The various stages of my professional journey have always been learning journeys characterised by curiosity, an interest in experimentation, the desire for exchange and an ambition to combine theory and practice. Unfortunately, taking a step back, reflecting and pausing hardly ever happens, especially in everyday work.
So this Blog is an experiment – it is emerging.
For the time being, the posts will deal with the topics that have been in the focus of my interest in the last 2 to 3 years: agile approaches, facilitation, strategy, system and complexity thinking.
Crossing a river by feeling the stones
The quote below from one of the introductory texts to Cynefin reflects an approach and way of thinking that could be considered a blueprint for this experiment.
In short, Cynefin methods are based on finding the evolutionary potential in the present, setting a broad future direction, and moving towards ‘adjacent possibles.’ The best way to describe this is by crossing a river by feeling the stones. The intent or direction is to cross the river. We are not aiming for a particular spot (in contrast to the idealist approach of engineering a bridge to a specific point on the opposite river bank.) We start from a place on the near side where there are reachable stepping stones (adjacent possible), and every time we take a step, new options become visible that we couldn’t see from the starting position. Sometimes we need to take a chance and take a step without seeing the next stone; we sense or feel our way forward. It is a purposeful and emergent and evolutionary journey firmly rooted in the present, not an engineered approach rooted in an idealized future that may never come about.
Sonja Blignaut – Organizing Principles: the Spirit of Cynefin
I am always eager to make a connection and look forward to an exchange – you can reach me via LinkedIn.