In this episode 9 chapters
- A Self-Published Unicorn
Jeff introduces Frederic Laloux, a former McKinsey consultant.
- Wolf Packs, Armies, Machines
Laloux traces how organizations evolved, from red wolf-pack tribes through amber hierarchies to orange modernity's well-oiled machine.
- Culture Eats Strategy
The green stage brings in servant leadership, culture and values but leaves the pyramid in place.
- Downloading the Same Code
Twelve pioneering organizations that had never heard of each other arrived at strikingly similar practices.
- The Advice Process
Laloux explains the advice process, conflict resolution and consent-based decisions, and Jeff remembers how holacracy at Integral Institute could lift a group into a shared we-space.
- Nursing by Stopwatch
Dutch home care was 'optimized' into timed products that left nurses and patients miserable.
- Teams the Size of a Band
Buurtzorg runs on self-managing teams of 10–12 nurses with a small headquarters, and Jeff links that team size to the bands of early human history.
- Taking Off the Mask
The second breakthrough is wholeness: workplaces safe enough for people to drop their professional masks.
- Sense and Respond
The third breakthrough, evolutionary purpose, replaces predict-and-control planning with sensing and responding, treating the organization as a living organism.
Each stage of human development features a unique way of organizing work. From hunting and gathering, to agriculture, to industry, to the Information Age, each stage represents a radical evolutionary expansion of capacity, and each remakes the world in its turn.
So what’s next? Frederic Laloux‘s blockbuster book, Reinventing Organizations, offers compelling answers to that question. A McKinsey consultant for many years, Fred has identified and researched what he calls “next stage“ organizations, and identifies the specific features that set them apart.
The key emergent of next-stage organizations harkens back to early human history: small bands of people on a mission, each deeply seen and valued by the others, responding together to changing conditions and making their way forward.
Today’s cutting-edge version of archaic bands are self-managed teams, which have become the building blocks of companies of all types and sizes. It’s a fascinating (and explicitly integral!) thesis whose success is demonstrated in organizations all over the world. In this conversation with Jeff Salzman, Frederic Laloux unpacks his key ideas and lays out some of the new rules of the road ahead.
Stay tuned for more episodes of The Daily Evolver, only on Integral Live.
Previous Episodes of The Daily Evolver
Armed Insanity: Getting Real About Guns and Criminality
Jeff Salzman
May 31, 2022
About Frederic Laloux
Frederic Laloux is the author of Reinventing Organizations, and works as an adviser, coach, and facilitator for corporate leaders who feel called to explore fundamentally new ways of organizing.
About Jeff Salzman
Jeff Salzman worked with Ken Wilber for several years in building the Integral Institute. He is a co-founder of Boulder Integral, the first bricks-and-mortar venue dedicated to the development of integral consciousness. These days Jeff provides integrally-inspired commentary on politics and culture on Integral Life and The Daily Evolver.
