Page 85 - DLIS406_ACADEMIC_LIBRARY_SYSTEM

Academic Library System

Notes disorder that precedes innovation, our challenge as leaders is to help people make meaning
of the journey. As Dee Hock describes, “Making good judgments and acting wisely when one
has complete data, facts, and knowledge [control] is not leadership. It’s not even management.
It’s bookkeeping. Leadership is the ability to make wise decisions, and act responsibly upon
them when one has little more than a clear sense of direction and proper values; that is, a
perception of how things ought to be, an understanding how they are, and some indication
of the prevalent forces driving change.” In this sense, innovation is the end product of a
disruptive cycle of Adaptive Change.
To innovate is to intentionally let go of the “way things are” and welcome “the way they could
be.” Breakdown is the first step toward innovation, an intentional release of established habits
of thought, expectations, assumptions, and beliefs in order to embrace “not knowing”. The
concept of surfing the “edge of chaos” sounds exciting until you get there and leave control
at the door. In Adaptive Change we call this the Fall.
Fortunately, Breakdown doesn’t last. As we confront the mess, we naturally make meaning of
it, allowing order and Breakthroughs to emerge—the “ah-ha” moments that we love to experience.
The journey from Breakdown to Breakthrough, the Cauldron of Change, is a period of stress
(high enough to motivate and mobilize, and potentially immobilize), uncertainty, and unpredictability.
There is no clear way forward; we are reduced to trial-and-error experimentation. This is a
period that requires a rapid and straightforward learning cycle, one that encourages experimentation
and taking smart risks as you learn your way forward. Sense-Test-Adapt, a biomimetic cycle
that is just what it says, propels you forward as order emerges from the chaos. The faster you
cycle the faster you learn.
Breakthroughs get you out of Chaos and into Complexity—you are half way home but you are
still not “in control”. Complexity requires Imagination, which takes you beyond creativity and
taps into mystery. Mystery allows us to explore “things in our environment that excite our
curiosity but elude our understanding. In the complex domain hunches and ah-has pull us
forward by removing extraneous information and linking up ideas to form a system of inquiry.
In this way novelty is morphed into a myriad of possibilities.
With all these possibilities we begin to follow our hunches to their logical conclusions, picking
one or two and applying all our knowledge, know-how, technology, etc. to understand them.
In this way we make the imagined “real”, manifest as products, programs, services, and art.
Making “manifest” is the phase I call Innovation. Innovation without the journey through
chaos and mystery is evolutionary at best, incremental most often. Innovation as the conclusion
of the full cycle is revolutionary, tapping into our most creative spaces and pulling forth
something remarkably different from where we started.

8.2.2 Do’s for Leading Innovation

Foster an environment of imagination, exploration, acceptable risk, and “what ifs.” Meet the
Devil’s Advocate at the door and refuse them entry. Give people time to think, toys to spark
off, and diverse partners to play with. The resource needs and costs of Innovation rise over
time. Resources that drive early innovation, Breakdown, Breakthrough, and Imagination, are
mainly emotional and psychological support. No leader can afford to ignore these intangible
costs for the foreseeable future.

8.2.3 Linking Innovation and Operations

Development is hard pressed to interface with operations. Yet it is extremely important that
this interface be workable because developments are not relevant until they find their way

80 LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY