Thomas Kuhn first made popular the notion of paradigms. He argued his case for \”the structure of scientific revolutions.\”
He made popular the notion of \”paradigm shifts.\”He also proposed that paradigms shift when exemplars begin to operate and disclose the new worldview or new meta-paradigms.
He also argued using \”the Einsteinian revolution\” as a demonstrable fact of a paradigm shift. Kuhn was a cultural and paradigmatic leader for those in the knowledge industry.
He unpacked the languge of science for the ordinary learner. He gave a language for those in the field of knowledge but focused on the domains of scientific discovery.
He even suggested that such shifts in worldviews may have been the equivalent of \”religious conversions\” for the person proposing that shift in perspective.
Last week was for me one of the most eventful and busy weeks since my optional retirement. First I was in Penang presenting my views on the topic of \”exploring learning and leadership in Asia\” conference, or ELLTA1; the first ever global conference on these two important knowledge domains, and hosted by USM and focused on Asia\’s contributions.
And of course, from my observation, the paradigm leadership for this new strategic initiative was provided by a multi-ethnic team of people but one of the prime movers was a true blue \”towering Malaysian; who has consistently been described as an inspirational leaders by many others.\” Those interested can find out from me who this is.
New directions
What I learned at that Conference of \”true believers\” from all over the world was that leadership and learning are not text-book affairs; they involve thought leadership, heart leadership, and courageous, convictional leadership of taking, setting and moving in new directions, even when the rest of the followership cannot see or even understand this new direction.
Congratulations, ELLTA Organisers; please count me in as a follower of your movement!
My learning about leadership did not stop there. I flew back and rushed to another leadership retreat by the UCSI University leadership team at the Palace of the Golden Horses; a good location to learn about leadership.
At the UCSI retreat I learnt, probably for the first time, what the BOS strategic shift or strategic moves in thinking are all about!
BOS stands for the new wave of thinking and doing pioneered by two European professors – one who is Korean and the other French. UCSI also happens to be the regional centre for BOS for about 10 nations; stretching from Canada to New Zealand.
My learning about BOS truly began with our new vice-chancellor; who was born in Penang, grew up in Singapore and now lives somewhere between China, India and Malaysia.
He is probably the clearest mind I have met in the field of applied knowledge!
Applied knowledge can be an oxymoron to many people; how can you apply all the knowledge in one\’s head, would be the question.
That may be precisely my point; one can only apply what is in one\’s head and heart, and not just the head!
What is only in the head, I would call information; what is also in the heart, I would call knowledge but these combined with the experience of time and space becomes wisdom!
Therefore wise leadership can solve problems anywhere in the world using their experience and knowledge!
What else did I learn at the UCSI Summit for the leadership team? I learned that individuals at best can only describe the part of the elephant or the BIG PICTURE that they know!
This fits into the folklore of the blind men and the elephant. Each could only describe what they learned about by touch and maybe taste, but not by sight. Vision requires sight. Obviously the only one in the story, God, if you like, was the one who could see and tell the whole story. All the rest were blind followers!
Paradigm leadership is often like this mythic analogy of the story of the blind men (why no women?) and the elephant.
Only the King who told the story had paradigm leadership because in the days of old leadership was often defined by hierarchy or station in life. The King could see and no others had 20-20 vision. But today we are in the world of the emperor without clothes!
Mythic story
This is another mythic story which captures another dimension of paradigm leadership. When the emperor has no clothes, as advised on dressing by his wise assistants and tailors, only the small 10-year old could see and speak the truth; the whole truth and nothing but the truth!
Much like in Cairo, or Indonesia then, or Malaysia now, leaders giving advice cannot see beyond their private interest for self-survival at a sub-optimising level.
Paradigm leadership always requires setting new directions which followership, and some advisors included, cannot see or understand but the new leadership team must ignore it at their own peril, as President Mubarak found out and many others in the Middle East are beginning to find out!
Paradigm leadership often makes requisite the move in strategic new directions for new value creation and cost reduction.
When value is up and costs down, all the people will experience a shift in paradigms and learn to see things in whole new ways which we then describe as a paradigm shift!
Cairo, Malaysia, and all of Middle East is undergoing a fundamental and paradigmatic period of a structure shift at the ground level of the tsunami-kind; of questioning of the desire for democratic and popular values.
But, one can argue, as Tun Mahathir has often done in the past (but not anymore), that democratic values are needed and requisite but not sufficient.
Such systems that face apparent chaos must also have stable and good visionary leadership which can help the ship captain steer the ship through turbulent waters, or what my chairman, Peter Vaill, would call \”under whitewater rafting conditions.\”
Whitewater rafting conditions require new and bold leadership models which define new and clear directions, and which guarantee ordinary people a clear new value proposition, and which definitely costs less.
For one example, the building of a brand new MRT system in this day and age, which is not benchmarked upon the Singapore experience and excellence with MRT-development would be a categorical disaster, and another paradigm-shift type revolution waiting to happen, right here in Malaysia!
The leadership of Spad has zero clothes for this kind of new leadership and there seems to be a design-flaw right from the beginning!
May God bless Malaysia with real paradigm leadership!
