Adaptive Action Labs

Corona virus infects our bodies, but it also infects our homes, communities, and organizations. Public health professionals and health care providers are courageously dealing with the wicked issues of physical wellbeing. Like most times of chaotic transformation, this moment holds tremendous danger and opportunity. We must address the wicked issues that influence how we see, understand, and influence the present and our emerging future. We must choose and act in this moment of complexity and uncertainty.

Around the world, turbulence and uncertainty create barriers to productivity and wellbeing.  Whoever you are, wherever you live, and whatever you do, you confront the complex patterns of unpredictable change. The theory and practice of human systems dynamics can help you thrive at work and at home.

The greatest challenge of the 21st century emerges from uncertainty and turbulence. This decade began with a year that brought global pandemic, widespread forest and grass fires, unprecedented weather events, and socio-political upheaval around the world. What does it mean to live, work, and play in such a world? What does it take to navigate change that emerges at the speed of thought, creating turbulence that shakes your world and uncertainty that limits your vision into the future?

The face and function of facilitation have changed in today’s complex landscape. In the uncertain and ambiguous situations of the 21st century, teams, committees, and communities are asked to take creative action together. They have to respond to multiple forces that influence their work. They navigate differences from a variety of sources on multiple scales. They deal with issues, challenges and activities that are massively interdependent and unpredictable. As a facilitator, your job is to help them deal with challenges they face  when they deal with overwhelming urgency and doubt, low trust in high stakes settings, long-term tension and division in an unpredictable and uncertain futures.

In a world where you deal with forces you can’t see or control, you have to navigate differences that are overwhelming and frightening. In this world you can neither predict nor control your future. In such a turbulent and exciting time, you need to prepare for a future you just cannot see. You must learn to move forward, responding to change and turbulence, even when you develop a plan that can reliably move you into that future. And in the face of all that, you need the anchor or touch point that having a plan gives you.

Life today is complex! You deal with many forces that impact your life. When you take action, you consider social expectations and connections; financial challenges and opportunities; political questions and competitions; and personal and professional relationships. In any moment, you are forced to make choices about what’s true, what you need to do, and how you can engage with others. In such a complex world, your old stories are not robust enough to represent your day-to-day experience. You need a new narrative to capture the realities you face and to frame your expectations and assumptions.

In simpler times change came slowly, if at all. Consultants could learn models and methods in graduate school and use them throughout a career. They could take a solution that worked with one client and confidently transfer it to another. Those days are gone. Today, consultants must be master learners and experts at inquiry. HSD-informed consultants bring adaptive capacity to help clients tame the wicked issues that emerge from their complex environments.

Systemic racism tears at the fiber of organizations, communities, and families. The insidious impact of historical decisions effect almost every aspect of your life regardless of your race or ethnicity. You may be aware of this fact but feel overwhelmed by the challenge of bringing about change. You recognize that change is needed at all scales and across diverse settings and situations, but you do not know how you can make a difference.