Ken Wilber on Integral Business

An Excerpt from A Theory of Everything – An Integral Vision for Business, Politics, Science and Spirituality by Ken Wilber

Applications  of  the  holonic  model  have  recently  exploded  in  business, perhaps, again, because the applications are so immediate and obvious. The quadrants give the four “environments” or dimensions in which a product must  survive,  and  the  levels  give  the  types  of  values  that  will  be  both producing  and  buying  the  product.  Research  into  the values hierarchy—such  as  Maslow’s  and  Graves’s  (e.g.,  Spiral  Dynamics),  which has already  had an  enormous  influence  on  business and  “VALS”—can  be combined  with  the  quadrants  (which  show  how  these  levels  of  values appear  in  the  four  different  environments)  to  give  a  truly comprehensive map  of  the  marketplace  (which  covers  both  traditional  markets  and cybermarkets).  Of  course,  this  can  be  used  in  a  cynical  and  manipulative way—business,  after  all,  is  business—but  it  can  also  be  used  in  an enlightened  and  efficient  fashion  to  more  fruitfully  match  human  beings with needed products and services (thus promoting the health of the overall spiral).

Moreover, management  and  leadership  training programs, based on an integral  model,  have  also  begun  to  flourish.  Daryl  Paulson,  in “Management:  A  Multidimensional/Multilevel  Perspective,”  shows  that there  are  four  major  theories  of  business  management  (Theory  X,  which stresses  individual  behavior;  Theory  Y,  which  focuses  on  psychological understanding;  cultural  management,  which  stresses  organizational culture; and systems management, which emphasizes the social system and its governance). Paulson then shows that these four management theories are in fact the four quadrants, and that an integral model would necessarily include  all  four  approaches.  He  then  moves  to  the  “all-level”  part,  and suggests  a  simplified  but  very  useful  four  stages  that  the  quadrants  go through, with specific suggestions for implementing a more “all-quadrant, all- level” management.

Other  pioneers  in  this area  include  Geoffrey  Gioja  and  JMJ  Associates, whose  Integral  Leadership  seminars  (which  use  three levels  in  the  four quadrants) have been presented to dozens of  Fortune500 companies (“We believe that until recently, the transformational approach of organizational change  has  been  the  unmatched  champion  for  producing  breakthroughs, both  subjective  and  objective.

We  now  assert  that  the  transformational approach  has  been  eclipsed  by  the  integral  approach.”);  John  Forman  of R.W. Beck Associates, who uses an all-quadrant, all-level approach to supplement  (and  correct  the  flatland  distortions  of)  systems  and complexity  theory;  On  Purpose  Associates  (John  Cleveland,  Joann Neuroth, Pete Plastrik, Deb Plastrik); Bob Anderson, Jim Stuart, and Eric Klein  (co-author  of Awakening  Corporate  Soul), whose  Leadership Circle  brings  an  all-quadrant,  all-level  approach  to  “Integral Transformation and Leadership” (“The main point is that the evolution of all of these streams of development in all of the quadrants are intimately bound up with each other. Spiritual intelligence is literacy in the practice of  transformation.  Spiritual  intelligence  is  fast  becoming  a  leadership imperative.”);  Leo  Burke,  Director  and  Dean  of  Motorola’s  University College  of  Leadership  and  Transcultural  Studies,  who  oversees  the training  of  some  20,000  managers  around  the  world;  Ian  Mitroff (A Spiritual  Audit  of  Corporate  America);  Ron  Cacioppe  and  Simon Albrecht  (“Developing  Leadership  and  Management  Skills  Using  the Holonic Model and 360 Degree Feedback Process”); Don Beck of Spiral Dynamics, which has been used in situations totaling literally hundreds of  thousands  of  people;  and  Jim  Loehr  and  Tony  Schwartz,  who  are working  with  an  all-quadrant,  all-level  approach  coupled  with  very specific  change  technologies  built  around  the  optimal  management  of energy—physical,  emotional,  and  mental.  Tony  is  now writes  the monthly  Life/Work  column  for Fast  Company  and  can  be  contacted there. All of the above individuals have joined theInstitute of Integral Business, along with Deepak Chopra, Joe Firmage (Project Voyager), Bob Richards (Clarus), Sam Bercholz (Shambhala), Fred Kofman, Bill Torbert, Warren Bennis, and numerous others.