By Steve Burrell
Quantum vs. Newtonian Thinking
“When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” ― Max Planck
Higher education CIOs know that institutions are complex organizations that function as living, nonlinear, dynamic systems. These organizations also illustrate quantum principles that do not always lend themselves to observable phenomena. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has illuminated how quickly our “Newtonian” organizations, emphasizing a defined hierarchical structure, rigid top-down controls, imposed plans and solutions, and its obsession with efficiencies, fail to provide the effective leadership framework and institutional responses needed during dynamic and chaotic times.
Moreover, higher education professionals no longer see themselves as simply obedient agents of a hierarchical organization. Instead, they seek to be part of a diverse, interconnected organization and interact with teams around a unifying mission or purpose. In quantum terms, organizations spontaneously create a morphogenic field—an invisible, intangible, inaudible, tasteless, and odorless connection (Curtin, 2013). These emerging organizational cultures need a new leadership paradigm that can deal creatively with rapid change, uncertainty, complexity, and greater demands for ethics and meaning. This situation requires new thinking and new metaphors, new assumptions, and new values.
CIOs have traditionally characterized their styles according to leadership theories such as Transformational, Servant, Situational, Adaptive, Leader-Member, Transactional, and Strengths-Based, among others. Dana Zohar, a physicist by training, extrapolates that most of these contemporary leadership philosophies resemble physical science rules espoused by Isaac Newton and industrial revolution principles that emphasize certainty, predictability, and control (Zohar, 2016).
Quantum Organizations
Quantum Leadership practices involve holistic and dynamic management aspects of our institutions. The attributes of Quantum organizations differ significantly from the Newtonian model. Quantum organizations are holistic, flexible, self-organizing, diverse, naturally inquisitive, deeply networked, vision-centered, value-driven, conscientious, and thrive at the edge of chaos. While there may not be any pure quantum organization today, Quantum Leadership and organization elements are increasingly evident in many institutions. In the wake of the pandemic, some organizations are adopting quantum thinking principles and evolving their ethos towards a more conscientious organization (D’Auria, De Smet, Gagnon, Goran, Maor, & Steele 2020).
The Quantum point of view is contrasted against Newtonian leadership thinking, which assumes that organizations and markets, like machines, are predictable, stable, and controllable. Newtonian organizations are structured into separate areas of expertise, separate divisions that are often in competition. Newtonian leaders hold that organizations are best managed to establish control, eliminate risk, and avoid outliers to ensure thought equilibrium. Newtonian leaders establish control over these organizations by meticulous planning, imposing hierarchical systems and roles, articulating SMART goals, quantified productivity expectations, performance appraisals, incentives to induce compliance with organizational goals, and deriving efficiencies and effectiveness through hierarchical decisions (Zohar, 2016).
Quantum organizations operate on the principle that human beings are internally motivated by their very nature. Quantum organizations are holistic rather than fragmented and recognize the connectedness between work processes and individuals. Quantum Leadership emerges from the combined active engagement of all organization members. As individuals’ engagement in the organization’s work increases, leadership also increases. In this view, leadership is not attached to individuals but instead occurs in the space between individuals. It is not something done by one person (the leader) to many others (the followers), and it is not a role reserved for the people at the top of the organization. (Porter-O’Grady & Malloch, 2014).
The principles of quantum science, chaos, and complexity theory warn that failure to incorporate these behaviors into an organization’s operations – in addition to rational, hard-driving, objectified behaviors, reduces the organization’s viability and sensitivity to its environment. Too much rationalization and hard-driving can alienate people and distance them from the work process, reducing their energy, creativity, commitment to the organization, and ability to perform their jobs effectively. Quantum leaders believe that collective wisdom is most likely to emerge when all members are treated as if they are internally motivated to act in the organization’s best interests. Quantum Leadership understands that thriving individuals create a synergistic cooperative that produces new energy that binds and drives the organization around a shared ethos.
The CIO acting as an institutional strategist means not delving into the details of the organization’s future actions but instead analyzing its relationship as a system to its external environment. It also means determining the institution’s ability to respond and adapt sustainably and translate relationships and capabilities into language meaningful to the community members who must do the organization’s work. Translating the strategic and tactical signposts into understandable and inspiring language is more critical than any other strategic task.
Table 1: Conceptual Foundations of Newtonian and Quantum Thinking
| Newtonian Thinking | Quantum Thinking |
| Component work breakdown | Envision the whole |
| Compartmentalism | Integration |
| Reductionism | Synthesis |
| Analysis | Relatedness |
| Discrete action | Team action |
| Hierarchical structures | Nonlinear structures |
| Focus on Control | Focus on relatedness |
| Top-down decision making | Center-out decision making |
| Process-driven action | Value-driven action |
| Vertical orientation | Multifocal characteristics |
| Management and control | Leadership and followership |
| Control | Trust |
| Top-down | Bottom-up |
| Reactive | Imaginative and experimental |
| Reductive | Emergent |
| Isolated and Controlled | Contextual and self-organizing |
Source: Porter-O’Grady, Malloch (2014), Zohar(2016)
Quantum thinking (QT) especially lends itself to situations that arise during turbulent times. There are intense pressures on our institutions to change when events seem chaotic, objectives have become ambiguous, and order seems to emerge of its own accord and in its own time (Curtin, 2013). These concepts are increasingly familiar to higher education leaders, particularly CIOs, who attempt to navigate the growing technological complexities and leadership paradoxes confronting them today.
To be effective CIOs for our organizations, they must reconsider the role of QT as a 21st-century leadership model. QT introduces new concepts that help leaders and their organizations to thrive in the age of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. Moving beyond the Newtonian era thinking and embracing QT provides a new paradigm for leadership that is well suited for our post-COVID new normal institutions.
In Part 3, we will examine the dimensions of quantum thinking and the importance of incorporating multi-dimensional thinking in the context of observable characteristics of Quantum thinking.
Reflection Questions
- Can you identify Newtonian mindsets with current ways of thinking and doing in your organization?
- What Newtonian era principles are limiting your leadership practice today?
- What are a few ways you might start to stretch your mindset to embrace quantum thinking?
- How might quantum thinking impact your leadership and the people around you?
References in this Section
Curtin, L. (March 11, 2013). American Nurse Today. Quantum Leadership: Upside down. Available at https://www.myamericannurse.com/quantum-leadership-upside-down/
D’Auria, G., De Smet, A., Gagnon, C., Goran, J., Maor, D., & Steele, R. (2020). Reimagining the post-pandemic organization. McKinsey Quarterly, (May). Retrieved from https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Busines Functions/Organization/Our Insights/Reimagining the post-pandemic organization new/Reimagining-the-post-pandemic-organization-final.pdf?shouldIndex=false
Porter-O’Grady, T., Malloch, K. (2014). Quantum Leadership: Building Better Partnerships for Sustainable Health. United States: Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Zohar, D. (2016). The Quantum Leader: A Revolution in Business Thinking and Practice. United States: Prometheus Books.Page Break