things are and these are the things you need to know, and you
accept what you’re told as gospel. You forget that there is a self
that must be listened to.
America’s automotive industry prospered on maintenance
learning, until it suddenly found itself up against the wall, out-
done and outsold by the Japanese automotive wizards, and
learned by shock that it was in crisis. Detroit was bankrupt cre-
atively and facing financial ruin, but instead of trying to think
its way out of the dilemma, it ran on shock for years, closing
down plants, throwing thousands of employees out of work,
buying any solution that looked good. It wasn’t until recently
that Detroit truly began to examine and recover from its self-
inflicted wounds, evidence of what the Club of Rome calls
“innovative learning that may come too late.”
The authors write, “The conventional pattern of mainte-
nance/shock learning is inadequate to cope with global com-
plexity and is likely, if unchecked, to lead to... loss of control
over events and crises....”
What applies on a global basis applies on the personal level,
too. Anyone who relies on maintenance and shock learning is
bound to be more reactor than actor in his or her own life. For
example, most families simply maintain. When someone in the
family dies suddenly, the shock is so profound that the family fre-
quently falls apart, at least temporarily. We all know husbands
and wives who were so devastated by the death of a child that
they wound up divorced. In the same way, people in business who
simply accept conventional wisdom may reach the top of a bu-
reaucratic organization, but they will never use their particular
talents to their fullest. And if they ever confront their own lives,
they will suffer the shock of failed aspirations—at the very least.
So innovative learning must replace maintenance/shock
learning. The principal components of innovative learning areOn Becoming a Leader0465014088_01.qxd:0738208175_01.qxd 1/9/09 4:00 PM Page 70