Module 11 independence versus interdependence. In Europe before the Renaissance, the idea of individuality wasn't considered a good thing. People lived on farms and groups of people were far more important than the individual. This is why a person's family name was often more important than the first name. Since then, the idea of independence has become more important so that most people even think of the notion of dependency as a bad thing. However, now that the internet and high speed forms of travel and communications have become the norm, the idea of independence as the best form of social organizing is being supplanted by a new notion of interdependence.
What is interdependence? The concept of interdependence is a recognition that everything and everyone is interconnected. It's different from the dependence because dependence implies a power dynamic. A person who is dependent on someone or something else is under that other entities power. interdependency, on the other hand, suggests that we are all mutually Relying on each other. A company is a good example of interdependence at work.
The CEO relies upon customers and the workers at the company as much as they rely upon the CEO. Take any one group out of the equation and the company will fail. When you come into work each day, consider the clothes you're wearing, someone had to make them. Instead of the roads you drive upon, or the subway system that you ride to get to work. Someone else built this. If you work in an office, consider the level of cleanliness and organization that is there.
This helps you to improve your own productivity and performance. On some level, you do some work to keep it organized, but this most likely other people do that work so that you may be more productive. This also goes both ways just as you rely upon other people in order to live a productive life. Others would not be able to succeed in their lives without your efforts, insisting upon independence and individuality ignores the notion that we are all in this together. Systems Theory systems theory is a fairly recent mode of understanding information. Our previous way of looking at the world tended to emphasize objects or things.
In order to understand something better, scientists would break that thing down into smaller parts. The principle idea in systems theory is that while the practice is useful, it ignores certain important forms of information. Systems Theory looks at things as they exist in context with other things. Often, scientists taking this approach are as interested in the interactions and processes between things in a system as they are in the things themselves. Obviously, this is an abstract concept, but it is important when you consider how we interact with each other. If the interaction is as important as the people involved in the interaction, then each interaction becomes a unique event.
It's a lot harder to see people in terms of good and bad when each interaction is a unique experience. For example, if a customer has recently experienced the trauma this might bear on that customer's interaction with a customer service representative. However, what could be a difficult situation in that context does not mean that in another country This customer will be difficult. It is difficult to remember this because often a negative encounter can have repercussions for our general well being. But it's important to remember how an environment can affect an interaction without defining any participant in that interaction. More than the sum of all parts.
Proponents of systems theory recognize that we can only look at things in terms of a framework, anything we observe will be largely determined by what frame we choose to view it in. This is what is meant by the system in systems theory. Another idea is that at certain levels of organization, a characteristic can emerge that wasn't present in other levels of organization. For example, we can scientifically describe the chemicals involved in brain processes that account for dreams. But we cannot by that description account for the content of dreams. The actual dream itself can be considered an emergent property of the chemicals in the brain.
Another example is that a computer uses binary code to generate all of its processes including the letters on the You see here, but it is a code a shorthand, whereas the letters and the meanings of the sentences are emergent properties. This is relevant to consider when you think of teams. It has been said that a team is more than the sum of its parts. And this is the very principle of emergent properties in action. team building, the fast food industry has the same aces in their places. This means that since not everyone can be good at everything, a good team will consist of people who are good or bad at a wide range of things.
We're working together you allow each team members strengths to come out while minimizing their weaknesses by covering for each other. Here are some suggestions for how to work better together and allow your team to be more than the sum of its parts. Identify each team members role. When people are allowed to play to their strengths. This increases the team's overall success. Identify group weaknesses, figuring out where you need to improve as a group as soon as you recognize them helps they keep on Sources of conflict from snowballing.
Play together, enjoying each other's company outside of a work setting helps to improve performance in the work setting. When you get to know each other better you develop a team chemistry recognize group successes. In work settings. Acknowledging when a team is doing well helps to motivate both that team and other teams as well. mediate internal disputes. Whenever you collaborate and are invested in the results, it is inevitable that disputes will arise.
When possible try to resolve disputes in house. Sometimes, however, a dispute may be so polarizing that you need to involve outside mediation. One way to head off to speeds before they get out of hand is to have in place good procedures and practices for conflict management. developing these ahead of time make sure that everyone knows what steps to take when conflicts arise. Words from the wise William Shakespeare this above To thine own self be true, and it must follow as the night the day thou canst not then be false to any man. Elizabeth Gilbert, we search for happiness everywhere, but we are like Tolstoy, he's fabled beggar who spent his life sitting on a pot of gold under him the whole time.
Your treasure your perfection is within you already. But to claim it, you must leave the by commotion of the mind and abandon the desires of the ego and enter into the silence of the heart. Billie Jean King, I think self awareness is probably the most important thing towards being a champion, Lao Tzu, one who knows others is wise one who knows the self is enlightened