Systemic management · Damien Légère’s perspective

Welcome to the Systemic Management department of Complexe Systémique

Come to think of it, the name “Department” is rather surprising!

We could just as well have called it a hub.
A hub is a point of convergence, a place of expertise. That could make sense for Complexe Systémique, which seeks to sharpen our understanding of management through a systemic lens.

We could have called it a unit.
That term is usually associated with a function, with services delivered: an administrative unit, a training unit, a support unit…

Yet our project aims to be much broader.

There is reflection.
Transmission.
Experimentation.
Support for organisations.
In short, the desire to develop a systemic way of thinking about management.

We could also have called it a laboratory. And that would have suited us rather well.

Because we are engaged in an ongoing exploration of systemic management. We do not claim to hold a definitive method. We want to experiment, bring practices into dialogue, observe what happens and develop our ways of thinking about management.

And yet we chose to call it a Department.

A department is a living territory, bordered by other living territories. Indeed, Complexe Systémique will have other departments, such as Parenting, Disability and Territorial Innovation… So our department will not live in isolation.

So welcome to the Department of Systemic Management.

A department is necessarily a distinctive territory. Come with me, and I will show you around!

A territory does not exist through its geography alone. It exists through the relationships between those who live there.

Today, there are already five villages bearing the names Julien, Yara, Marie-Anne, Claudio and Damien. Some are villages or small towns, others are hamlets. Some houses echo with children’s laughter, others are rich with the life experience of those who live in them.

Like all human beings, we are nomads. We all come from elsewhere, and we all live on this earth only for a while. We do not all arrive by the same road, across the same seas. We come from different countries and different professions, with histories, experiences and sensibilities of our own. Our buildings bear witness to different architectures and different kinds of knowledge. Our paths end up meeting here, but the point is not to make everything uniform; it is to bring our differences to life.

And when they meet, something can emerge that none of us, alone, could have seen.

We have not learned the same languages: not only the ones we speak, but also those of our professions and of our cultures, shaped by industrial, non-profit, social or medico-social settings. Sometimes, behind the same word, we do not put exactly the same idea. So we will have to translate, clarify our terms, compare our representations and discover what brings us together and what sets us apart.

There are also different accents. Listening also means knowing how to keep silent. Not an empty silence, nor a noisy silence in which, even as we listen, we are preparing our reply. No, a genuine silence that gives words room to take shape and thoughts room to form. A silence that accepts not knowing, so that new thinking can come about.

There are also different landscapes. Plains and hills. Because we do not all look at management from the same place. From our side of the hill, we do not necessarily see the same thing as our neighbours do from theirs. A point of view is always the view from a point! So let us dare to occupy different points of view. Let us climb higher, come back down into the valley, look from the other bank.

There is also a river. It crosses our landscapes, takes in tributaries, meets obstacles and winds through meanders. It reminds us that movement cannot be decreed and that the paths of change are rarely straight. Management is a complex process. A river always finds its way to an estuary in the end. Let us trust the processes that drive systems.

A river depends on a whole ecology. It is not just a flow of water. It is movement within groundwater; it runs down hillsides; it is fed by wind and moisture, by rain and sun. From a systemic point of view, management does not rest on the professional context alone. The question of burnout reminds us of this: every professional belongs to several environments that meet one another.

Together we are going to travel the length and breadth of systemic management. We are not arriving with a ready-made map. Rather, we are going to learn how to map.

We will also have to observe the fauna and flora of management. The species that live side by side, those that protect themselves, those that compete, those that have learned to live together and those that appear when an environment changes.

Ultimately, we share the same curiosity to discover what is at play in organisations: what holds them together, what sets them in motion, what throws them off course and what can enable them to evolve.

We do not know in advance what all these encounters will produce. And that is probably what makes our adventure interesting. We do not know exactly where we will end up. As our friend Bernard Geberowicz says: “When you are lost, don’t ask for directions. You might not get lost!” The most interesting thing will not be knowing where we have arrived, but looking at what happened along the way.

This department is not a destination. It is a territory to travel through, explore, map and develop.

Regularly, each of us will send a postcard from our village.

A way of sending news, of sharing what we observe, what puzzles us and what we are experimenting with in systemic management.

Little by little, these postcards will be able to create links between our villages and give rise to shared reflection.

And perhaps one day we will hold village markets to come together, compare our experiences, share our practices and circulate ideas. This could take the form of a conference, training days or other kinds of gathering.

Because a department is not only a territory to discover; it is also a territory to bring to life. So welcome to our department, welcome to this landscape that we will go on discovering together.