In an organization, this whirlpool-type subsystem is represented by the predictable changes in the life cycle and seasons of the organization. Change is occurring in the organization, but it is change that has occurred before in the organization (seasonal change) or it is change that one can anticipate given the experiences of comparable organizations as they grow larger or older (lifecycle change). There are the unknown aspects of the change—as the organization (like the leaf) is pulled into the vortex of the compelling change. Even if they don’t know where it will all end up after the predictable cycle, seasoned leaders can be relatively confident regarding the pattern of organizational change that will unfold in the cycle. Budget preparation times in companies are typically whirlpool occasions: intense, dizzying but ultimately predictable.
Stable Environment: a third environment stands in stark contrast to the first two. This environment often takes the form of a quiet pool located near the shoreline. This pool often contains water that is stagnant and undrinkable: White water streams usually include this subsystem. The quiet pool is tucked away behind a large boulder in the stream or at the edge of the stream beside a large sunken tree trunk. It is remarkable that a stream with rapidly flowing water also inevitably contains many subsystems that are not only very quiet but also often stagnant. We can usually drink from the rapidly flowing water in a stream–but are warned (by the smell) to avoid drinking from the stagnant pools.
Yet, these pools are often the sources of nutrients for the ecosystem of the stream. Our leaf floats into the stagnant pool and remains there. It eventually sinks and joins with other rotting leaves to form a richly nutritious biomass for the living organisms of the stream. The quiet pools represent yet another form of order in the turbulent stream. Nothing changes. Everything eventually sinks, rots and contributes to the ongoing revitalization of the bio-system.
The quiet pool is represented in the organization by those subsystems that never change or change very slowly. These are the subsystems that provide what Talcott Parsons (1955) calls the latent pattern maintenance functions of the organization. They preserve the continuity of the organization, while other subsystems are rapidly changing. These subsystems include the rituals, ceremonies, norms, values, and narratives of the organization—the deeply embedded and often invisible (latent) patterns of behavior in the organization (to which I turn in a later chapter).
The quiet pool is also represented in the formal bureaucratic processes of the organization: those rules and regulations that are slow to change and that seem to have a life of their own. They are reinforced even when no longer appropriate and are followed even when no longer formally in force. These are the bureaucratic ways represented in the phrase, “that’s the way we have always done it around here.” We might also include those people and departments who represent the old ways of doing things in the organization. Sometimes called the “remnant,” Everett Rodgers (1995) identifies these people as the “laggards” of an organization who forever struggle against change and innovation.
