The Rocky Flats experience of managing for success using Heliotropic Abundance

1. MAKING THE IMPOSSIBLE POSSIBLE
Applying Heliotropic Abundance for creating
Program and Project Management processes
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3. Making the Impossible Possible, Kim Cameron and Marc Lavine, 2006
Lessons learned from the cleanup of America’s most
dangerous Nuclear Weapons Plan

4. Abundance Principle of Management
 Strive for positive deviance, pursuing the best of the
human condition and working to fulfill the highest
potential of the organization.
 Focuses on:
 Resilience
 Flourishing
 Vitality
 Extraordinarily positive individual and organizational
outcomes
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5. The Ordinary Approach to Change†
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 Identify and define the problem accurately.
 Generate alternate solutions to the problem based
on root causes so that convergence on a solution is
not premature.
 Focus on evaluating and selecting the best
alternative.
 Implement the chosen alternative solution and follow
up to ensure that the problem or obstacle is
resolved.
† Leading Change, John Kotter Harvard Business School Press, 1996
Organization Change: Theory and Practice, W. W. Burke, Sage, 2002
A Primer on Decision Making: How Decisions Happen, J. G. March, Free Press, 1994
Smart Thinking for Crazy Times: The Art of Solving the Right Problems, I. I. Mitroff, Berrett–Koehler, 1998

6. The Abundance Approach
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 Abundance is not a substitute for ordinary
management – it is a supplement for the problem
solving approach.
 Abundance focuses on:
 Closing the gaps between acceptable performance
and spectacular performance.
 Emphasizes positively deviant accomplishments rather
than normal or expected accomplishments.
 Positive possibilities rather than deficits.

7. Conventional Principles versus Abundance
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Conventional Principles Abundance Principles
General Leadership Principles
 Problem solving and deficit gaps  Virtuousness and abundance gaps
 A single heroic leader  Multiple leaders playing multiple roles
 One leader from the beginning to end  A continuity of leaders
 Congruence and consistency  Paradox and contradiction
Principles Related to Visionary and Symbolic Leadership
 Logical, rational, and sensible visions – with
SMART goals
 Symbolic, emotional, and meaningful –
with profound purpose
 Consistency, stability, and predictability  Revolution and positive deviance
 Personal benefits and advantages  Meaningfulness beyond personal benefits
 Organizations absorb the risks of failure
and benefits of success
 Employees share the risks of failure and
rewards for success

8. Conventional Principles versus Abundance
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Conventional Principles Abundance Principles
Careful, Clear, and Controlled Leadership
 Organizational change at the expense of
the people
 Organizational change for the benefit of
the people
 Commitments and priorities based on
environmental demands
 Unalterable commitments and integrity at
all costs
 Managing the contract, attaching resources
to performance
 Managing the contract and ensuring stable
funding
 Ultimate responsibility and accountability
for measureable success at the top
 Responsibility and accountability for
measureable success for everyone

9. Conventional Principles versus Abundance
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Conventional Principles Abundance Principles
Collaboration, Engagement, and Participation
 Building on and reinforcing the current
culture
 Introducing challenges that the culture
cannot address
 Decision making and leadership at the top
 Employee and management in
partnerships in planning, decision making,
training, evaluation, and discipline
 Need–to–know information sharing and
physical separation
 Early, frequent, and abundant information
sharing with colocation
 Long–term employment, personal
relations, and use of specialist
 Long–employability, professional relations,
and retraining

10. Conventional Principles versus Abundance
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Conventional Principles Abundance Principles
Rigorous, uncompromising, and results oriented leaderhip
 Managing external communications
 Openness of all message through early and
often communications
 Keeping critics at a distance
 Making critics stakeholders, building
relationships, and using positive strategies
 Clear, stable performance targets that
meet standard coming from the top
 Escalating performance, virtuousness, and
positive deviance targets from multiple
sources
 Organizational financial benefit from
outstanding success
 Financial generosity and benevolence with
employees

11. Four Quadrants of Improvement
Guided by the Abundance Approach
Collaborate Create
Control Compete
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12. Collaborate
Relationships, Human Capital, and Collaboration
 Develop talent, build strong relationships, and foster
trust between all parties based on:
 Culture
 Collaboration
 Credibility
 Human capital and social relationships
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13. Create
Vision, Innovation, and Symbolic Leadership
 Articulate and reinforce a motivating vision of what
could be in contrast of what occurred in the past.
 Forge a clear and shared vision of the future.
 Symbolic leadership in support of changing mission.
 Innovative and creative ideas about work.
 New sense of meaning and importance to pursued tasks.
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14. Control
Stability, Discipline, and Process Control
 Grounded in virtuousness, extending beyond just
doing well, but developing mechanisms for
producing extraordinary results
 Goal clarity
 Agreements between producers and suppliers
 Planning and objective measures and accountability
 Stable support and funding for work efforts
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15. Compete
Incentives and Rigorous Performance Standards
 Aggressive actions, external constituents, market
forces, performance incentives, and obtaining
measureable results
 External stakeholder agreements
 Managing external relationships
 Taking bold action
 Incentives for measureable progress
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Long Term Flexibility for Change New
InternalMaintenance Culture Type: CLAN Culture Type: ADHOCRACY
ExternalPositioning
Orientation: COLLOABORATE Orientation: CREATE
Leader Type:  Facilitator
 Mentor
 Team builder
Leader Type:  Innovator
 Entrepreneur
 Visionary
Value Drivers:  Commitment
 Communication
 Development
Value Drivers:  Innovative outputs
 Transformational
 Agility
Theory of
Effectiveness:
 Human development
and high commitment
produce effectiveness
Theory of
Effectiveness:
 Innovativeness, vision,
and constant change
produce effectiveness
Culture Type: HEIRARCHY Culture Type: MARKET
Orientation: CONTROL Orientation: COMPETE
Leader Type:  Coordinator
 Monitor
 Organizer
Leader Type:  Hard driver
 Competitor
 Producer
Value Drivers:  Efficiency
 Timeliness
 Consistency and
Uniformity
Value Drivers:  Market share
 Goal achievement
 Profitability
Theory of
Effectiveness:
 Control and efficiency
with capable processes
produce effectiveness
Theory of
Effectiveness:
 Aggressively competing
and customer focus
produce effectiveness
Incremental Stability Control Fast

17. This is What DONE Looks Like
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