Talk and Development
As a number of studies have documented (Kotter, 1990; Mintzberg, 1973; Stewart, 1985), talk is the most frequent activity of managers. Some say that as much as 75 percent of a manager’s day is spent in conversation (for instance, Gronn, 1983).
Yet, for all this, there is a sense that something is wrong with the way people talk to each other at work—something is artificial, false, or at least unsatisfying much of the time. They often think to themselves that they have to be careful about what they say and to whom they say it. There are things that might be said privately, to a trusted colleague, that cannot be said publicly. On the other hand, people sometimes say something publicly that they realize they do not really believe; it is said “just for show.” Organizational talk often has a game-like quality that makes it seem unreal.
I believe that people long for a more authentic kind of interaction with their co-workers but that they are not sure that it is possible, or even if their longing is legitimate. Work is not generally thought of as a place where you are supposed to get your own needs met. Thus, people come to accept what they believe to be inevitable, that they must leave a part of themselves at home when they come to work.
What is lost, when talk is limited in these ways, are two kinds of development: Individuals lose the opportunity to learn in ways that could foster their growth—if they cannot be themselves at work, they cannot develop themselves at work—and the organization, the system as a whole, loses the opportunity to learn those things about itself and about its interaction with its environment that could lead to its development.
There is substantial agreement among development theorists that individual development is, potentially, lifelong rather than ending with adulthood. Although these theorists differ greatly about what comprises various stages, or even if stages are an appropriate frame, they generally agree about the direction that adult development takes (Commons, Richards, & Armon, 1984; Kegan, 1994; Labouvie-Vief, 1984; Perry, 1970): Given both challenge and support, individual adults take on an increasingly more open, differentiated, and integrated perspective. Open, in this context, means a willingness to entertain alternative perspectives; differentiated means the individual is able to draw finer distinctions between concepts (for example, the concept of “team” can be differentiated into self-directed and manager-led or, alternatively, into task teams, performing teams, production teams, and so on, each having distinguishing characteristics that result in different issues); and integrated means that the individual is able to weave these differences into an increasingly complex whole, a system view rather than an ethnocentric or fragmented view. As an individual becomes more developed he or she is able to deal with increasing complexity—or, perhaps more accurately, is able to construct increasingly more complex perspectives on the world. The opposite of continued adult development is rigid and highly defended thought patterns—patterns that leave a person less able to adapt to changing conditions and less able to change.
Adult development is, however, only a potential; it is not a certainty. For development to occur an individual must continue to face new issues or problems for which current responses are inadequate. In order to deal with new challenges the person must reframe his or her understanding of “self in the world” or “self in relation to the system” of which the individual is a part. It is, of course, quite distressing to find that one’s current understanding of “self in the world” is inadequate, that one doesn’t yet “have it figured out.” So an individual in the midst of development must have the support of others, both to sustain the effort and to offer alternative frames.
Organizations, however, are in general poor places to develop. People can develop specialization in them: There are adequate challenges and support for reframing within an area of technical skill or abstract concepts. But when it comes to developing themselves more broadly, the way people talk to each other (avoiding open exchange, trying to win at all costs, and other tendencies described below) can prevent them from receiving the information and support that is necessary for reframing.
Organizations also acquire patterns of interaction that can make it difficult for the system as a whole to find out about itself and thus to develop. Chris Argyris (1990) has referred to these patterns as “defensive routines”: customary ways of acting that the organization evolves to avoid embarrassment or conflict. For example, people frequently modify information that is sent upward through the organization so that it appears more favorable, and subordinates often agree to do a task or carry out a process that they believe will not work. Defensive routines work in the sense that they do prevent embarrassment and conflict, but in so doing they also prevent the organization from learning about challenges which, if faced directly, could lead to new ways of thinking—that is, could lead to development.
I believe that both individual and organizational development are dependent upon learning and that learning is dependent upon talk; thus, talk leads to learning, which leads to development. Obviously, though, not all talk leads to learning. As I have just pointed out, some talk may indeed work against it. (It is also important to note that learning can and does occur without talk—for example, learning calculus from a computer program, learning history from a text. However, the learning I am interested in in this paper is the kind I referenced above: learning that results in an individual or system reframing self in relation to the world.)
Development as a Necessary Response to Complexity
Kegan (1994) has defined development as the “active process of increasingly organizing the relationship of the self to the environment. The relationship gets better organized by increasing differentiations of the self from the environment and thus by increasing integrations of the environment” (p. 114). At a systems level, Ashby’s (1957, 1960) law of requisite variety, which states that the internal regulatory mechanisms of a system must be as diverse as the environment with which it is trying to deal, is again an argument for differentiation and integration—or the development of the organization as an ever-more-complex system.
To live in a world that is culturally diverse requires individuals to be more complex than to live in a homogeneous world. People face diversity every day as organizations become more heterogeneous and struggle with ensuing issues of equity and fairness. The women and people of color who are exiting corporations in increasing numbers speak to the current ineptitude in addressing the complexity that cultural diversity brings with it (Barrentine, 1993). As organizations become more global, people must deal with yet wider issues of cultural diversity: fairness in wages and benefits within poorer countries, disruption of family patterns in traditional countries, and economic exploitation juxtaposed against national loyalty, to name only a few.
To live in a fast-changing environment requires greater complexity than to live in a more stable world. The speed with which product decisions must be made often prevents considered thought of their consequences. The technological advances that make possessions quickly obsolete create environmental problems and issues of equity about the use of the planet’s scarce resources. The organizational changes that force people to frequently change tasks, colleagues, and location leave them bereft of community and support. Einstein’s insight that the world that people have made as a result of the level of thinking they have done thus far creates problems that cannot be solved at the same level as they were created makes the case for development.
This is an age in which people are aware that their truths are embedded within a paradigm that, over time, will surely be transcended. This consciousness requires more complexity than living in a world in which truth is sure and steadfast. Some have said that this may be the first generation that is fully aware that it functions within a paradigm—that knowledge is ephemeral and conditional. Theorists such as Thomas Kuhn (1962) and Peter Berger (1966) have carefully illustrated how people construct their own reality. That is a difficult fate—to not have truth—to labor in the great vineyard of constructed reality. It requires much greater complexity than many have been able to develop. Robert Kegan (1994) was right: People find themselves in over their heads much of the time.
The organizations in which people work are also in over their heads. They are actively searching for new ways of acting and interacting. There is a growing acknowledgment that organizations cannot face this increased level of complexity armed with the traditional tools of bureaucracy: control, consistency, and predictability (Block, 1993). Organizations are actively seeking new ways of interacting, such as empowerment, self-directed teams, and organizational learning. They are, as well, seeking new forms of structure—for instance, Handy’s (1989) shamrock organization and Ackoff’s (1994) democratic corporation.
Individual and organizational development is a long-term answer to dealing with increased complexity, not a quick fix. Development moves at its own pace. It can be stifled, as it regularly is in current organizations, but it is difficult to hurry. The best that can be done is to make organizations places where individuals can know themselves and speak their truth.
I suggested above that if people cannot be themselves at work, they cannot develop themselves at work. They may fail to be themselves by (1) misleading others in what they say, (2) saying more than they know, or (3) saying nothing. Being oneself at work means that the person speaks authentically, agreeing and disagreeing, voicing one’s hopes and distresses. Individual development is about taking on an increasingly open, differentiated, and integrated perspective. To do that the person must give voice to his or her current perspective so that others can respond to it. Then in talking with others, reflecting an authentic self, the person learns from others about his or her tacit assumptions and, if those assumptions prove to be no longer viable, may choose to change them—to develop. Thus, speaking out of one’s own experience, he or she may hear that experience affirmed by others, perhaps in more eloquent words, and come to understand it more fully—to develop. Similarly, the person can internalize the perspectives of others, and integrate their ideas with his or her own—develop. Carl Jung (1963, p. 3) said, “I can only make direct statements, only ‘tell stories.’ Whether or not the stories are ‘true’ is not the problem. The only question is whether what I tell is my fable, my truth.” Developmental talk requires each person to say one’s own truth—not the truth but one’s own truth. And in giving voice to that truth, each person opens the door to his or her development.
I do not want to be misunderstood as advocating that people should say everything that comes into their heads, that they should be “brutally honest.” I am not suggesting that it is necessary to give voice to every thought in order to be authentic or to develop. It is, however, necessary to speak authentically and fully about all which bears upon the subject of the dialogue. To do less is to mislead others who are trying to learn, and to prevent oneself from learning as well.
Another way people can limit their development is by saying more than they know. It is difficult to avoid this, particularly when a person is placed in an authority role by virtue of position or expertise. Morris Cohen, in speaking facetiously about professors, once said, “No man, however conservative, can stand before a class day after day and refrain from saying more than he knows.” I could paraphrase that to say, “No manager, however conservative, can talk with subordinates day after day and refrain from saying more than he or she knows.” When individuals say more than they know they lose the ability to hear the perspectives of others, and others, hearing that person’s certainty, refrain from offering their conflicting thoughts, which might widen and enrich his or her perspective. Freire reminded us of the need for humility in talking with each other when he said, “The encounter of men addressed to the common task of learning and acting … is broken if the parties (or one of them) lack humility. How can I [talk developmentally with others] if I always project ignorance onto others and never perceive my own?” In developmental talk one is not obliged to say more than he or she knows; the task is not to convince, sell, or get “buy in.” A person can, even as a manager or expert, speak his or her own truth, without claiming it as the truth.
Silence, which in practical terms is the opposite of saying more than one knows, is equally dehabilitating to development. Audre Lorde (1984), the black feminist poet, has written eloquently about silence: “I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood. That the speaking profits me, beyond any other effect” (p. 40). People break their silence because it profits them, in their own growth and development and in the development of others.
People become what they act out, conditioning themselves by their play acting. If, day by day, they act indifferent when they really hurt for others, disinterested when they are truly ashamed, stoical when inside they are joyous, then, over time, they will become indifferent, disinterested, and stoical. If, on the other hand, the situation is such that they can act authentically, openly, and in relationship with others, then they have the opportunity to develop into authentic, open people who deal with others in relationship and not as objects.
The kind of talk that I have just described has been called dialogue. There are a number of theorists who have thought very carefully about the nature of dialogue. Let’s review their ideas and see what can be learned from them about how people might talk in more meaningful ways at work.