Did I Walk Out to Walk On?

A while back, I received an email from my alma mater advising me that I had been nominated for a Distinguished Alumni Award.

While I know it was an incredible honour and should have been excited, I didn’t feel I deserved it.

I know that I work hard, have taken risks, and have had some success. However, my track record with employers and sometimes painful climb up the corporate ladder left much to be desired. That and my lack of staying power are reflected in a sketchy and eclectic employment history.

Although I’m now happily self-employed, I left a job with the City of Niagara Falls after seven years and lasted 12 years at Niagara College. My work at Alberta Recreation and Parks Association ended after six. Prior to that, I left both Bell Canada and the Investors Group. In each case, it seemed it was time.

As I left each workplace, it seemed some weren’t at all surprised, whereas others left me with the distinct impression they were disappointed that I had bailed.

However, I’ve had cause to rethink and learn that perhaps my reasons for leaving were something else entirely. That “something else” was made more explicit in a brilliant and enlightening Ted Talk by a woman named Deborah Frieze.

Frieze began her Ted Talk by bluntly stating, “The way we are trying to change the world is not going to work, and it’s never going to work.”

Instead, she offered a radical theory of change suggesting that you can’t fundamentally change big systems; you can only abandon them and start over or offer hospice to what’s dying.

By big systems, she was referring to education, healthcare, government, business, or anything characterized by over-organization, standardization, regulation, and compliance. And contrary to what the experts are saying, Frieze suggests we can’t undo, fix, reverse-engineer, redirect, or reassign these systems. This is due, she goes on to say, because “They’re not machines, they’re living systems…and the world is not causal, linear, and predictable. Instead, any system involving humans is complex, emergent, and unpredictable.”

It’s no wonder our systems are not responding to well-meaning change efforts.

The living system map Frieze provides—and the one responsible for helping me better understand my own checkered path—suggests that all living systems rise, peak, and then decline. At the peak, signs of decline appear. It is at this point that alternatives to the dominant system appear.

Frieze calls these alternatives “walkouts.” As someone who turned her back on several dominant systems to experiment with something new, I definitely fit the category. Of course, it’s not enough to walk out and risk feeling ignored, invisible, and lonely because, as she suggests, walkouts or trailblazers need to connect, exchange information, and learn from one another or risk being crushed by the dominant systems seeking self-preservation.

As local walkouts connect and learn from one another, they can create new systems that could replace the old order.

In addition to the Walkouts or Trailblazers, Frieze suggests three additional roles each of us can play.

The “hospice workers” stay inside failing systems to provide thoughtful and compassionate care to what’s dying as the new system evolves. Their role is to help the dying focus on the transition and to guide us through.

The “illuminators” are the storytellers who shine a light on the trailblazing efforts to create something new. They can patiently maintain grace in the face of resistance and criticism as they help others see new approaches for what they are, what’s possible, and what our new world could be.

Lastly, there are those who have been successful in the dominant systems and have access to power and resources that can advance pioneering efforts. These are the dedicated and thoughtful revolutionaries who use their relationships and influence as “protectors” to create an oasis where people can innovate.

No one best role provides answers. Instead, new systems require the trailblazers, hospice workers, illuminators, and protectors to work together.

As a vocalist or, as I describe myself, a community builder, Frieze has made it clear we can’t rely on others to fix the systems. Instead, each of us needs to take small local actions alongside others who share our visions and dreams.

While it was never her intent, she also helped me understand that maybe, just maybe, my history of walking out might be a good thing. It may have even been the impetus for the nomination. Regardless, I’m grateful to Deborah Frieze for her astute observations and theory of change.     

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View the Ted Talk by Deborah Frieze at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jTdZSPBRRE&t=245s

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