Managing Leadership^®

Many of us have a tendency to anthropomorphize the concept of evolution. We think of it as animated by a sort of ingrained competitive instinct, or, perhaps, straining toward a pure standard of excellence, a state of perfection.

Often, we unconsciously connect this kind of thinking with the more general, even teleological, sense that there is a goal it is aiming for, attainable in some distant future. Which brings up another assumption we generally make about evolution: we view it as occurring across time.

But the truth is that it has none of these characteristics in an inherent sense. It makes tentative, but random, alterations; multitudes of essentially pointless experiments. These steps are not necessarily forward; they may be, but they might also be sidesteps, or even backsliding – rejections of blind alleys.

They are not a considered response to a SWOT analysis. They are accidents, arising both from pure coincidence and interaction with life, and in either event acting in new ways upon life.

They do not anticipate the future. The address the present. Their only relation with time is that they occur in it; adaptive mutations become the new norm, finding themselves in a new present.

And speaking of that, it is not really proper to think of them as occurring chronologically, with a cumulative, linear logic. They occur in space. One branch of a species here does not mutate, but another over there does. The latter’s mutation interacts with the the local environment, thus prompting evolution of the environment itself, and of other species in it. Thus, related branches continue into the future side by side, or one – which one? – proves the more successful and the other fades away.

So, the evolutionary process is not sentient. But we are.

Can you see, then, any ways to anthropomorphize the concept of evolution as described above into the design, management, and growth of your local, regional, national, or international organization? Can you combine conscious aims with both deliberate and coincidental – but observed and captured – adaptations across space and time, in order to improve your competitiveness, to alter your environment in ways favorable to you, your customers, and your partners?

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Today’s tips: Speaking of evolutionary backsliding, please see this Management-Issues piece about how it is getting to be more of a jungle out there.

As for the standard evidences of progress, you will definitely want to see this finely expressed refutation of some of them, with respect to management, as related by the owner of Sippican Cottage.

Learning doesn’t occur, either, in a straight line – sometimes it can get stuck for long periods until evolutionary adaptations appear that bump it up. Please see Gannon Beck‘s engaging and instructive explanation of some of these.

Finally, you will surely take some comfort from Peggy Noonan‘s latest WSJ column about pressures to adapt in unpleasant ways, resisted from what many might believe to be unexpected quarters.

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Note: This month’s Leadership Development Carnival, hosted by Dan McCarthy, is up at Great Leadership – please be sure to stop by and see how Dan has grouped some truly worthwhile contributions into St. Patrick’s Day themes!

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