FACE TO FACE
An Interview with Pegasus Board Chair Sharon Eakes

PEGASUS CONFERENCE CORNER
• "I have found my people!"—Reflections of a 2005 conference participant
• Order Peter Senge's 2005 Conference Keynote:
A New Vision for an Interdependent Planet Go
• Register Now at Lowest Rate for 2006 Conference in Boston Area--$950 Go

LEARNING LINKS
Connecting Systems Thinking and Action

FACE TO FACE
An Interview with Pegasus Board Chair Sharon Eakes

Sharon Eakes is an executive coach who works with leaders wanting to hone their interpersonal skills and enhance the systems in which they operate. As chair of the board for Pegasus Communications, a longtime Pegasus Conference attendee, and a participant this year as a coach in the teams program, Sharon brings multiple perspectives to the conference experience.

In the following interview with Leverage Points editor Vicky Schubert, she reflects on the importance of the conference to her own work and to the systems thinking and organizational learning communities.

LP: You have attended the Pegasus Conference every year since 1996. What sets it apart from other conferences and why is it so important to you?

SE: I always feel renewed by this conference on so many levels—head, heart, and spirit. Intellectually, I come away with ideas or practices that are stimulating and useful. Socially and professionally, it’s an indispensable connections point; I have remained connected to many of the people I’ve met at the conference, and we’ve become friends and resources for each other throughout the year. And then spiritually, there’s always something uplifting about it, a hopefulness. The keynotes often provide the sense that there’s a way out of this mess.

On top of all that, you get practical tools. This time, I got a terrific, well-thought out piece on mental models from Marc-André Olivier and an enormously useful look at how to design for team interdependence from Jack Regan. I find the combination of high-level thinking and pragmatism at this conference unusually satisfying.

LP: Are there also ways in which the conference has evolved over the last 10 years?

SE: There have been a couple changes in format that have been improvements. I’ve never been to another conference that incorporates 45-minute networking breaks. Those weren’t there in the beginning, but the conference designers added them in response to people’s requests. Most events have a 10- or 15-minute break between sessions. But 45 minutes is enough time to have a real conversation. Another format innovation was seating participants at conversation tables during the general sessions. I know those are a challenge to coordinate, but they allow for a lot of valuable cross-pollination of ideas.

There has also been an evolution in the make-up of the conference community. Over the years, the core business constituency has been augmented by more people from education, healthcare, and government. And there’s a growing compliment of international participants. It feels as if we now have a broader spectrum of sectors and people coming together in a way that generates a lot of new ideas and demonstrates that this approach can be used in so many arenas.

LP: That mix of sectors and interests puts the onus on the program designers to find the right balance of content that will be relevant and stimulating to systems thinkers of all kinds.

SE: That’s right. I think that cross-pollination creates opportunities for breakthrough thinking that wouldn’t occur in a community predominated by a single sector. For example, in the forum about the US Army’s training program led by Marilyn Darling and Joe Moore, I learned that the military has developed a whole lot of knowledge about adapting fast. And this is something that other sectors need to learn.

Pushing ourselves to borrow across sectors and to extrapolate from the experiences of others helps build our capacity for systems thinking. It’s consistent with a whole systems perspective to avoid narrow compartmentalization: “Oh, well, he’s in automotive; that’s not what I’m about.” I found the conversation by keynote speakers Rose von Thater-Braan, Leroy Little Bear, and Amethyst First Rider about Native Science provocative and generative in that sense.

LP: This year’s theme was “Embracing Interdependence: Effective and Responsible Action in Our Organizations and the World.” Do you have any stories from your experience at this year’s conference that give you hope that people are expanding their capacity for building effective relationships?

SE: Through the teams program, I got to work as a coach with a large group from a statewide child welfare system. Some years ago, this group sent a few people to the conference who had a powerful experience. As a result, they have been quietly making a difference in their individual areas ever since. This small group began to think, “How could we have this experience shared by more people?” So they got a grant and managed to bring a team of 14 people to the conference this year. This time, they represented a much bigger slice of the whole picture, including a state legislator, a few heads of agencies, and people representative of all different components of this very complex system.

The way they had created this team reflected their instinctive awareness of interdependence. They not only drew people from all the various sectors of family policy, but they included a woman who had left the child welfare system to get a master’s degree in organizational systems. Her familiarity with the territory combined with her new knowledge of systems theory proved very useful. She stayed mostly on the outskirts, but every now and then offered an important observation that helped the group see itself more clearly.

Read the complete interview

Learn more about the 2006 Pegasus Conference

PEGASUS CONFERENCE CORNER
We wish to offer a special thanks to all of our readers who participated in the 2005 Pegasus Conference. The conference was extraordinary not only because of the insightful and inspiring presentations, but also because of the energy and brilliance of those who come from all around the world to take part in the event. We could not do it without you.

“I have found my people!”—Reflections of a 2005 conference participant

…What I heard, over and over [at the conference], is what I have known to be true for many, many years. I have intuitively followed this path, but often lacked the words and tools to really be productive and helpful. A few years ago, I read Peter Senge's The Fifth Discipline, and I found a touchstone. Since then, I have pursued my own development in Systems Thinking, Servant Leadership, and Organizational Learning. My managers are always amazed at the amount of reading and self-development I pursue.

That being said, I have to admit that I was missing something—something I got by coming to the conference. Because of my previous mental models about how one applies principles and tools, I couldn't 'get' how to use Systems Thinking. I kept looking at it as a 'solution generator,' instead of a way of describing an issue and a way of investing in trust—trust that those talking about the issue together can find a solution. There is no silver bullet, but there is a silver lining—working together, we can accomplish amazing things. See you next year!
—Peg Carlson-Bowen

The 2006 Pegasus Conference—Early Bird Discount
The 16th Annual Pegasus Conference will be held November 13–15, 2006, in Waltham, Massachusetts, USA (just outside of Boston). Don't miss this lowest registration rate available for just a few weeks. Register now through December 31 for only $950. Also, take advantage of a special subscription price for The Systems Thinker Newsletter—only $89 for a one-year subscription when you register (regularly $109). Register on our web site, or call 1-781-398-9700.

Order Peter Senge's 2005 Conference Keynote
A New Vision for an Interdependent Planet

Quickly sold out after it was shown to open the 2005 conference, this special video by Peter Senge was created solely for his keynote presentation. In it he draws on the extraordinary global reach of his experiences with all kinds of organizations to discuss how a new vision of an interdependent future is taking form on the planet. With his usual insight and grace, he observes how the 21st century has brought more opportunities for collaboration while raising new ethical challenges, especially for consuming/discarding nations and manufacturers with disproportionate environmental impacts. View clip
Order # V05K01D • DVD format • 58 minutes • $125

More conference audio and video recordings from the 2005 conference will be available on our website soon (including those referenced in Face to Face above).

LEARNING LINKS
Connecting Systems Thinking and Action
by Ed Cunliff

Administrators in every kind of organization can benefit from the use of metaphors and models to build a deep understanding of systems and strengthen their actions toward continuous improvement. One such tool is the spidergram, which emphasizes linkages within a given system.

In The Web of Life (Anchor Books, 1996), Fritjof Capra uses the spider web as the central metaphor to describe the interconnections of all life. A disruption at one point in the web has an impact that reaches to all points, just as it does in human institutions. A spidergram helps you apply this systems metaphor to organizational issues.

Consider, for example, an admissions unit in a hospital. The CEO believes that no one should have to stand in line for anything and the admissions staff—who would like to reduce their workload—agrees. So, when budget time comes around, they ask that two additional positions be created. Applying the spidergram to this issue (see illustration) involves placing the admissions unit’s request in the center of the web and indicating the impact that the request could have on the anchor points, which might include the hospital budget, other departments that would be affected by adding expense and capacity to the admissions unit, and customer satisfaction.

This is an extremely useful systems thinking strategy to avoid suboptimizing the whole in order to fulfill requests by units with strong and persistent advocates. The best-laid plans can go astray if the whole system has not been considered.

Read the complete article or see The Systems Thinker, V15N2 (March, 2004)

Subscribe to The Systems Thinker