Thanks for your timely, relevant and needed article, Ryan.
Laloux’s book gave structure and clarity to thoughts that our founding CEO has had through the history of our organization yet has been unable to institute. The real examples in Reinventing Organizations of companies who have successfully transformed their organizations provides the template for the organization our CEO has long envisioned but did not know how to create.
World Centric was born as a non-profit and transformed into a for-profit, Certified B Corp organized as a California Benefit Corporation, yet there has remained a conflict between that non-profit vision and the demands of a for-profit corporation (even a benefit corporation). Laloux’s articulation of evolutionary purpose as one of the there principle breakthroughs of these organizations has provided the context we needed to re-vision our mission as a purpose that bridges that conflict.
Additionally, our deep study of the organizations in Reinventing Organizations has illustrated to us the need for strong, core processes as the stability around which self-managing teams can operate with agility and flexibility. Yet, we realize there are three key things we need to do as an organization before we can fully operate in self-managing teams—build the necessary skills and competencies across the organization, ensure the appropriate access to information through reporting and data sharing, and finally develop the processes and tools to support distributed decision-making across self-managing teams.
Any attempt to transform a business as you suggest is a journey into unknown territory as we are all writing the future along the way. The deep community among B Corps provides the opportunity for undertaking this journey with others who share our vision for more responsible business models and practices. The model revealed in Laloux’s groundbreaking book enables us to also do that with deeper awareness.
At Fitzii (mentioned in the article), we transitioned so smoothly to “no managers” that it was almost anti-climactic. When you believe that people are unique, creative, and trustworthy, they naturally rise to those expectations. It’s a beautiful thing.
I believe that shifting the paradigm from command and control to self-management has more potential to drive improved employee engagement and business results than any other new “strategy” we’ve seen over the last few decades. And when you combine this with a B Corp mandate to serve all stakeholders, it’s a recipe for exponential benefit.
Yes! Thanks for this fundamental observation Ryan. We do need them both. I am trusting that the B Corp movement will naturally move towards Teal in the spirit of continuous improvement. We applaud many of the social and environmental achievements of the B Corp movement, but as we assess their management structure they are mostly in the Orange to Green range. This leaves no lack of opportunity for these early adopter companies to keep moving forward and push responsibility and ownership out to all edges of the company and abandon the old command and control practices of the past that leave everyone feeling incomplete.
Your articulation of this confluence between B Corps and “Teal” organizations is spot on, Ryan. And, like Barry, the book (and, more importantly, the companies on which examples in the book are based) provided the concrete guidance we needed to take action.
We are in transition to effect the change that teal holds out in promise, but I can report that energy levels are higher, efficiency is increasing, and our growth strategy is more exciting and aligned than I can ever remember it being. Previous to B Corp and Teal, I feared growth for what it could do to our culture, our way of life. Now I’m excited to see that culture and way of life expand organically yet quickly.
I want to let you know about Enlivening Edge: News from Next-Stage Organizations, our online magazine inspired by Frederic Laloux’s work. We just published some excerpts from Ryan’s brilliant article here: http://www.enliveningedge.org/teal-buzz/can-b-corps-even-better/.
We are looking for an editor of our section about B Corps going Teal. If you’re interested to explore that or know someone who may, drop me a line: george(at)enliveningedge(dot)org
COMMENTS
BY Barry
ON May 24, 2015 10:43 AM
Thanks for your timely, relevant and needed article, Ryan.
Laloux’s book gave structure and clarity to thoughts that our founding CEO has had through the history of our organization yet has been unable to institute. The real examples in Reinventing Organizations of companies who have successfully transformed their organizations provides the template for the organization our CEO has long envisioned but did not know how to create.
World Centric was born as a non-profit and transformed into a for-profit, Certified B Corp organized as a California Benefit Corporation, yet there has remained a conflict between that non-profit vision and the demands of a for-profit corporation (even a benefit corporation). Laloux’s articulation of evolutionary purpose as one of the there principle breakthroughs of these organizations has provided the context we needed to re-vision our mission as a purpose that bridges that conflict.
Additionally, our deep study of the organizations in Reinventing Organizations has illustrated to us the need for strong, core processes as the stability around which self-managing teams can operate with agility and flexibility. Yet, we realize there are three key things we need to do as an organization before we can fully operate in self-managing teams—build the necessary skills and competencies across the organization, ensure the appropriate access to information through reporting and data sharing, and finally develop the processes and tools to support distributed decision-making across self-managing teams.
Any attempt to transform a business as you suggest is a journey into unknown territory as we are all writing the future along the way. The deep community among B Corps provides the opportunity for undertaking this journey with others who share our vision for more responsible business models and practices. The model revealed in Laloux’s groundbreaking book enables us to also do that with deeper awareness.
BY Edwin Jansen
ON May 24, 2015 06:12 PM
At Fitzii (mentioned in the article), we transitioned so smoothly to “no managers” that it was almost anti-climactic. When you believe that people are unique, creative, and trustworthy, they naturally rise to those expectations. It’s a beautiful thing.
I believe that shifting the paradigm from command and control to self-management has more potential to drive improved employee engagement and business results than any other new “strategy” we’ve seen over the last few decades. And when you combine this with a B Corp mandate to serve all stakeholders, it’s a recipe for exponential benefit.
BY Shawn Berry
ON May 27, 2015 11:10 AM
Yes! Thanks for this fundamental observation Ryan. We do need them both. I am trusting that the B Corp movement will naturally move towards Teal in the spirit of continuous improvement. We applaud many of the social and environmental achievements of the B Corp movement, but as we assess their management structure they are mostly in the Orange to Green range. This leaves no lack of opportunity for these early adopter companies to keep moving forward and push responsibility and ownership out to all edges of the company and abandon the old command and control practices of the past that leave everyone feeling incomplete.
BY T.J. Cook
ON June 2, 2015 01:45 PM
Your articulation of this confluence between B Corps and “Teal” organizations is spot on, Ryan. And, like Barry, the book (and, more importantly, the companies on which examples in the book are based) provided the concrete guidance we needed to take action.
We are in transition to effect the change that teal holds out in promise, but I can report that energy levels are higher, efficiency is increasing, and our growth strategy is more exciting and aligned than I can ever remember it being. Previous to B Corp and Teal, I feared growth for what it could do to our culture, our way of life. Now I’m excited to see that culture and way of life expand organically yet quickly.
BY George Pór
ON November 1, 2015 11:52 AM
I want to let you know about Enlivening Edge: News from Next-Stage Organizations, our online magazine inspired by Frederic Laloux’s work. We just published some excerpts from Ryan’s brilliant article here: http://www.enliveningedge.org/teal-buzz/can-b-corps-even-better/.
We are looking for an editor of our section about B Corps going Teal. If you’re interested to explore that or know someone who may, drop me a line: george(at)enliveningedge(dot)org