Immunity to Change

Robert Kegan
Lisa Laskow Lahey
Human Capability is the critical VARIABLE not FIXED
Mismatch between the world complexity and ours; either reduce world complexity or
increase ours. This calls for a CHANGE
Age and Mental Complexity – the Revised View
Trajectory of mental development in adulthood
 Mental Complexity – what it is not

 It is not the IQ X
 It is not about developing more abstract, abstruse apprehension X
 Not How smart your are in the ordinary sense of word X
 Not about whether you are able to understand a blackboard full of complex
equations X
3 Plateaus in adult mental development
3 Plateaus in adult mental development
Socialized Mind – Information Flow at Work

 Maintains alignment with important others

 Strongly influenced by what it believes others want to hear
 Also how information is received and attended to
 Highly influenced by and sensitive to what it picks up
 Faithful follower and a team player
Self-authoring Mind – Information Flow at
Work
 What I send is a function of what I think others want to hear which will best further my
agenda/plans
 Getting behind the wheel (self-authoring) in order to drive my agenda
 Places a priority on what kind of information it wants to receive, which is relevant to my
plan
 Much better at rejecting information that is not relevant – has a filter
 Capacity for focus, distinguishing important from the urgent, best use of its time
 Includes the socialized mind, and transcends it
 What if one’s agenda is flawed, or the world changes in a way that the agenda becomes
obsolete ?
Self-transforming Mind – Information Flow at
Work
 Values one’s own stance, or plan , at the same time wary about it too
 Aware that time and the world is in motion
 Not only advances own agenda but also allows information for critical evaluation and
modification
 Not just enquiring within the design, but also inquires about the design itself
 They let others know that information that challenges their design is welcome
 Includes and transcends self-authoring mind
Technical v/s adaptive – Change Challenges…

 Technical Challenges – need technical skills necessary to perform tasks, complex

or otherwise
 Adaptive Challenges – challenges that cannot be met with technical skills.
 Need a mindset shift. Challenges that VUCA world poses
 Addresses the gap between real world complexity and our own mental
complexity
 Takes the focus from the ‘problem’ to the ‘person with the problem’
 Developing the Complexity of Mind - Adaptive
Challenges
 Adaptive formulation of the problem –
 How exactly the challenge comes up against the current limits of our own
mental complexity
 Adaptive solution – we ourselves need to adapt in some way