Systems thinking and leadership in organizational change

Systems Thinking: Leadership & Change

Systems thinking may be differentiated from traditional analysis of the organization in that analysis concentrates upon the whole instead of analysis of the parts of the system. The work of Peter Senge is reviewed in this work in relation to systems thinking, leadership change, and leadership in the learning organization. Dialogue is stressed in the work of Senge to be a critical component of effective leadership. Also reviewed are others works related to systems thinking and the basic principles behind this type of system analysis. Regardless of the authors in the area of systems thinking, the work of Peter Senge serves as a guide as his work is referenced throughout other works on systems thinking. Peter Senge views leadership as going beyond the mere physical and inspirational in that it must take on a spiritual aspect in order to communicate a vision with clarity and to incite enthusiasm and commitment within the organization. Senge states that the learning organization is one that is perpetually changing and growing and states that personal mastery means knowing that one has never 'arrived' at the destination and further that personal mastery is a paradox of knowing ones' shortcomings while at the same time being characterized by a deep levels of self-confidence but that this paradox only exists for those who fail to understand that it is the journey that is important as the goal is never actually reached due to striving for continual improvement.