Create Future Choice
Synergise the human heart and AI mind to ensure that the Future you Create is the one of YOUR choice

This is Chapter 5: Create Future Choice taken from my ebook,

'Future Shock or Future Choice?'.

It explains how to synergise the human heart and AI mind so that the future you create will be the one of your choice.

“The coming era of Artificial Intelligence will not be the era of war, but be the era of deep compassion, non-violence, and love.”

Amit Ray, Pioneer of Compassionate AI Movement.

Introduction:

The purpose of this chapter is to stimulate your proactive green box mindset to ‘outsmart’ Future Shock by doing the three key things below and to create and synergise a new future of your choice i.e. your Future Choice:

1. do as much as you can as often as you can of the things we suggested in Chapter Four, especially green box thinking and behaviours (‘infect’ everyone you can) and open, honest communications

2. especially in the early days of what may feel like ‘chaos’ and especially for displaced employees loosing livelihoods, do everything you can to look after them

3. re-invent your business, especially its culture and help your employees and stakeholders and yourself to participate fully in the process.

The skills and tools we suggested in Chapter Four will give you the opportunity ‘to realise your wings of potential’ and to build a strong secure base from which to create your future.

But we wish for you to achieve more.

We wish you to grab this once in a lifetime tsunami of AI changes we face as opportunities to create Future Choice and a life that may prove to have been beyond our imagination at this time.

Can we really soar? Can we really transform ‘impossibles’? Have we humans really got the motivation and potential to do it?.

We don’t know but we believe so because we’ve facilitated it happening before in Lubrizol and Pfizer and with great success.

As you know our mission is to synergise the human heart and AI mind to soar beyond the stars and transform impossibles into realities. If we build a synergistic relationship with AI and our employees we believe we will never have a better chance.

1. Apply Chapter Four, especially green box mindset, whole brain thinking and open honest communications

2. How do I look after my employees?

The short answer to the question is: the best way of looking after your employees is for you to help them to help you re-invent your business to achieve its ‘go to the moon’ vision of being (for example) the best in the world at what we do and create a secure, wealthy, thriving business that it is a pleasure for your employees and you to work in.

In practical terms, adopt the CARE framework—Communicate, Advocate, Reinforce, Engage—tailored for an AI-driven era:

1. Communicate Transparently
   Speak from the heart. Share your vision for a re-invented, AI-powered business with honesty, dispelling fears of displacement. Host small, safe forums or use anonymous feedback tools to include shy or anxious employees. If details are pending, explain why and commit to updates. Open dialogue—town halls, regular notes—builds trust and invites everyone into the “go to the moon” mission.
2. Advocate for Empowerment
   Show you care by investing in growth. Offer training in AI tools, data skills, and soft skills (e.g., public speaking via Toastmasters) through platforms like Coursera or internal mentors. Recognize employees as self-managers who navigate life’s changes—they can master AI with support. For shy or anxious team members, tailored upskilling builds confidence, as seen in Microsoft’s success, where AI training boosted morale and innovation.
3. Reinforce Purpose and Pride
   Tie every role to your non-negotiable purpose, celebrating small wins—like mastering an AI process or sharing an idea—as steps toward a thriving future. For shy employees, private praise reduces anxiety; for all, public recognition fuels intrinsic motivation. If roles shift, offer empathy and support, ensuring no one feels abandoned. This alignment makes work meaningful, fun, and satisfying.
4. Engage as Co-Creators
   Invite employees to co-shape the future. Form task forces to design AI workflows, turning resistance into collaboration. Involve shy or anxious employees in low-stakes pilots to build comfort. Treat every employee as a leader—formal or informal—whom others turn to for help. By fostering a non-hierarchical culture, you unleash their creativity and resilience, making work a pleasure.

AI’s demands can amplify shyness or social anxiety, where fear of judgment stifles collaboration.

Integrate these into CARE:

Transforming the Impossible

• Communicate Safely: Small meetings and digital tools (e.g., Slack) let anxious employees contribute without pressure.
• Advocate for Confidence: Combine AI and soft skills training to empower shy team members.
• Reinforce Value: Celebrate their contributions to boost self-esteem.
• Engage Gradually: Involve them in AI pilots to foster comfort.
  Offer counseling or mindfulness apps (e.g., Calm) to manage stress, creating a culture where all thrive.

History is a museum of experience—your past isn’t your potential; your future is. Your employees are a massive, underutilized resource, ready to co-create a re-invented business.

Look to Pfizer, where Bettina and 121 direct reports transformed operations through empowered self-management, or Lubrizol, where 70 employees saved their company from closure. These “impossibles” became realities through synergy and vision. Your team can do the same, soaring beyond the stars.

Practical Steps with Heart and VisionLeading with Heart and Mind

• Phased Rollout: Introduce AI gradually via pilots, showing consideration for your team’s pace.
• Shared Decisions: Form teams to explore AI ideas, giving employees ownership.
• Support Networks: Offer workshops, counseling, or check-ins to address AI-related stress, especially for anxious employees.
• Celebrate Synergy: Highlight achievements—like a team excelling with AI—tied to your purpose with pride.
• Reinvent Yourself: Look in the mirror. Transform your leadership to model vulnerability and growth, inspiring employees to lead.

Caring for your people means empowering them to co-create a future where AI amplifies human potential. By communicating openly, advocating for growth, reinforcing purpose, and engaging all as leaders, you build a culture of resilience, fun, and innovation.

Your employees aren’t children to be “looked after”—they’re self-managing leaders ready to transform impossibles. Step up with empathy and vision, and craft a legacy where your re-invented business thrives alongside your people.

Many employees as well as managing their own lives may bring experience of using AI at home e.g. ChatGTP and other AI assistants provided by Apple, Microsoft, Google etc.

Tap into this reserve of existing knowledge and skill by creating experience-based learning opportunities as an alternative or supportive process to ‘training’. We found this to be a very effective process in both Lubrizol and Pfizer and which was very attractive to employees.

3. How do I re-invent our company’s culture? 

I have a preliminary question for you first:

what makes a child out of a man?

Have a mull; think about your own culture then read the poem of the same name below.

I first came across this poem when I was training with Ned Herrmann in America.  The more I've studied it the more I am convinced that culture has a major part to play.

Consider: is your existing culture im-maturing your people?

if your culture isn’t developing your people, it may be diminishing them?

If it isn’t empowering them it may be impoverishing them?

If it isn’t fun or creative it may be de-humanising and alienating?

If your culture isn’t ‘alive’ and ‘thriving’ well maybe neither are your people?

If your culture is making your people into miserable ‘children’ the really sad bit for me is that no one is doing it deliberately…probably??

If your culture is confused, inconsistent and ‘always moving the goal posts’ it may contribute to feelings of insecurity or apathy or who cares?

If it isn’t caring about them it may be creating a reciprocal reaction?

If your culture is ‘immature’ so too are your employees….probably?

If your culture is making a 'child' out of even one of your 'men', it needs to be re-invented?

OK, let’s explore culture.

We need to be sure that we are all thinking about the same thing first.

What is your definition of ‘culture’?

Don’t worry if you don’t know, you are not alone.

A dictionary defines culture as: the set of shared beliefs, attitudes, values and behavioural patterns characteristic of a group or an organisation.

Ok, we prefer the simpler: culture is the way we choose to do things around here.

The other key point we would stress is that culture is not an end per se. It is a means to an end. What end? The non-negotiable purpose of staying in business by beating the competition and exceeding stakeholders’ legitimate needs.

And the purpose of culture is what therefore?

Would you agree that whatever form you choose for your culture it must generate a working, stimulating ‘climate’ where employees genuinely feel valued, trusted, respected, empowered, free to use their heads, hearts and hands to be creative, and enhancing.

I.e. employees choose to work here because their skills and knowledge is developing, they enjoy their work, they are not a number and it is good fun with great people.

You may be thinking that’s all very interesting Dennis but do I really have to re-invent our

culture just because we’ve got a bit of AI due soon?

Good question, Our answer would be, ‘No’, you don’t and ‘Yes’, you might.

It is your business and your choice (green box in the Choice Model covered earlier). If your involvement with AI will be very narrow and focussed (e.g. inventory control, customer data patterns) you may judge that it’s fine for the rest of the business to continue with the existing culture.

If so, just before you finalise your ‘No’ decision, are there any aspects of your existing culture that if changed would boost business performance or safety or employees’ morale?

That is, although they may not need to change because of AI you may want to change them anyway now you've considered the 'maturity' of your culture and its effects on employees?

On the other hand, if AI, robotics and automation will be re-shaping your business significantly in the next few years you recognise that changing your culture early is a smart initiative and the sooner we begin the better.

Quite probably most senior Leaders such as yourselves may be somewhere in the middle,

So what we’d like to do now is introduce six key tools / techniques which will facilitate you creating Future Choice.

As before think of them as a toolkit from which to draw the matching tool for the situation no matter how significant you choose your culture change to be.

We also suggest that you see culture change as a brilliant opportunity to release and realise more of your employees’ potential by seeking synergistic ideas that soar beyond the stars.

Be sure to involve AI in this process by asking it many questions, especially, ‘Grok 3 what are the three things we should change in our culture that people would say is ‘Impossible?’.

In no order of importance, the six tools are:

1. complex adaptive systems (needing a different management approach than linear systems)

2. upward overlapping (to replace upward ‘delegation’)

3. intrinsic motivation (to replace ‘carrot & stick’ and money and fear as ’motivators’)

4. overcoming resistance to change (to change ‘resistance’ into opportunity)

5. Mentor facilitators (to support you and employees especially in a ‘flat’ organisation structure)

6. newness related tools that may not yet exist (to prepare psychologically and emotionally for the unexpected).

These tools will help you and your employees achieve a future of your choice free of the 10 negative self-fulfilling prophecies that Future Shock would bring (see Chapter Four).

They will instead create the following 10 positive self-fulfilling prophecies:

* feeling of sustainable and persistent control

* able to sort the ‘wheat from the chaff’

* feeling secure, seeing change as opportunity

* clarity (e.g. of purpose and direction and priorities)

* strong self confidence and independence

* only acute stress and anxiety which soon passes

* feeling of ownership and capable of making decisions

* growing self esteem and self belief

* capable of knowing what’s important to know

* no dithering or procrastination

1. using complex adaptive systems (CAS)
Just before the soccer match is about to kick-off, I say to you, 'what do you predict the 27th pass will be?'. Could you do it? Could the players do it? WHY NOT?

Because football (soccer) is a complex adaptive system. There are too many variables involved that are interacting in unpredictable ways. The essential difference between a complex adaptive system and a linear system is that a linear system is knowable and predictable in advance.

A complex adaptive system is not (see model below).

What emerges from a complex adaptive system is unknowable and unpredictable until it happens.

If you try to manage a complex adaptive system as you would a linear system, you will sub-optimise what potentially may be achieved.

By the way, how many games of soccer would you attend if you could accurately predict every pass in every match do you think?

It's the uncertainty that makes sport exciting, isn't it? and living your Future Choice is similar.

In practice what does living complex adaptive systems look like for CEOs, HR Executives and small/medium business owners?

Here are some behaviour changes leading companies report. There is no formula though, it depends on how you create a culture that facilitates changing ‘chaos’ into opportunities, transforming ‘impossibles’ into realities.

Switch from "control the machine" to "nurture the ecosystem"—your business is a CAS! (complex adaptive system).

Ditch centralised top-down commands, directions and control mechanisms for facilitating emergence, creativity, learning and synergy.

Lead like a gardener, not a mechanic—your role shifts 70% from directing to enabling and facilitating growth.

Here's your personal guide:

1: Listen to & understand your employees and existing culture

2: Use Mentoring to overcome resistance to change

3: Empower autonomous Teams

4: Create sustainable Intrinsic Motivation

How will my employees need to be different?
In CAS, employees evolve from "cogs" to adaptive agents who co-create value. Focus on hiring for traits (e.g. curiosity, learning), not just skills—train the rest!

Examples from leading USA companies include:

Southwest Airlines: Agents (pilots) self-reroute storms = 20% faster.
Google: Pod experiments = Gmail (unplanned $200B).
Tesla: AI fleet learns = +50% production (chip crisis).

CAS require different leadership as the above info and examples illustrate. Central to achieving the major benefits of CAS is making changes WITH your employees not doing things TO them or FOR them.

Your employees are a massive underutilised resource that bring to the workplace for FREE self-management skills honed from managing their own lives.

They will often astonish you (and themselves) at what they can achieve which will be amplified with the contribution AI will make given your leadership.

2. upward overlapping and initiative

This concept originally connects to jobs and hierarchies in business. For the business to function it needs people in different roles to interact (e.g. operators, supervisors, managers).

So the roles overlap. In most hierarchies the roles overlap in a downward direction. That is, supervisors are often super-workers because they do part of the operators job, usually the more interesting thinking bits.

Managers then overlap down into the supervisors role as super-supervisors. Get the idea? In many businesses this means in practice that everyone in the hierarchy is looking down at the short-term issues.

Who’s looking up at the bigger picture and the future of the business? No one.

So the business is vulnerable to threats and unaware of opportunities.

It doesn’t have to be like that though.

Suppose instead the hierarchy roles were overlapping upwards. That is the operators did all aspects of their role and some of the supervisors role.

The supervisors would be released to look up and do some of the managers’ roles. And senior managers could then fulfil why they exist – that is to look after the future of the business tomorrow while the supervisors and operators look after today.

Upward overlapping is a very powerful change lever.

It is also a transferable concept that would improve many situations (e.g. families).

It requires, of course, a change in initiative by everyone as below:

The 5 degrees of initiative:

1. wait to be told what to do (lowest initiative) – no control over timing or content
2. ask what to do – control over timing but not content
   For control over both timing & content:
3. recommend & then take resulting action
4. act & advise at once
5. act on own & routinely report (highest initiative)
   
   

What to change?:

* outlaw 1. and 2.
* agree appropriate level of initiative situationally

3. Intrinsic Motivation

During the last 35 years I have been asked by managers hundreds of times: ‘how do I motivate employees?

My reply has consistently been, ‘you don’t, you can’t’.

Meaningful motivation is not something you do TO employees which is why ‘carrot & stick; (a.k.a. money and fear) doesn’t really work.

You and your employees come to work already motivated.

They may not be motivated to achieve what you want them to because, for example, your culture is contaminated with anti-motivational aspects or is de-maturing your employees.

For example, a deep organisation hierarchy; hourly pay; overtime payments; unnecessary rules and regulations that shout to employees. ‘management doesn’t trust us….so why should we trust them?’

The work of Frederick Herzberg revealed that in the work place there are two types of influences that affect motivation:

1 Hygiene factors such as:

* company policies and their administration

* pay

* supervision

* teamwork

* conditions

2. Motivators such as:

* a sense of achievement

* recognition for achievements

* work that is interesting

* a sense of responsibility

* advancement and learning

Hygiene factors are not motivators but need attention. If neglected they will result in dis-ease, an infection that may turn nasty.

The five motivators we call intrinsic motivation because they come from inside the employee based on his or her experience of your workplace and culture and his or her experience of life.

AI is likely in the changes it brings to affect both hygiene factors and motivators. We would say it is a critical part of your leadership of AI to ensure that its consequences on both hygiene and motivation factors are positive and enhancing, whether intended or not.

4. Like many CEOs and OD professionals, you may have wondered at times,

how can we effectively manage employees’ resistance to change?

I know from experience that it isn’t easy or simple dealing with resistance to change because it is  fundamentally emotional in nature.

The irrationality of resistance to change is complex, frustrating and powerful.

The best way to manage change is, I believe, to help your employees to help you create it.

Easier said than done, I know.  How to do it? 

Macro big picture answer:

Empower your employees to drive change by enabling them to understand the need for it and by creating and implementing it together.

Micro practical processes answer:

Our bespoke, distinctive, and award-winning approach, proven by real-world outcomes with industry leaders like Lubrizol — where the business was saved from closure — and record breaking financial gains achieved at Pfizer, included 7 key processes:

Because our approach is bespoke and different, we start with diagnostic sessions to build trust and clarity; a solid foundation for change; and to inclusively develop an imperative non-negotiable purpose for change that all employees can get behind and support.

In September 1962 President John F. Kennedy facing the prospect of Russia winning the space race said to the American people: 'we choose to go to the Moon'.

Although nobody knew if it could be done, by and large the American people got behind the vision and supported it.

In July 1969, Neil Armstrong stepped onto the surface of the Moon.

What is your version of, 'we choose to go to the Moon', for your business?

Be sure to ask your employees and AI.

The listening process creates enthusiasm and boosts Employees' morale and loyalty by dissipating any resistance to change that is based on poor communications, rumours and suspicion.

The diagnostic listening sessions above also facilitate assessing the degree of receptivity to change.  For example, introducing and using Mentoring.

Our approach to mentoring creates in effect a mini-culture change in your business. 

The Mentor and Mentee/s will demonstrate through their mentoring behaviours that new and significant changes are possible for everyone's benefit.

They will be self-managing with real power to spend money and make decisions.

They will have as a central focus how to release and realise more of the mentee/s potential and, as a result, leadership potential and business potential.

They will become very positive influencers in your business for beneficial change including significant ROI (returns on investment)  and an enhanced, enjoyable working environment for employees.  

The old saying: from small acorns big oak trees grow, is a fitting metaphor for the benefits of using mentoring to overcome resistance to change.

Also improve beyond "carrot & stick" tactics (a.k.a. money and fear) to unlock employees’ true potential, ownership, alignment with business goals and commitment.

This creates intrinsic motivation from which employees:

* experience achievements;

* receive recognition of their achievements;

* have more interesting work;

* benefit from significant applied learning;

* take responsibility and

* show personal and professional growth.

5: Remove barriers, obstacles and inhibitors

Flatten hierarchies and eliminate silos to enhance synergy and collaboration and to enable employees to use their (free) life skills, exceed expectations and achieve greater results through change than they could have done by resisting it.

For example, Lubrizol avoided imminent closure because 70 employees demonstrated change that tripled productivity within one month.

On my website read 'The Lubrizol Story' for which we were awarded a U.K. National Training Award.  The judges described our approach as 'revolutionary and inspiring',

6: Enlarge Leadership resources

Form self-managing high performance teams, accountable to leaders, with real decision-making and spending power.

This participative approach demonstrates genuine cooperation and willingness for everyone to learn from shared experiences and feedback of results.

Yes, but why teams?  They are not the answer to everything are they?

No, teams aren't the answer to everything but they do contribute 'a golden egg' I believe and have seen it many times from my experience.

It is called 'synergy', which in effect means that the sum of the parts (team members) is greater than the whole (team).  In other words, 2 + 2 = 5.

That is, when the teamworking is done correctly, the team's outcomes exceed what could have been achieved by individuals or a group of individuals.

Encourage leadership at every level, creating a more dynamic and responsive work environment. Integrate ‘Everyone a Leader’ (formal and informal) into your culture.

In most businesses this is already happening but is often unrecognised, invisible and unencouraged.

For example, an easy illustration is to consider a 24/7 business. 

At 3a.m. in the morning, who is actually running the business?

We know who isn't, don't we?

In most situations, it isn't 'management' or the formal leaders who make up the hierarchy. 

They are, quite rightly, probably tucked up in bed sleeping.

It is your employees who are in effect running the business, usually without being trained how to do it (something else Mentoring can help with).

Now, imagine operator A says to operator B, 'how do I fill in the batch record on the computer, I've never been allowed to do it before?'

At this point operator A has created a leadership situation by asking operator B the question.

That is, our definition of a Leader is 'someone to whom others turn for help, advice and support'.

And that is just what operator A did.  Neither employee A or B may understand it as 'leadership'.

What happens next is either operator B says, 'shove off, I'm fed up of you asking all your questions, I've got my own job to do', in which case operator A's enthusiasm, motivation, receptivity to change etc. may take a knock.  If so, your company is slightly more unsuccessful than it needs to be.

On the other hand, B may say, 'don't worry, it's not as hard as you think.  I'll show you what to do and how to do it', in which case B has delivered a positive response to A's request for some leadership and both of them are likely to feel good about it. Their enthusiasm, motivation and receptivity to change have increased.  Your company is slightly more successful as a result.

Multiply this by the hundreds of times it may happen per shift to see how this informal peer leadership must be one of the most neglected and wasted free company resources.

Our approach does not ignore this aspect of your business, we will positively show you how to develop it with often amazing results as it releases and realises more of every employee's potential.

7. Trust the process, your employees and yourself

Rely on your teams and these proven methods and achieve sustainable high performance success.

‘Let go’ of top-down managing of employees.   Why?

Because if you have to 'manage' someone to get the performance needed you are completely wasting your time and theirs.....and an awful lot of money.

Some resistance to change is 'natural' because change means ending some familiar things and learning some new things.

It takes employees out of their comfort zones and may create feelings of self-doubt and insecurity in some.

Kind words are often not enough to overcome the underlying fear that change can instil. 

Discover how our unique approach based on shared, empathetic learning and doing can transform challenges and ‘impossibles’ into opportunities and realities; and transform resistance into improved morale and productivity and a sense of achievement.

On my website read ‘The Pfizer Ireland Tablet Plant Story’ and to discuss how we can support you and your organization in changing from resistance to change to releasing and realising more of your employees' and business's potential.

[this section is taken from my website: www.MentoringandMentorship.com.]

Mentor Facilitators

Pre AI, I carried out 2 highly successful Organisation Development projects. One was for Lubrizol near Liverpool where we saved the company from closure and tripled productivity and won a U.K. National Training Award.

The other was for Pfizer Ireland Tablet Plant where we achieved record breaking financial success and created a unique culture which significantly increased the employees work performance, sense of achievement and fun.

In both cases one of my secrets of success was Team Development Facilitators. This was a new role unexperienced by any employee. It was a full-time dedicated mentor role with no boundaries. That is the Mentor Facilitators were resources for every employee including the Site Leaders.

No one needed permission to call on the Facilitator’s skills and confidentiality was a top priority.The Facilitators were trained by me and were not technical experts. They were however process experts in terms of complex adaptive systems, motivation, communications, teamwork and self managed teams, giving and receiving 360 feedback for learning purposes etc. etc.

I used to think of them as a ‘lubricant’ for the new culture and the steep leaning curves everyone was on in the Pfizer start-up.

Having talked with those involved we chose the title of Team Development Facilitators with one key change. We changed the definition of facilitator from ‘helping others’ to ‘helping others to help themselves’ in order to develop potential on the one hand and avoid ‘dependency’ on the other.

You will be re-inventing your business, culture, employees and yourself to some degree or other as a result of AI, robotics and automation. I would recommend, especially if you choose a flat organisation structure, that you invest in Mentor Facilitators as key resources to achieve your ‘go to the moon’ non-negotiable purpose.

You won’t regret it if you do it ‘right’.

Recognising and using as yet unknown new resources

This does sound like a ‘Catch 22’, how can we use resources that don’t yet exist?

The key message is that in the technological change period we have now entered we will need to accept and deal with newness. We don’t necessarily know what new problems may arise until they do (complex adaptive systems) and we can’t just look at it and say, ‘never seen that before’, and go and make a cup of tea.

We will have to roll up our sleeves and become creative and innovative and synergisric as mentioned above

This may involve much ‘trial and error’ so we will need to be more resilient and adaptable.

We will have to find solutions to new problems that don’t exist today. You will be able to partner with your AI and achieve win-win outcomes.

If you have a Green Box mindset and skills, you will find this uncertainty exciting and stimulating with a major sense of achievement for every ‘solution’ you create.

If you have a Red Box mindset and skills, you may find this uncertainty very stressful.

Finally, if you are facing AI, robotics and automation on a workplace changing scale that in effect means you need to re-invent your business, your employees, your existing culture and yourself we’d like to share with you our approach to helping Pfizer’s start-up in its tablet plant in Loughbeg Ireland.

What follows is taken from an independent Review Report re the Tablet Plant carried out by an ex-Head of Function Leader for Pfizer Ireland Pharmaceuticals.

More of the Report can be seen on my website: www.MentoringandMentorship.com

Pfizer Tablet Plant leaders and an external facilitator mentor (Dennis Martin of MDS) agreed to a cultural design based on five key concepts:

* complex adaptive systems

* learning organisations

* continuous improvement

* whole brain thinking and creativity

* personal responsibility

The intended culture was clearly seen as a means to the non-negotiable ends and as, “resurrection is much more difficult than birth”, the Tablet Plant started out with a business plan that outlined a flat, upside-down, inside out organisation structure involving self-managed teams continuously learning and delivering high performance.

The culture had the following 6 key characteristics:

• high performance
  i.e. everyone would see their work as their business; would continuously improve everything they did and would be innovative in initiating and responding to change

• trust 
  i.e. every colleague would be valued (and experience that feeling) and relationships and interactions would be conducted on an adult-to-adult basis.  Trust was defined as: "I know that you will not take unfair advantage of me"

• thinking i.e. everyone would understand their thinking preferences (and others’ thinking preferences) and would, therefore, value differences as a means of generating ideas and improvements 

• learning
  i.e. everyone would be a learner (learning from everything they did and from everyone they worked with) and a mentor (to everyone else).
  Learning was defined as: “enhancing my capacity to create my own future”

• team based
  i.e. everyone would provide high-support and high-challenge (please see model below) and would work with others to ensure that differences produced synergy (2+2 = 5).

• self-managed 
  i.e. everyone was perceived to be able to manage their own lives and in so doing to use skills that were equally valid in running their own business. 
  
  In addition, everyone was defined as a leader (either formal or informal), given the definition of a leader as "someone others turn to for advice, guidance and support"

A key element of the team based flat organization culture was the assumption that all colleagues, with help, learning and support, are competent and willing to organize their activities and execute role functions without the need for overt supervision.

This assumption was based on the realization that employees are competent to run their personal lives on a daily basis.

The same planning, foresight, and work required to purchase a home or automobile; to organize and live within a budget; to plan any social activity; etc. are necessary in the place of employment to plan and execute one’s work schedule.

If the employees are competent and responsible enough to manage their personal affairs, then it is reasonable to assume that they can and will also manage the responsibilities related to their livelihood.

Essentially, each colleague supervised themselves and their own activities.

This obviated the need for the traditional supervisor and hierarchy, with the benefit that the entire operational staff was applying its collective knowledge and time towards progressing the manufacturing schedule, rather than placing this responsibility on a single individual.

As an illustration, the Operations Lead had 121 direct reports.  Observers would ask, 'but how did she control them?'.  The answer was, 'she didn't, they did'.

In the Pfizer Ireland Tablet Plant:

• two full-time, dedicated Team Development Mentors were available as a key support resource for all employees to help them along the learning and experience curves created by the unique culture
• The contribution of the highly skilled Team Development Mentors, and their professional mentoring, was critical in establishing the giving and receiving of feedback for learning and development purposes as a major asset in the success of the Pfizer Ireland Tablet Plant Story

Finally, we expected the culture to evolve and change as colleagues moved along their learning and experience curves.

Fundamentally, the colleagues are the culture (it is not something a management does to them) and a major stakeholder.

We expected, in line with complex adaptive systems thinking, that new approaches and changes would emerge as we went along – we did not have, or want to have, a master blueprint that controlled the process.

In the absence of such a “master plan”, we expected to trust our own and colleagues’ values and beliefs, experiences of the culture and intrinsic motivation to  “do the right things” to achieve the non-negotiable ends of high performance and personal growth.

The Pfizer Ireland Tablet Plant did NOT have a plan B either.

But did it work?

The Pfizer Ireland Tablet Plant Story clearly shows that the unique culture has been, by all measures, an outstanding success.

For example:

• facility start-up from ground breaking to full regulatory approval was achieved in 30 months (and 85% of the people recruited into the Tablet Plant had not worked in the industry before)
• the facility was completed within the original project budget
• the IMB inspection report was the first example in which there were no critical or major deficiencies found
• the FDA inspection team indicated that their inspection report was the shortest that these individuals had ever issued
• the facility received full regulatory approval 4½ months ahead of schedule while absorbing a nine months construction delay
• every goal for total batches produced has been met or exceeded

From a performance efficiency standpoint, and in terms of realized earnings, Pfizer has received exceptional returns on the investment made in the Tablet Plant cultural initiative.

Establishing a self-managed, team based work environment in which all colleagues are empowered to make decisions within the framework of established policy and procedures has resulted in a corporate or collective decisiveness which facilitates meeting cycle times and production schedules.

Knowledge and expertise is shared within the team, and each individual respects the contributions of the others in the team.

At the same time, individuals have derived enhanced self-esteem and commitment to the success of the endeavour.

Hopefully this Chapter Five: Create Future Choice has given you plenty of ideas, inspiration and willingness to succeed no matter the scale of change you may be facing in your business as a result of AI, robotics and automation.

Our purpose has been to inform, clarify, re-assure, facilitate and inspire you to synergise your resources including AI to do whatever is needed yourselves. We have deliberately avoided presenting you with a one-size-fits-all formula solution.

Relax, be comfortable with the uncomfortable, have fun and enjoy the process, trust yourself and others and keep a positive confident ‘green box’ mindset.

Let us know how you get on or if you have any questions or need help.

Email us at: mds.mentor.hin@btinternet.com

An AI consultant's motto: "I'll optimize your workflow so efficiently, you'll wonder why you ever paid humans to rearrange deck chairs on the Titanic."