Lunettes,

I have written this reflection in two parts. The first highlights some of my most significant learnings
related to my own individual development and continuing cultivation of self-as-instrument. The second
part focuses on my theory of practice. I wanted to spend time thinking about this because we have
been prompted with the inquiry about our own point of view and perspective on OD many times, but
never explicitly tasked with writing one out. I felt that it was important for me to reflect both on the
personal and the professional aspects of my learnings, even though it feels wrong to segment those out
now, since we all know they are really one in the same.

My Individual Development
The principle of self-as-instrument holds that we must know ourselves to the point that we understand
our actions cleanly and clearly, and can when needed, suspend ourselves in service of others. From
our entire MSOD experience the most resonant and profound learning has been the deep and
pervasive impact of my own patterns, and the power I can cultivate when I master those patterns.
There are two specific learnings that stand out in this area.

The first pattern emerged early in the program through the inner committee exercise we did in Intensive
1, but manifested fully in Costa Rica. This pattern is rooted in my high standards and drive for
achievement. Beginning in Intensive 1, I began to explore my pattern of the high standards I hold for
myself and how they shape my relationships. The three inner committee members who play the biggest
role in this tension are my Inner Critic, and My Good Student. My Good Student values
competence, preparedness, and quality. I strive to make those conditions true for myself always, but
the lifelong process of being called out by others for those characteristics has made me hide them in
ways that are uncomfortable and inauthentic. In that process I developed a habit of avoiding attention
for my performance and my successes, because of an unconscious fear that by virtue of being
recognized by others I will become isolated from them.

I first identified this in pattern in Pajaro, and its impact was more fully understood in Intensive 3, through
our experience in consulting work. In Costa Rica, I realized just how far these patterns go back through
my life. Since early childhood many of my experiences have made me believe that when I show
confidence, others will act in ways that take it away from me, and that has led to a long history of
diminishing myself, feeding my own Inner Critic as a form of self-preservation. This awareness feels
freeing to me in a huge way. I don't feel like I have broken this pattern, but I feel that I am developing a
deeper awareness of it and beginning the journey towards mastering a part of me that has caused me a
great deal of pain over the course of my life.

The second key learning related to my own personal development is around the integration of my whole
self. A significant part of my work in the program has been around accessing and engaging more parts
of myself beyond the intellectual. Primarily, I have been focusing on emotional expression, but spiritual
connection, and physical wellbeing, and intuition has all come together in this work as well. In Intensive
1 when we worked with SPINE, I appreciated it, but I didn't leverage the model as must as I saw others
do for the rest of the program. However, when I left my job at the end of 2017, something clearly shifted
inside of me, and for a while I couldn't articulate what it was. This week, when I read Abi’s letter to me
about my growth and progress with expressing my emotions, she shared how much she has seen me
lean into my intuition, as a way to support and balance out my intellectual strengths. Throughout this
program intuition is not something I have thought too much about, nor did it stand out to me in our work
with SPINE, and yet it is there, and is emerging in a way that others in my life see it.

In reflecting on how this could be, I realized that when I left my job, when I slowed down and took a
deep breath, I unconsciously made more space in my life for my whole self. I no longer had to be
intellectually correct, over-prepared, or flawlessly competent, as I had felt the pressure to be in my job,
and in most of my life up until that point. When you take an achiever out of an environment where goals
are pre-determined and performance is expected to fit in a specific box, a totally new paradigm
emerges. For the first time I slowed down and asked myself what I, independent of anyone or anything
else, wanted to accomplish. In this new state I find my self to be more calm, more prepared, and more
at peace with the way things are.

I think I spent a good deal of time, in this program and before, under-appreciating all the parts of
myself, focusing on one to “work on”, and while that work has been rich and good and life changing,
when I made more space in my life to simply be, so much more richness appeared and has flourished
in and around me. I am grateful for this experience and this realization because it helps me to value my
full self and not think about my continued development in a compartmentalized way, as I was when we
began this program.

My OD Practice and Point of View

Over the course of our MSOD journey I have had various points of view on my practice. Each session
has brought new and different information to help shape my own beliefs about what is most important in
this work. As we near the end of our experience, I feel confident in my central beliefs, as they have
been proven relevant many times in our consulting experience. These beliefs make up my current point
of view on the work of OD. To make this summary more relevant and actionable for me, I use my
beliefs to identify capabilities I must continue to focus on in order to be most effective. This process
produced the description of my practice below.

The organizational dynamics we encounter and seek to work with as OD practitioners are created by
the behaviors of individuals in the system. These behaviors are rooted in the individual’s interior
experience, and are often enacted unconsciously, thus allowing problematic organizational dynamics to
persist and evolve. To effectively work with these dynamics I must have three essential capacities:

1. An intimate understanding of my own individual experience, such that I can suspend myself, in
service of being fully present with those I am working with
2. The ability to hold space for individuals and groups, using essential process consultation, inquiry,
and facilitation skills to help groups surface dynamics and work through them collectively
3. A clear understanding of the implications of my choices as a practitioner operating in complex
systems, and how I define, shape and change the system through my participation

My ability to live into these capacities as an OD practitioner rests on three key assumptions or beliefs
about organizational life and consultation:

1. I cannot effectively be present with another person when I am unclear about my own state,
motivations, perceptions and needs. For this reason, my own individual development is paramount
to effective consultation.
2. Individuals often use processes and structures to mitigate natural anxiety that we experience in
groups. Processes and structures often serve to suppress the dynamics of a group, and cause
more individual and collective pain in the process. As a consultant I must question these process
and structures to effectively explore the tensions they create in organizations.
3. Effective organization development consulting cannot occur in a strictly diagnostic model in which
the consultant assumes or is given the “expert” role. Organizations exist in systems that are too
complex and contextual for any one “expert” solution, recommendation, or prescription to be
successful. I must become a partner, not an expert.
4. Because of the scale of complexity and rapid change, I will never be able to fully understand an
organizational system. I must therefore, be aware of the choices I make regarding where I focus my
attention in a consultation, as that will shape the way I come to understand the organization and
ultimately the impact I have.
5. Paradox is inherent in organizational life. There is never one right or absolute answer.
I will continue to refine this theory of practice as I learn and engage, but I do believe that many of these
core principles will remain the same. Similarly, I will continue to work on and learn about myself, but I
do believe that some of the foundational patterns I have discovered through this program will remain
cornerstones of my personal development. The work is never done, and while we are ending our time
together in this program, I also in some ways feel like this is just the beginning…

I will always be endlessly grateful for you all and the role you have played, and will continue to play in
my own deeply meaningful journey to what matters.

Love Always,
Hans