Focuses on the essential uncertainty of participating in evolving events as
they happen and considers the creative possibilities of such participation from
a complexity perspective.This book draws on the theoretical foundations laid out in earlier volumes
of this series to describe an approach to organizational change and development
informed by a complexity perspective. It sets out to make sense of the
experience of being in the midst of change. Unlike many books that presume
clarity of foresight or hindsight, the author focuses on the essential
uncertainty of participating in evolving events as they happen and inquires
into the creative possibilities of such participation. Most methodologies for
organizational change are firmly rooted in systems thinking, as are many
approaches to process consultation and facilitation. This book questions the
way such thinking suggests that we can choose and design new futures for our
organizations in the way we often hope. Avoiding the widely favoured use of 2
by 2 matrices, idealized schemas and simplified typologies that characterize
much of the management literature on change, this book encourages the reader to
live in the immediate paradoxes and complexities of organizational life, where
we must act with intention into the unknowable.; The author uses detailed reflective narrative to evoke and elaborate on the
experience of participating in the conversational processes of human
organizing. It takes as central the conversational life of organizations as the
activity in which we perpetually sustain and change the possibilities for going
on together. This book will be valuable to consultants, managers and leaders,
indeed all those who are dissatisfied with idealized models of change and are
searching for ways to develop an effective change practice as participants
seeking to make a difference.
