Spaciousness
Research report on spaciousness
A fascinating new research report on spaciousness has just been published: ‘Permission to Pause: Rediscovering ‘spaciousness’ at work’ by Professor Megan Reitz and John Higgins. It highlights not only what spaciousness is, but also its place and value in organisational life.
Two modes of behaving: doing and spacious
The researchers highlight two different modes of behaving: ‘doing’ (paying attention to action, achievement, productivity and the like – the territory of busyness) and ‘spacious’ (attention is focused on enquiry and exploration, interdependence and relationship). Their research separates busyness from flourishing, revealing one of the underlying principles that this work rests on: that busyness and flourishing are mutually exclusive: you can’t flourish if you’re caught up only with doing, achieving, producing.
Busyness
Busyness seems to be part of the entrenched culture in many systems and organisations, say Reitz and Higgins, to the extent that it is worn as a badge of honour, a status symbol, regardless of its utility or appropriateness. Not only that, but it seems to be spreading, militating against the kind of thoughtfulness that helps ensure that action is the right action. We get seduced into looking as though we’re busy, for fear that we might be judged as deficient in some way, simply because we may be reflecting or working through resolving a problem. The jacket on the back of the chair, outside normal working hours, purporting to suggest a hard-working employee (rather than an overworking employee) suggests a sense of shame should that employee be thought of as ‘not busy enough’.
Interdependencies and relationships
This intense focus on task risks missing the point that can be revealed through double-loop learning: ‘Are we doing the right things?’. It inhibits clarity of view in relation to interdependencies and relationships – those systemic factors that help to account for organisational health and flourishing if attention is paid to them, and that illuminate the complexity that is an inevitable part of organisational life. It clouds what is both present and what may be emergent, hiding it from sight, paving the way for shocks and surprises. It inhibits creativity and innovation. As Reitz and Higgins say: ‘Without the ‘spacious mode’, our ‘doing mode’ is impoverished, misdirected and occasionally absurd and harmful. The widespread absence of spaciousness means we cannot truly innovate, develop trust, transform, find meaning, or maintain physical and mental health’.
A definition of spaciousness
They define spaciousness as: ‘An expansive and unhurried attention where we are neither grasping towards the next moment, nor running away from the previous one. We are aware of our interconnection with the world around us, free from the expectations of how we need to be and what needs to happen next, curious and open to potential’ and they stress that spaciousness is about attention, not time, and it’s about a way of being, rather than a tool or an instrument or action.
Mindfulness and psychological safety
There’s much here that brings to mind for me both mindfulness (paying attention on purpose, in the present moment and without judgment) and psychological safety (the belief that it’s safe to take the interpersonal risk of speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns or mistakes because you won’t be criticised, undermined, humiliated or punished for it.) In environments of psychological safety questions are appreciated, ideas are welcomed, and errors and failures can be explored and discussed. Neither mindfulness nor psychological safety easily accommodate measurable outcomes – but they underpin behaviours that boost measurable outcomes because they allow attention to be directed to where it’s really needed, rather than being constrained by any pressure or expectation of ‘success’ or ‘achievement’.
I’m struck, too, that spaciousness seems to enshrine effective listening – not as doing but as a way of relating to others.
Emergent and interconnected
The doing mode is of course valid – but it isn’t sufficient on its own for organisational health. In the spacious mode, as Reitz and Higgins say, ‘we see the world around us as dynamic and relational …. The ‘things’ of the doing mode are seen in the spacious mode as emergent, interconnected, processes rather than fixed and standalone objects. The spacious mode brings into focus interdependencies and how we impact and are impacted by others and the world around us.’
Our world is becoming increasingly complex, and complexity isn’t best dealt with by seeing it as composed of discrete objects, in serial relationship with each other. We need to seek, allow for and see the interdependencies, we need to take multiple perspectives, we need to tolerate – indeed welcome – uncertainty and the fact that ways forward may emerge gradually and in relationship with each other. Premature definitive decisions and action planning may offer only part of an appropriate approach. Spaciousness enables more of the bigger picture to become clear.
How to introduce spaciousness into organisations?
I’m wondering: given that spaciousness is counter-cultural in many organisations, because it doesn’t necessarily provide immediate solutions or output, how can it be introduced if we think it furthers the organisation’s agenda? Of course, it isn’t only a way of being for teams and groups. It’s also a way of being that we as individuals can offer to ourselves – space, time and ease to reflect, to enquire into, to notice, to become aware (which, of course is what coaching offers). Can it perhaps be encouraged as a facet of effective leadership? Can it become a way for a team to be – to be with each other and with others on a broader basis, rather than a token of productivity?
And the irony is that the most effective way of introducing spaciousness into a resistant organisation is to create spaciousness in order to welcome this new concept, to explore it, to experiment with it, to enquire into it, and to hold it lightly.
Spaciousness for the report
This research report is rich and has considerable depth. It offers rewards to those who can create the spaciousness to read it and engage with it.
Photo by Maria Teneva on Unsplash
