Encyclopedia of Leadership

PARADIGMS AND CHANGE

It is new entrants, not established players, who most often initiate the shift to a new paradigm.

Defenders of traditional approaches can always point out problems with the new paradigm, as

new paradigms seldom solve more than a few of the problems that confronted the old

paradigm. Allegiance to the new paradigm is often a matter of faith, and cannot be forced. For

this reason, the transition between competing paradigms cannot be made incrementally. A

shift of underlying assumptions is required. Inevitably, as we enter the twenty-first century,

new paradigms of organization and leadership are already in the process of being sorted out.

HOW TO USE THIS LEADERSHIP TOOL

“For a social discipline, such as management, the assumptions are actually a good deal more important than

are the paradigms for a natural science. The paradigm—that is, the prevailing general theory—has no impact on

the natural universe. Whether the paradigm states that the sun rotates around the earth, or that, on the con-

trary, the earth rotates around the sun, has no effect on sun and earth. But a social discipline, such as manage-

ment, deals with the behavior of people and human institutions. The social universe has no ‘natural laws’ as

the physical sciences do. It is thus subject to continuous change. This means that assumptions that were valid

yesterday can become invalid and, indeed, totally misleading in no time at all.”

—Peter Drucker, FORBES MAGAZINE,October 5, 1998

Often, paradigm shifts are not easily identified. Symptoms that an organizational paradigm

shift may be happening are:

➠Change seems overwhelming.

30 SECTION 1 FOUNDATIONALCONCEPTS

• Fredrick Taylor’s scientific management


• Study, subdivide, and standardize work so
  that anyone can do it.


• The Human Relations Movement and
  participative management studies show
  people can be more productive when they
  are involved.


• The rise of the systems thinking and quality
  movements


• Eric Trist and Fred Emory’s sociotechnical
  design


• Success of quality gurus with Japanese
  industry


• Open-book management


• The total quality movement combining
  quality tools with teamwork


• Systems thinking
  
  
  • The Hawthorne studies of the 1930s showed
    that productivity increased when workers
    were involved.
  
  
  • The knowledge that motivated people can be
    defeated by poorly designed systems.
  
  
  • Studies show that a combination of involved
    workers and well-designed work systems
    produces better results.
  
  
  • Success of Japanese management style of
    using quality tools combined with worker
    participation.
  
  
  • Rise of technical complexity and the
    knowledge worker—no expert could
    understand it all.
  
  
  • Rise of new economy, the Internet, and
    e-commerce
  
  
  • The changing employment contract, loss of
    corporate loyalty, and worker specialization
    and contracting out
  
  
  
  

About 1900:

Experts solve

problems.

About 1950:

Everybody solves

problems.

About 1965:

Experts improve

systems.

About 1985:

Everybody

improves whole

systems.

Work design What challenged the

paradigm Elements of the paradigm paradigm?