Conscious Integrated Organizations: A model of working together for transformative change
Reimagining how our organizations work
If our world is to have a sustainable and happy future, we need to reimagine the way we work together. The challenges facing us are global and complex, and will need large numbers of people working in coordinated, compassionate and wise action. Yet existing organizational structures are not serving us, seen in phenomena like the “great resignation”, cynical or burnt out teams:
For-profit businesses at their best excel in being efficient and result oriented, functional, strong in business development (planning, strategy, marketing/sales), and innovation-driven. But they are generally stuck in a limited paradigm of short-term profit leading to lack of meaningful work that is increasingly empty and stale for employees.
Charities, nonprofits and social ventures at their best have a strong mission focus, excel in meaningful work and have extremely committed engaged employees. But all too often they are running on burn-out, are stuck in poverty mindsets, and lack clear hierarchies or decision-making processes.
All these types of organizations need to be successful in accomplishing their tasks but also in growing people, learning their way into the future and drawing from a deeper source of meaning. What would a more complete conscious organization look like?
An unconventional model: lessons from the monastery
One organizational model often overlooked, but which was a primary and successful model for collaboration at many times in our history is the monastery or nunnery. Consider old European or Tibetan monasteries that flourished as people-growing centers for hundreds of years. Some ran “businesses” (e.g. wine and cheese) as part of a financially sustainable model. Key strengths of the “monastery” are:
Rooted in wisdom and a view of something bigger
Strong contemplative practice
Motivation for compassionate service
Strong personal and group vision, mission, values
Integrating inner and outer
The modern Western approach that dominates our business approach is heavily weighted towards outer results and a focus on “doing”. The result is our businesses and organizations may exclude or ignore our vital inner lives. We ourselves may separate our inner lives and outer work in different boxes. Only by integrating inner and outer can we transform our own actions - and our organizations - into something richer, more resilient and more purposeful. Personal mindfulness itself becomes much richer when grounded in a deeper view, and embedded in a wider context of integrating this into our lives, communities and organizations. Put in other language, in both personal and organizational settings, we need a truly integral approach (ref: Ken Wilber) across I, We and It.
The conscious integrated organizational model
Individuals and organizations truly flourish when integrated across the full range of human experience. This means integrating the best of for-profit, non-profit, and spiritual-based/monastic models. And it means integrating inner and outer. The picture below shows the conscious integrated organization and how familiar organizational types map into this.
The journey to wholeness: how do we get there?
Each organizational type has a journey to make to become something fuller and richer. The model suggests the most important avenues of growth for each organizational type.
For-profit businesses need to expand their approach to consider social and environmental impacts, and to become purpose and vision driven. This will create a context in which their employees will be passionate enough to offer the innovation a business needs to thrive. Mindfulness, EI and resilience programs - when led authentically and grounded in a people-growing rather than “productivity hack” context - are one door towards creating a ground for a company-wide cultural shift. Mindfulness can be seen as “turning on the light”. Once the “light” is on, the next step is to integrate and manifest the power of mindful awareness as an agent of change in our workplaces, our communication, how we work together, and our values and vision.
Conversely, nonprofits and spiritual-based groups need to embrace business strengths such as functionality, efficiency and accountability, without compromising on mission. One leverage point for this shift is organizational money coaching - diving into the blocks and shadow around finances and all the deep and far-reaching patterns associated with money (see e.g. https://themindfulmoneycoach.com/)
In conclusion
The conscious integrated organization model proposed here is a way to re-imagine our organizations (and ourselves) in a new form to meet the challenges of our times that are (a) rooted in wisdom and compassion, (b) express themselves through passionate engagement, strong vision, mission and values, and (c) manifests with innovation, functionality and accountability.
Appendix 1: Case studies from for-profit business
IBM: from 2014 to 2019 I was one of the pioneers of IBM’s mindfulness community which grew to over 10,000 members, and practice groups in 30+ countries. A grassroots movement, it captured the imaginations of employees for a different way of working.
SS&C Technologies: from 2020-2022 I have been running a global mindfulness program. To date, approx 2K people (out of 25K employees) have participated in some form of training. COVID-19 created a great openness from employees to find a different, more engaged and more sustainable way of working. Poll results from 1000+ participants give interesting insights. For example issues with constant multi-tasking consistently tops the list of challenges for people, followed by stress and work-life balance
80% of people are multi-tasking all or most of the time
62% hardly ever take breaks, or at most once a day if they remember
89% of people name temptation to multi-task their biggest challenge with Zoom; 37% feel no-one on a call is paying attention; and 35% struggle to pay attention themselves
Also interesting is the % of employees who reported themselves improved or greatly improved in the following areas. One conclusion from these results is that standard (i.e. non-mindful non-conscious) business practices are highly unsustainable and ineffective. Note that the lowest % increase is motivation and engagement at work: I hypothesize that as employees become more aware they in fact become increasingly aware of the limitations of the corporate paradigm. My hope is that this can become a powerful vehicle of change from within towards a more purposeful and conscious organization.
Appendix 2: Case study from charities and spiritual-based world
Clear Sky Meditation and Study Foundation (www.clearskycenter.org). Founded in 2004 as a registered charity, the center came close to bankruptcy in 2012. Despite the great commitment of volunteers and donors, a lack of functionality and accountability, an endemic poverty mindset of money being evil, and a resistance to practices like sales and marketing, led to a real danger the foundation would no longer be viable. Clear Sky today is a flourishing organization that I believe is a thought-provoking example of a conscious integration organization. It works to a quadruple bottom line of financial, social, environmental and spiritual, with the spiritual basis of wisdom and compassion as the fundamental and non-negotiable orientation.