I'm very happy to be here today toshare with you my thoughts aboutour past and about our promise. Idon't have light and jolly thoughts orfeelings to share with you today. Infact, I have bloody serious thoughts toshare. I want to talk about crises-crises for individuals and crises forour society. I also want to take aboutthe ordeal of change. And, finally, Iwant to talk about how you and I canfind hope and courage if we are wil-ling to get clear about the purposeswe want to serve.

We are just entering a new decade.It's the decade of the Brave NewWorld of 1984.You and I must decideif we have the will and clarity of pur-pose that we need to shape ourworld.

At the start of a new decade there isalways a rush of forecasting aboutwhat the future will bring. There is abenefit to this forecasting becauseunderstanding what's technological-ly feasible, understanding popula-tion trends, and understanding re-source limitations is certainly the be-ginning of informed choice. But wemust be careful about what we dowith these forecasts. We cannot ex-pect to find our future by passivelygazing into the forecaster's crystalball. It is crucial that we choose ourfuture. Trends are not destiny. Youand I can create our destiny if wehave the will to choose our purposes.I believe that making such choices isa vital aspect of our professionalwork.

*President, Block Petrella Associates,Inc., Plainfield, N.J. and Executive Direc-tor, 00 Network. This was the KeynotePresentation at the Spring '80 ODN Con-ference. -Ed.

Vol.12. No.2. June,1980

A Publicationof the OD Network

Our Past and Our PromiseTony Petrella*

"We cannot expect to find our future bypassively gazing into the forecaster'scrystal ball. It is crucial that we choose.our future. Trends are not destiny. Youand I can create our destiny if we have thewill to choose our purposes. I believethat making such choices is a vital aspectof our professional work:'

Our society is experiencing con-siderable stress; I think that we havea messon our hands. Let me illustratewith the problems that are on mymind:• We have a well-documented pro-ductivity slump.• There is increased alienation ofboth labor and management.• I believe we are seeing only thebeginning of a tax revolt.• The rate of inflation seems totallyout of control.• The costs of health care rise at astaggering rate.• We are short of investment capital.• There is continuing racial unrest.• Older people are increasingly iso-lated and lonely.• In spite of our energy problems,we have been unwilling to makesmaller cars.• The divorce rate is soaring.• There is widespread alcohol anddrug abuse.

• Some of our high schools arearmed camps.• We observe the decay of ou r once-vital center cities as if it wereinevitable.• 15 states have not ratified the EqualRights Amendment.• The federal government's regula-tory agencies grow like a cancer.

In recent years we've had Water-gate, the Vietnam War and assassina-tions of fine leaders. I'm not a proph-et of doom. I'm just describing "whatis."

It's from this set of circumstancesthat we must move into the future.And what can you and I do with thissituation? What role is there for us?

If we wish to understand what rolethis profession might play in makingchoices for the future, we must ap-preciate who we have been in thepast. To some extent, our past is ourprologue. Basically, we have helpedpeople and organizations by increas-

ing consciousness beyond self-awareness to a consciousness ofsocial-awareness. We have beenbusy at the task of developing thisnew consciousness for the last dec-ade and we and our work have be-come well-known and valued. Wehave brought to the world a practicalunderstanding of the importance oforganizational norms.

Throughout this time we have alsobecome deeply identified with thechange and improvement of organi-zations. We have become the proc-ess experts of organizational change.We have enthusiastically gone forthto become social inventors. Throughour efforts to improve the cultures oforganizations, we have learned agreat deal about the process ofchange. And we have become awareof some very deep aspects of theprocess of change from others' ex-perience. The research of ElizabethKubler-Ross on death and dying isjust one example of other sources ofinsight.

This knowledge about just what isinvolved in the process of change isvery important. It gives us a perspec-tive which helps us go through thecrisis we face as a society; and it willhelp us go through the crises we ex-perience as individuals.

Let me illustrate with the use of amodel from across the Atlantic-from Claes Janssen, of Sweden, whodeveloped it to explain what it meansto be an outsider in one's own cul-ture. As he worked with it, he sawthat it contained the essential stagesof individual or societal trans-formation.

I would like first to describe themodel in terms of an individual's ex-perience and then use it to considerour societal problems. The theorydescribes four major phases of trans-formation, or change. These phasesare: first, contentment, then repres-sion, then confusion, and finallyrenewal.

Let's start with the phase calledcontentment. I don't think that itwould reflect an overly-optimistic at-titude to assume that each of you hasexperienced contentment. In theseperiods of our lives, we are at peacewith ourselves and with the world. Atsuch times, our reservoirs of self-esteem are full; we are relaxed; weenjoy things as they are. We feelfulfilled.

We may go along for a consider-able period of time like this, but then

something happens which threatensour contentment. It might be thatsomething goes seriously wrong onthe job. A close personal relationshipis damaged or broken. We suffer alarge financial loss. The problem maybe the result of forces outside of usor it may be the culmination of a slowprocess of erosion within us. Wehave a growing awareness that some-thing isn't right-isn't whole. We areno longer content. But we try to hangon to our former happiness. We re-press our unhappy feelings and carryon as if we were O.K. (I'm O.K. andyou're O.K. has become our"should.")

We are now in the second phase ofour model. We feel the distress but

"In the smooth talk of ourprofession, we declarethat people and organiza-tions must go through astage of unfreezing. But, ifthe change is a significantone . . . then repressionand pain will be part of theprocess:'

we repress the problem. We holdon; we deny what the situation hasbecome. Others may see the prob-lem and encourage us to act. We tellthem that their perceptions are in-correct. If we are in positions ofpower and authority, we repressothers who wish to address the real-ity of the situation. We are suffering alittle death, and we are trying to denyits existence.

Fortunately, as we go through thisprocess of self-denial, our uncon-scious psyche and our body will giveus the signs that we are suffering.That is to say, the cost of holdingon-of holding ourselves in-becomes too great to bear, and ourfeelings and the reality of the prob-lems flood into our consciousness.No longer do we repress our anxiety.Our mask of strength and self-assur-ance comes off. Our uncertainties-our grief over loss-our fears offailure-break out into the open.

This is a time when we lack self-confidence and experience confu-sion. In severe situations, we mayfeel some disintegration of our life

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meaning-we may temporarily losethe sense of our own identity. This isthe feeling of confusion or chaos. Weare now in the third stage of trans-formation.

Phases two and three of change-repression and confusion-dealwith the dark side of change-thepainful side, the ordeal of change. Inthe smooth talk of our profession, wedeclare that people and organiza-tions must go through a stage of un-freezing. But, if the change is a sig-nificant one, if important life experi-ences and patterns must be given upto allow the change, then repressionand painful confusion will be part ofthe process. This is where StanleyKeleman's expression "little death"captu res the sense of the experience.Little deaths are frightening. They arefrightening to go through, and theyare frightening to witness.

As people involved in change, andas guides through the process ofchange, we need to be prepared forthe agony of these stagesof develop-ment and transformation. We mustalso be aware that very often changeis the result of something unforeseen-something out of control. It isn'tso much a matter of planning thechange as it is coming to grips withthe necessity for change-changewhich is unplanned, unwanted andpainful.

Now I want to re-focus on our so-ciety and what we have to offer asmembers of our profession. I believethat our society is in a crisis, is suffer-ing some "little deaths." We are ex-periencing the repression and con-fusion that comes with significantchange.

The problems I listed at the begin-ning of this talk are a mix of both thecauses and manifestations of our cri-sis. Future Shock is with us and moreis on the way. And the bumper stick-er that cries out, "America, Love It orLeave It," is not the response tomake!

From our work with change, weknow that the transition through re-pression and confusion does notflow easily. We have a critical role toplay. With our process awarenessand skill, we can provide assistanceto others in moving through thestages of repression and confusion.Think of the work we have done tofree people, and organizations, fromthe trap of repression. The "how doyou feel?" question of the T-groupand the action research models ap-

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plied to organizational cultures havebecome as commonplace as baconand eggs for breakfast. Inter-groupconfrontation meetings and the diag-nostic processes involved in team-building almost always help freepeople and organizations from con-tinuing to suffer with problems theyhave repressed.

When people and organizationsexperience confusion, again we haveprocesses to help. Some of theseare: the procedures that tap right-brain thinking, imagining the future,processes that tease out commonvisions, ideas about networking forlearning, and creating collateral or-ganizations for solving ambiguousproblems. All of these are processeswhich help people through the briarpatch of confusion.

Then there are the qualities webring to these situations because weare who we are-optimistic, inven-tive people who have been throughtransformations before. We knowthat strength comes from being emo-tionally mature, understanding, sup-portive and caring.

For years we have been remindedby our better mentors that our ownwarm bodies are our best interven-tions. This has been our short-handway of acknowledging the impor-tance of our hope and optimism. Sowe can help others and ourselvesthrough this painful side of change.And because of this, we know that wecan playa very significant role in thefuture of our society.

But what about renewal? I'm com-ing now to this most exciting stage inthe process of change. And, if you'reanything like me, you're straining atthe bit to get to the stage of renewal.Our society just might be at thethresh hold of a major transformation-a renaissance. We know that weare experiencing confusion; but lis-ten to what Nietzshe so beautifullysaid about confusion: "One muststill have chaos in one, to give birth toa dancing star."

And, what must you and I do togive birth to our dancing star? Whatdoes our experience with changingtell us? What does our model ofchange tell us?

If the stage of repression is self-denial, and the stage of confusion isself-disintegration, then the stage ofrenewal is self-assertion, or, per-haps, self-affi rmation. But self-affi r-mation means searching, and choos-ing, and risking, and creating. And

the self-assertion I'm talking abouthere is not simply acting on impulse.The impulse and desire must bethere but, beyond this, there needsto be a purpose. To succeed in re-newing ourselves we must ask thequestions, "What end do we serve?What purpose?" Risking the choiceof acting towards some purposebrings renewal. And this is where Isee a critical issue for us.

By and large, in our professionalwork, we have stood outside of thesechoices. We have chosen to remainon the periphery. We have beenwedded to process to the exclusionof being selective about specific pur-poses. To me, it seems that, at thisstage of our development, this pos-ture hinders the realization of ourpotential.

"We know that we are ex-periencing confusion; butlisten to what Nietzsche sobeautifully said about con-fusion: 'One must stillhave chaos in 'one, to givebi rth to a dancing star.'"

Our work of differentiating proc-ess from task has been useful. But itwas never intended to create lop-sided people who follow the mean-dering of "what is" at the expense ofchoosing "what might be." We haveto join clear purposes to our processorientation to capture the imagina-tion and spirit of humanity and tohelp renew our society. We don'thave to limit ourselves to supplyingour process technology to purposeschosen by others. We can choosepurposes as well as anyone. Thequestion to ask ourselves is: Improvethe process for what purpose? Theanswers may change but the ques-tion remains the same: "Improve theprocess for what purpose?"

Mother Theresa, Martin LutherKing, Mahatma Gandhi, and EleanorRoosevelt don't stick in our memo-ries simply because they had processskills. They became symbols and in-struments of important purposes-pu rposes which brought out the bestin people. We have energy, creativityand intelligence within us. To usethis potential, we need to find sets ofrelationships and purposes to be in-vested towards.

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It was a long time ago that Platodefined a slave as the person whocarries out the purposes of another.It's a rather heavy definition, but Ithink it makes the point. We can joinothers and pursue common purpos-es. We don't have to retain this spe-cial relationship of forever being theoutsider, concerned only with proc-ess. We must dedicate ourselves topurposes of our choosing and beknown for our advocacy. We can dothis without becoming driven dog-matics. I'm not talking here aboutimposing the will or desire of a singleleader. I am talking about joining inwith the moving spirit of a wholegroup developing and pursuingsome valuable purpose. Leadershipis the act of choosing a purpose andmobilizing energy and resource inthe pursuit of that purpose.

Perhaps I can illustrate what I amtrying to express with a personal ex-ample. As I mentioned earlier in thistalk, our nation is experiencing aproductivity slump. We also see in-creasing evidence of worker aliena-tion. These twin problems have givenme a new sense of mission and pur-pose. To some people, productivityhas come to mean working harderand faster, to produce cheaper prod-ucts, of lower quality, in order to endup with a net profit at the expense ofalmost everything else. But that's ma-terialistic number-counting runningwild.

Productivity has a deeper meaningand people want to be productive inthis deeper sense. To be productivecan mean that we make the most outof the limited resources we have. Itcan mean putting quality into prod-ucts. It can mean working safely atthe work place and within the largerenvironment. And it can mean theexcitement of mastery and the dig-nity one can find through shapingsomething of value. I always saw thedignity of a master craftsman when Iwas around my father. It was yearslater that I discovered that literally noone in the entire world could matchthe performance record of the en-gines that he and his mechanicsoverhauled. The quiet dignity thatcomes from excellence in one'swork, from the conservation of re-sources, and from the creation ofvalue, is one of the deepest mean-ings we can hope to find. This iswhatit means to be productive. It is a pur-pose worth pursuing as an individu-al, as an organization, and as a na-

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tion. I intend to work towards thiscommon endeavor and to be knownfor my advocacy of its value.

I would like to direct you towardssome other issues within our societywhich will require leadership, a gooddeal of which we could supply. Theseare areas which, in my opinion, willcontinue to change rapidly, bringingabout stress and dislocation.• First, it is likely that there will becontinued and severe dislocationsthat will accompany the new eco-nomics of energy supply.• Second, there will be an accelerat-ing change in the nature of work,stemming from automation, robots,and microelectronics.• Third, there will be continuingchange in the composition and valueorientation of the work force.• And, finally, there will be a contin-ued and growing disillusionmentwith our traditional political process-es, institutions and structures.

These issues present us with thegreatest need for purposeful leader-ship. We can face these challengesand choose our purposes with wis-dom if we keep in mind S9me life-sustaining values gleaned from ourcommon heritage. These values are:• An appreciation of learning;• An understanding of the basis ofscience;• An appreciation of how profound-ly we are related to others; and,finally,• An appreciation of the twin valuesof community and self-governance.

The kind of learning that I'm talk-ing about is that which values the ex-perience of the learner as much as itvalues the body of information beingexplored. The view of science is onein which science is not a mechanism,not the discovery of absolutes,butinstead the process of human searchand creativity. The view of related-ness is that we cannot know our-selves, save through our relationshipwith others.

And the view of community andself-governance is that which was sowell expressed by the early Boston-ians. Fanueil Hall, their meetingplace, is still standing. It's beencalled the Cradle of Liberty. The hallsymbolizes both the freedom ofspeech and the importance ofcommunity.

I have never stood in anothermeeting place where my heart hasbeen so strongly moved. You can feelthe human dimension of the art of

United Nations Address, October 2,1979.

The social democracy of the workplace, of which we are a part, is in-deed reaching into the establishedinstitutions of our world when thePope of the Roman Catholic Church,advises the representatives of theUnited Nations to judge nations byparticipative processes in the work-place.

We practitioners are optimistic andinventive people. We have the proc-esses, we have the values, we havethe ability to choose our purposes. Ifwe put them all together, we will re-kindle our spirit and our commit-ment-a commitment to life filledwith meaning. There is a moment be-tween chaos and commitment wherewe create our worlds and our mean-ing. It's not simply discovery-it'screation.

I don't know what purpose youmight choose to fulfill your promise.I only know that to be whole as aperson and to make a difference inthe world, we must make suchchoices. You know what will giveyour life meaning .... Choose thatpurpose.

Our world is crying out for a re-newal of purpose and for those whowill commit themselves. I again wantto reach into our political history tohelp capture the strength of what itmeans to commit oneself. The sign-ers of the Declaration of Indepen-dence concluded by writing: "Andfor the support of this Declaration... we mutually pledge to each otherour Lives, our Fortunes and our Sac-red Honor."

You can be renasissance womenand men if you wish, if you take thechance to be known for you r com-mitment to some lifegiving purpose.My two young sons are here with ustoday. At the end of this decade theywill be entering the world asadults. Itwill help them enormously if you andI fulfill our promise to our future.

Thank you.

government in that place. A persondoesn't feel small in that room. Youcan get in touch with what it means tobe self-governing.

These values can be beacon lightsfor us aswe chart our future. And thepurposes we choose can, in turn,bring life and renewed meaning tothese cherished values. We won'trenew these values by going back-wards, but by creating new forms ofrelationship and new forms of organ-ization and new forms of self-gov-ernance.

Is the world ready for the pu rposeswe are likely to choose? I want toread a quote to you that shows an

"The quiet dignity thatcomes from excellence inone's work, from the con-servation of resources,and from the creation ofvalue, is one of the deep-est meanings we can hopeto find:'

appreciation for the promise we haveto offer our world. I chose this quotebecause it comes from the leader ofthe most conservative organization Iknow; and, because it is addressedto the world at large.

"[The criterion we should use] incomparing social, economic andpolitical systems ... must be thehumanistic criterion; namely, themeasure in which each system iscapable of ... eliminating thevarious forms of exploitation ofman, and of insuring for people,through work, not only the just dis-tribution of ... material goods,but also, a participation ... in thewhole process of production andin the social life that grows uparound that process."This is from Pope John Paul II's

ODN '88A Network-designed ConferenceSan Francisco October 6-10,1980

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