic role in directing our attention and guiding us in conducting our lives:
[It] coordinates our knowledge and judgements about the fundamental pragmatics of life around such proprieties as: (1) strategies and goals involving conduct and meaning of life, (2) limits of knowledge and uncertainties of the world, (3) excellence of judgement and advice, (4) knowledge with extraordinary scope, depth and balance, (5) search for a perfect synergy of mind and character, and (6) balancing the good for well-being of oneself and that of others (Baltes and Staudinger 2000, p11).
In other words the concept of wisdom is a common sense guide that gives direction and enables a person to make educated guesses, recognise promising approaches to problems and work with incomplete information.
Wisdom is concerned with the fundamental pragmatics of life. These pragmatics include:
- knowledge and judgement about the meaning and conduct of life;
- the orchestration of human development towards excellence; and
- attending to both personal and collective wellbeing (Baltes and Staudinger 2000).
Focusing on w isdom also reminds us of the importance of investing in research in professional development in the first place and why we should consider strength based models of change, explore learning ecologies and life based learning. It also affirms the central role of human development, life management and striving to be the best that we can be for the benefit of others and ourselves:
[T]he perennial power of wisdom is its role as a reminder, a source, and a benchmark in our quest for excellence (Baltes and Staudinger 2000, p17).
References
BALTES, P B, 2004, Wisdom as orchestration of mind and virtue, Book in preparation.
BALTES, P B & Staudinger, U M 2000, Wisdom: A metaheuristic (pragmatic) to orchestrate mind and virtue toward excellence, American Psychologist, 55, (1), 122-136
HAYS, J 2005, Dynamics of Organisational Wisdom Paper presented at the 5th International Conference on Knowledge, Culture, and Change Rhodes, Greece.
MILLER, W C & Miller, D R 2006, Wisdom Leadership: Exploring its relation to spirituality One of a series of think pieces prepared for the Designing Professional Development for the Knowledge Era’ Research Project, TAFE NSW ICVET.
PATTON, M 1996, Nurturing systemic wisdom through ecology, The Systems Thinker 1(8): 3
POR, G 2000, Nurturing systemic wisdom through knowledge ecology, The Systems Thinker, 1(8):e 3
SELIGMAN, M & Steen, T 2005, Positive Psychology Progress, American Psychologist, July-August
SENGE, P 1996, The ecology of leadership: Leader to leader
WHEATLEY, M J 2002, Leadership in turbulent times is spiritual
Also see
Life based learning: a strength based approach to capability development in vocational and technical education – final report on the national research project Designing Professional Development for the Knowledge Era conducted by TAFE NSW ICVET with Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST)
STARON, Maret, Jasinski, Marie & Weatherley, R 2006, A Business Approach to Capability Development: Considerations and suggestions for applying Life Based learning in the Workplace, TAFE NSW ICVET with Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST)
This is a companion document to the research report above that will assist individuals, teams or organisations to apply the life based learning model
Voices: Contemporary thinking for working and learning in the Knowledge Era – the series of think pieces commissioned by ICVET (TAFE NSW International Centre for VET Teaching and Learning) to inform the national research project Designing Professional Development for the Knowledge Era.
Life based learning for capability development in the Knowledge Era | A-Z Resources