Joel Arthur Barker, Future Edge: Discovering the New Paradigms of Success,

William Morrow and Co., New York 1992

Paradigm
: A set of rules and regulations that does two things:

1) It establishes or defines boundaries.

2) It tells you how to behave inside the boundaries so as to be successful.

Ch.11 Key Characteristics of Paradigms

1. Paradigms are common (p.150)

You'll find that there are paradigms all around. many are trivial; that is, the rules
and regulations do not impact much, if at all, on the larger environment. But all paradigms great or
small have the same effect of giving the practitioner special vision and understanding and specific
problem-solving methods. (p.151)

2. Paradigms are functional.

We need rules to help us live in this highly complex world. Without rules for
direction, we would be constantly confused because the world is too rich with data.(p.151)

Function of Paradigms
: They help us distinguish data that is important from that which is not. The
rules tell us how to look at the data and then how to deal with it.(p.152)

For that reason, whenever I hear people speak against immigrants of a different
culture as "weakening" the United States, I object. Because I know that their differences have
increased the potential problem-solving capacity of the nation. American immigration laws have
stimulated and catalyzed this power of difference. Why would we ever want to give up such an
advantage? (p.153)

3. The Paradigm effect reverses the commonsense relationship between seeing and
believing.

Remember the cliche "I'll believe it when I see it!" From what I have said in this
book, you should conclude that the reverse is more accurate: "I'll see it when I believe it." In other
worlds, subtle vision is preceded by an understanding of the rules. To see well, we need paradigms.

So, new employees are on both sides of the "seeing and believing" characteristic of
paradigms. Treat them gently until they learn to see. Use their naive perceptions to your advantage
to see yourselves anew. (p.154)

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 4. There is almost always more than one right answer. (p.154f)

The effect of paradigms explain why this must be the case. By changing my
paradigm, I change my perception of the world. That does not have to mean I must have
contradictory perceptions; rather that I am seeing another portion of the world that is just as real as
the portion that I saw with the other rules. but because one paradigm allows me access to one set of
information and another paradigm allows me access to another set, I may end up with two different,
yet equally correct, explanations of what is happening in the world.

5. Paradigms too strongly held can lead to paradigm paralysis, a terminal disease of
certainly. (p.155)

Paradigm paralysis has profound implications for innovation within an organization.

Why is it that internal innovation is so difficult to stimulate? Because the paradigm is already in
place. So, until we can change that attitude and stimulate people to be more flexible and break out
of their paradigms to search for alternatives, we will continue to find the great new ideas, on the
whole, being discovered outside the prevailing institutions. (p.156)

6. Paradigm pliancy is the best strategy in turbulent times.

Paradigm pliancy is the opposite of paradigm paralysis. It is the purposeful seeking

out of new ways of doing things. It is an active behavior in which you challenge your paradigms
on a regular basis by asking the Paradigm Shift Question:

1) Why do I believe is impossible to do in may field, but, if it could be done,

would fundamentally change my business?

2) Who, outside my field, might be interested in my unsolved problems?

(p.157)

Here's a good first step toward paradigm pliancy. When someone goes against your
paradigm, fight your natural tendency to explain why it is impossible and, instead, say:

1) I never thought about it that way before, tell me more.

2) And, then, be quiet and listen. You'll be surprised at how many good
ideas you will hear.

7. Human beings can choose to change their paradigms.

Human beings are not genetically encoded with only one way of looking at the
world. In fact, our coding seems to give us the capability to look at the world in a wide variety of
ways.

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 You can choose to see the world anew. (p.158)

There are very few irrational people in the world.

Kuhn suggested that you must consider, when talking to a person with a different
paradigm that you are talking to a person with a different language. Until you can speak their
language, you will not be able to communicate clearly.

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Ch. 12 Managers, Leaders, and Paradigms

Manager

1. Managers must demonstrate paradigm pliancy if they are going to expect others
to practice it. (p.160)]

2. Managers must facilitate and encourage cross talk. (p.161)

Cross talk is having people from different disciplines, from different

departments, from different divisions, talk about their problems together.

This kind of "managing" is crucial because, more and more, we are going to
find the answers to our problems by applying someone else's paradigms. (p.162)

3. by listening to all those screwy ideas, managers gain a special leverage for
innovation.

Leadership

1. Definition
: A leader is a person you will follow to a place you wouldn't go by yourself.
(p.163)

2. Leadership and paradigm

You manage within a paradigm. (p.164)

You lead between paradigms.

1) Paradigm enhancement

That is the relation of paradigms to leadership. What allows you to

"manage" within a paradigm? The rules, the guiding principles, the system, the standards, the
protocols. Give a good manager the system and a manager will optimize it. That is a manager's
job. It is called paradigm enhancement.

Paradigm enhancement is taking the rules and making them better.

It is working your way up the b Phase of the Paradigm Curve. We spend 90 Percent of our lives
doing just this, because it is a form of progress and is the natural route to improvement. We also
call it evolution. Paradigm enhancement is what the Total Quality movement is all about. To be

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able to paradigm enhance is crucial to success and is the domain of the manager.

2) Paradigm shift

But you don't manage between paradigms. Remember, leaving one

paradigm while it is still successful and going to a new paradigm that is as yet unproven looks very
risky. But leaders, with their intuitive judgment, assess the seeming risk, determine that shifting
paradigms is the correct thing to do, and, because they are leaders, instill the courage in others to
follow them.

This kind of change, paradigm shift change, occurs during less than
10 percent of our lives. Yet, it is as important as the paradigm enhancing that consumes the other
90 percent. I don't say it is more important, but it is surely equal. (p.165)

3) Paradigm enhancement and shift goes together.

Paradigm shifting without the follow-on skills of paradigm

enhancing leaves you vulnerable to the paradigm pioneers who practice Total Quality. Paradigm
enhancement without the skills of paradigm shifting will lead you to continually improve obsolete
products and services. Nobody will buy obsolete excellence.

4) Three choices (p.166):

Keep your paradigm; change your customer.

Change your paradigm; keep your customer.
Change your paradigm; change your customer.

Warren Bennis

"A List of characteristics of leaders (p.168)"

┌────────────┬─────────────────────┬───────────────────┐
│ │ Manager │ Leader │

├────────────┼─────────────────────┼───────────────────┤
│ Role │ Administers │ Innovates │

├────────────┼─────────────────────┼───────────────────┤
│ View │ Short-range │ Long-range │

├────────────┼─────────────────────┼───────────────────┤
│ Asks │ How and when │ What and why │

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├────────────┼─────────────────────┼───────────────────┤
│ His eyes on│ The bottom line │ The horizon │

├────────────┼─────────────────────┼───────────────────┤
│ Status quo │ Accepts it │ Challenge it │

└────────────┴─────────────────────┴───────────────────┘

Ch. 13 Shifts for the 1990s - a Barker's Dozen

Trends for the 1990s (p.171)

1. Regionalization of world economy.

2. The greening of industry. (p.172)

: Recycling and reducing outflow of pollution

3. Quality everywhere.

4. Celebration of diversity.

5. Gambling instead of taxes.

6. The fiber optics everywhere. (p.173)

7. Energy conservation optimized.

8. National health care.

9. Self-managing work teams. (p.174)

: Total Quality trend and democratization of the workplace. Displacing of the
largest groups of the middle class - the middle manager.

10. Water as precious.

11. Biotechnology everywhere.

12. Intellectual property as the key to wealth.

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New Paradigms for the 1990s (p.175)

1. Solar/hydrogen/fission
: Solar energy, hydrogen power-operated cars, Supersafe nuclear engineering.

2. Time taxes (p.177f)

: Work in public places instead of paying taxes.

3. The Buffalo Commons (p.178f)

: The Poppers suggest that the land be accumulated and returned to its natural state,
"The Buffalo Commons."

4. Education K through competence (p.179f)

: Competence as graduation barometer.

5. Magical, mystical polymers (p.180f)

: Plastics in many different uses: Building material, electric wire, automobile,
computer chips,..

6. Nature's Wisdom (p.181f)

7. Negawatts (p.183f)
: Energy conserving technologies

8. New building materials (p.185f)

9. Gaia (p.188f)
: The earth is alive and she is named Gaia.

10. Loans to the third world poor. (p.189f)

: The poor of the world are creditworthy.

11. Fractals and Chaos Mathematics (p.191f)

: The new way describing the world mathematically

12. Personalized production (p.192f)

13. Masters and patrons (p.193f)

: Concept of manager/employed relationship that offers fundamentally new rules for
both.

14. Virtual reality (p.194f)

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PCh.14 And So It goes (p.198)

1. Our perceptions of the world are strongly influenced by paradigms.

2. Because we become so good at using our present paradigms, we resist changing them.
(p.199)

3. It is the outsider who usually creates the new paradigm.

4. Practitioners of the old paradigm who choose to change to the new paradigm early, must
do so as and act of faith rather than as the result of factual proof, because there will never be
enough proof to be convincing in the early stages.

5. Those who change to a successful new paradigm gain a new way of seeing the world and

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new approaches for solving problems as a result of the shift to the new rules.

6. A new paradigm puts everyone back to zero, so practitioners of the old paradigm, who
may have had great advantage, lose much or all of their leverage.

As a conclusion to these observations, I suggested that, in turbulent times, it is your best

advantage to develop and practice paradigm pliancy.

If there is one thing I am clear on its it: We do not create the world around us. There is an
objective, knowable universe. (p.200)

An attitude of tolerance and openness keeps available the huge potential of conceptual
leverage that springs from new ideas that can change the world, the very paradigm shifts that I have
spent this book writing about. (p.202)

Paradigm of paradigms (p.203)

First, there is an act of faith that you will have to go through if you are going to use this
paradigm.

Second, only if you go out and try these rules for observing the world will you find out if I
have given you something worthwhile. Only if you start solving problems that you couldn't solve
before, explaining behaviors that you couldn't explain before, seeing the world in a new light and
with new vision, will you become convinced of this paradigm's worth.

Peter Drucker's observations

"Significant competitive advantage lies with those organizations and individuals who
anticipate well in turbulent times." (p.204)

Much of the turbulence of our times is caused by:

(1) the failures of old paradigms (and the attempts to prop up those outmoded rules),
and
(2) the creation and introduction of new paradigms.

Because trends have clear direction, instead of causing turbulence, they actually help reduce
if because they have a significant amount of predictability.

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 In times of crisis (high turbulence), people expect, in fact demand, great change. This
willingness to accept great change generates two results:

1. More people, responding to the demand for great change, put in time trying to
find new ways, i.e., new paradigms, that will resolve the crisis, thus increasing the likelihood of
paradigm shifts. (p.205)

2. More people are willing, because of the crisis mentality, to accept fundamentally
new approaches to solving the crisis, thus increasing the opportunity to change paradigms.

Sequence of radical change:

Step 1 The established paradigm begins to be less effective.

Step 2 The affected community senses the situation, begins to lose trust in the old rules.

Step 3 Turbulence grows as trust is reduced (the sense of crisis increases in Bright's terms).

Step 4 Creators or identifiers of the new paradigm step forward to offer their solutions
(many of these solutions may have been around for decades waiting for this chance).

Step 5 Turbulence increases even more as paradigm conflict becomes apparent.

Step 6 Affected community is extremely upset and demands clear solutions.

Step 7 One of the suggested new paradigms demonstrates ability to solve a small set of
significant problems that the old paradigm could not. (p.206)

Step 8 Some of the affected community accepts the new paradigm as an act of faith.

Step 9 With stronger support and funding, the new paradigm gains momentum.

Step 10 Turbulence begins to wane as the new paradigm starts solving the problems and the
affected community has a new way to deal with the world that seems successful.

It is still a great risk in our society to offer new rules for the game.

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