This episode is hosted by Boundaryless Conversation Podcast host Simone Cicero with co-host Stina Heikkila.

The following is a semi-automatically generated transcript that has not been thoroughly revised by the podcast host or by the guest. Please check with us before using any quotations from this transcript. Thank you.

Simone Cicero:
Hello, Hello, everyone. So, we are back in conversation in the Boundaryless Conversations podcast. I’m here today with my usual co-host, Stina Heikkila.

Stina Heikkila:
Hello, hello, happy to be here!

Simone Cicero:
And today with us on the podcast we have a friend and inspiring, I would say, voice that we have been following for a while as a team, as a company, and personally: Nora Bateson. Ciao, Nora. Great to have you here.

Nora Bateson:
Ciao. It’s great to be here.

Simone Cicero:
Thank you very much for your time. And we look forward to this conversation. And as I said very quickly before, I was holding on a bit to jumping into this conversation with you. Because I was really looking into a way to say something “new”, to get to some new insights with you beyond the very important points that you have been touching upon in your book, and in a new book that is coming up, and in your writings and — more in general — in your speeches, in your podcasts. That was my posture, let’s say, in this conversation. We had this very quick preliminary conversation a few weeks ago, and I think I am really looking forward to understanding what your point of view on this topic of organizing is. And also the starting point is really that beyond, let’s say, the complexity of the matter that we understand, we feel. There is a certain kind of unavailability, let’s say of organizing, especially in a world that is changing so fast and pushing us as people, communities, teams, companies, to face continuous changes, disruptions, and uncertainties. The question will be, as a starting point: what’s your feeling in the future of organizing? How is this unfolding? Or maybe, as you have been using recently, how’s this all “submerging”? So, I’ll leave it to you to maybe address these more generally, as a starting point.

Nora Bateson:
So, I guess I’d like to start just by saying, Simone: I don’t know. I don’t know. And I feel like that’s a really important place to start to just begin by saying even what is an organization? What is organizing? What are we even talking about? And I guess, for me, that’s very important, because, there are so many ideas that we are holding all of us, each of us, everyone who’s living in a society, or a community or with any grouping of people, there are ideas that are being shared that become assumptions, they kind of drift into the water and the air. And those ideas become invisible. And I worry that with this exploration of organizations, that there are a lot of invisible ideas and assumptions that are just kind of lurking around that seem like you said, is it inevitable? Is it inevitable? Is it scalable? What is scalable? I have a lot of questions around that. And I guess, let me kind of say why I think it’s important to question at that level.

So, the question is, how to think about what it is that is an organization or the process of organizing in such a way that there is attention and attentiveness to the presuppositions, and the invisible assumptions of what an organization is. And the reason that’s important is I’m assuming that we, in this conversation are also talking about the way in which the world is changing, and the need for that change. As I look around after 2020, one of the things that is so clear, and you’ve heard 1,000 people say it is that there was a massive failure on behalf of the institutions. Political institutions, financial institutions, I mean, everything from shipping and postal services to political democratic voting machine makers to — oh, my goodness, right, in every direction. And through these cracks then came an entirely new level of possibility of getting at the deeper systemics of racism, of colonialism. This is a moment where I’m assuming no matter what we’re talking about, we’re talking about things in a changing set of states. So, what’s an organization? Where’s the edges of the organization? Is it the sort of coherence of their process? Is it their mission statement? Is it a legal boundary, an entity? Is it the people that are working with an organization? Is it their families? Is it their communities? Is it the economic larger context in which that organization resides? Is it even bigger still, an epistemological or cultural context in which the idea of an organization resides? So, where’s the organization? Where’s the edge of it?

One of the things about working in this world of trans-contextual description, okay, trans-contextual is a word that comes from my father, Gregory Bateson, in the 60s. And it kind of got lost for a while. But we’ve been bringing it out dusting it off, and using it pretty frequently lately. But what happens when you start to look at an ecology or any kind of living system, as you start to see that it’s existing in multiple contexts simultaneously. And nothing just has one purpose. Nothing in a living system. So, this trans-contextual business is what knits and re-knits and over-knits and under-knits and side-knits nets, and it’s what holds these relational processes together from multiple directions in multiple ways in an ecology. So, that means that when you look at any aspect of a living system, whatever that aspect is, okay. So, let’s say we’re talking about, I don’t know, the family, the economy, whatever. Whatever it is, it’s not just that and nothing more, it’s always more.

So, how do we begin to think about what an organization is? Where’s the edge of it? So, in the 70s, and 80s, there were all sorts of systemic managerial processes that got into all kinds of businesses and organizations. And everything but government because it didn’t work in government. That was too rigidly hierarchical. But systemic managerial practices infiltrated quite a few corporate and other organizational processes. But there was a problem. And the problem was that the edge of the organization was the edge of the system. And that problem is looming large. That problem is a serious problem. If there is a hope for bringing systemic thinking or complexity or interdependency ideas into notions of organization, the organization doesn’t get to be the container. Okay.

So, the boundaries of the organization are absolutely critical to explore. Because if you know, just think about this. If the people who are working with an organization are working too hard, their families are compensating for that. So, therefore, the edge of the organization is not the edge of the workers. It includes the families. And those families are part of community. So, if those kids aren’t getting the attention or the love or the help with the homework that they need from their parents because their parents are engaged with various organizations that are in a stressed state, then the teachers and the social services end up taking up the slack for where those parents might have been. Okay. So, that includes the community now. And if there isn’t a way in which that organization is paying attention to the ecological needs of the community, not only the community that they are servicing, in terms of wherever they are based, but also those communities that they touch in any way. Right? If they happen to be producing items, or if they’re having conferences, or if they’re bringing in people for any reason. What are the relationships that are getting touched in all directions?

So, that’s the first question, where’s the edge? What is an organization? How do you even know where its coherence lies? And then, how do we talk about that? And that’s not an insignificant question either. Because for most people, some kind of affiliation with some kind of organization, is how they live. Right? Whether it’s a health organization, or the school organizations, or the organizations they work with, or the food production, and transportation, or retails, or political organization. Whatever it is, we’re all wrapped into lots of organizational processes. So, where’s the end of one and the beginning of another? Like, how do we think about those edges?

Simone Cicero:
Right. I mean, your first comment, I think, is really poignant, that this point that you make that no living system, let’s say, has one purpose. And it made me really reflect on this idea that maybe organization and complexity are two opposites of a polarity, let’s say. So, just trying to explain better what I mean is that does a way to do organizations in a complex way really exist? So, it’s this trans-contextual organization something that can still really be considered an organization? You know what I mean? So, in terms of, if we look at the story so far of organizing, the point that I’m raising here is, the story of organizing most likely, is co-evolving, let’s say with mechanistic thinking, let’s say and managerialism and a certain way to deal with the world, to organize our human activities. So, the question maybe could be, what do we need to let go of our experience in the world, in the modern world, let’s say? What do we need to let go if we really want to explore? What would it mean to organize in a complex, friendly way? In a way that fits with the complexity of the world?

Nora Bateson:
This is why those boundaries are so important to explore. Because there’s a need to make a little bit of a mess. And that mess is going to come one way or another. Because the structure right now have this false separation between, let’s say, me in my work life versus me in my private life, me as a mom versus me as a biological organism. Okay. So, those separations are of course illusions, and those separations are leading to the legitimization of a societal structure that’s premised on discrete organizations that are not really discrete. They never have been. And I guess for a while, some people who were in some level of comfort got away with it, but they used all the flexibility up. And they used it up and it wasn’t theirs to use. So, the capacities of the soil has been diminished. The air quality, the exploitation of huge numbers of people in the world.

So, the way in which this system has continued is by spending of the vitality that was produced in other places. And usually, those other places were just conveniently outside of our perception or vision. I’m including myself in the grouping of people who have been comfortable. But that’s not true for everyone. And certainly not by a longshot. So, I think this question of where are those — The thing is this, is that if a child is in a school system, and the organization of that school system is geared toward the economy, and the job market and the production of an identity in a culture, okay. But that child is at a very young age feeling that this system, this classroom, that he or she is sitting in, or they, that this classroom is confining what they have to give. What they have to give is not part of what’s going on there. And so that kid is frustrated. And that frustration can lead to whatever, you know, a sense of loss of self-esteem.

That self-esteem later could become domestic violence or addiction. But when we get into the layers of domestic violence or addiction, suddenly, that’s no longer the department of the school. Right? So, these issues that get produced in one organization, they land in another, that then there isn’t the vitalized connective tissue and the shared systemic accountability. Okay. That’s, I think, really where I’m going with this is that if we want to think about what organization looks like, in a way that deals with complexity, it is something that is going to absorb and respond, be sensitive in its response to a completely different order of integrity, generosity, and accountability. So, we’re not looking to point to one person or department or association and say it’s your fault that this went wrong. But another way of saying there is a systemic destruction happening here. How do we bring systemic vitality in? And right now, the way in which organizations are forming discrete edges around themselves particularly protects each item from shared integrity.

Simone Cicero:
So. I was talking about this with Stina in the background, and I think the point that you raise is really important, this idea of systemic accountability and systemic integrity. And my impression is that we have been trying to, to some extent, as a society to, I would say, enforcing it and controlling it and then shooting it top-down. While we really don’t know how it works, let’s say, bottom-up. And to really let it work bottom-up, I think, the point of education and learning is really important. So, Stina, I know that you have this reflection on learning, so maybe I can hand it over to you.

Stina Heikkila:
Yeah, it’s also a question about unlearning. And I think that has been some of the key takeaways, when I read your writings, Nora, often I have to catch myself several times to say: “oh no! Now I’m running towards a solution”. I feel it’s very so deeply ingrained in us, I think, and many with me, and I can only speak to myself in this conversation, wanting to look for a solution wanting to make order in chaos, almost being a “mess adverse”, let’s say, rather than risk-averse because it gives this sense of security. So, I’m wondering what can we do as individuals living in this moment? Because, for sure, we get some training from the pandemic, and we have to live with a lot of mess and uncertainty. But I know that this is the essence of your work. So, where to start? What would you bring to the table here in terms of that individual journey that many people would have to go through?

Nora Bateson:
Yeah. And it’s an individual journey, but it’s also a journey in relationship. Because if I have this great insight, and I say, wow. I get it. There’s a need for systemic accountability, and I’m going to — Okay. But where am I going to go with that? Where is the there that I can take that? There is no there. If I’m in my workplace, or if I’m in relationship, if I go into the hospital or into my kid’s schools, or into the whatever, the passport office or listen to the politicians talk, there’s absolutely no place for me to play out this notioning of systemic integrity in that space. It’s already all kinds of knitted together from multiple directions. And I can’t get in as an individual.

So, part of what is really there is that these assumptions and these relationships to existing organizational concepts are produced in relationships. We build those assumptions. That itch that you have to come directly to a solution, that’s not just yours. It was produced in relationship to work, to school, to projects, to life, to parents, to an idea that you have to have that your accomplishments are your own. Okay. That your accomplishments are your own. This is something that as kids, most of us are taught in school. You got to get what you put into it, you got to work hard, and your accomplishments are your own.

I want to kind of pull on that thread because: are they? And it’s not that I’m saying you don’t have agency or your will or your own personal strength or ability. But I’m asking where did that come from? Where did that strength or that muchness, that possibility for you to act, and do and change and go out there and make the most of it? Where did that come from? And I think if you really sit down and think about that, it comes from relationships. Some of those relationships are going to be the ones that hurt you, and some of them are going to be the ones that lifted you up. Inevitably, it’s in the contrast between the two is how you learn to be in the world. And that learning, I think, is really kind of at the core here of what does it mean, to learn to be in the world and another way. And the only way we can do that is in relationship, is in shifting our relationships to each other.

It’s like we’re all notes in a big song. The way in which the song is melodied right now has to do with the way all of the notes are in relationship to each other. If we want to change the song, we have to change the relationship between the notes. So, on the one hand, it’s a personal journey, but it’s really something taking place in the in-between because really what is an organization? It’s just an idea. It’s not really the people. The people go home, they do something else. People are involved with lots of organizations. I mean, each one of us is a whole ecology of organizations. I might be in a jogging organization and a dog watching organization and a developing new forms of education organization, right. What is the relationship between you and me and the various equal qualities of organizational identity and intending, right? So, at some level, the question is, what are you tending to? What are you taking care of? What are you nurturing and bringing vitality to?

Simone Cicero:
Good reflections. Nora, to add on these, while you were talking, you brought up to me two ideas, two key ideas, let’s say in our relationship with organizing, and wrangling around this idea of organizing. One is leadership, and one is interfaces. I’ll try to explain how I got there. So, if you talk about an organization, something systemic, where you tend to look at the idea of one organization as something whole, let’s say, and also something that you cannot really separate in pieces or look into a collection of pieces. But at the other hand, I think my impression and feeling is that if you look at such a way to frame organizations, it can be fairly paralyzing to think about changing it, for example, or evolving it.

And so, for example, my experience in building a small organization, it has been always and often an experience of frictions around the idea of leadership, and this is something that we have been debating recently also with Aaron Dignan on this podcast. So, to some extent, I would say, the very assumption of building and organization deals with separation of duties. Or in general separations of spaces of autonomy, that piggyback on the idea that someone can lead somewhere, and get something done or bring something forward. And so, this is one thing, and this comes with the idea of interface. Because, especially if you think about large organizations, as we leave them now, the feeling that we have is that these are “incumbents organizations”. We call it like that, they are “incumbent”, let’s say, on us to some extent. How do you change them? And our experience has been that one particular approach would be that of unbundling them.

So, essentially, instead of letting them think as a whole, but maybe pushing them into think themselves as a set of small pieces. And this finally, reconnects with some reflection that I borrowed from Joe Norman, that was on this podcast in the past. And even to his post on wholeness a couple of years ago, if I’m not wrong, where he pointed that sometimes to preserve a whole, if you’re really embracing a complexity, perspective, and lens, you need to preserve the small holes that make the big hole system. And also this big turn, let’s say, to come back into the idea of shouldn’t we focus on the small — the teams and where someone can really create something new and create some autonomy around that and interact with the others through interfaces? How does it fit with the idea of systemic awareness, systemic accountability that you seem to be pointing out?

Nora Bateson:
The thing is, is that it’s impossible to actually separate this idea of creating a model for what an organization is. Which is something I kind of hear in the background is that there’s this sort of abstracted notion of organization, and how organizations are structured. And the thing about that is that no matter how true it may be, that there are these structures that are created, the other thing that is there, and it’s very difficult to find the beginning of the end is that there is a culture around which that structure is actually saturated in all sorts of metaphors of life. Okay. So, one of those cultural pieces is this idea that I need to just go out there and get what I can. My accomplishments are my own, I got to get what I can. And I’m coming into an organization, the most natural thing in the world is for me to ask what’s in it for me. And if you happen to be the CEO or the leader of some organization and you’re making a decision, that decision should be based upon the premise that you’re going to find out whatever the next steps are, and what’s in it for the organization.

And so that’s something that I think is really important to kind of address because it’s everywhere. Okay. It’s not just a structure, it’s a structure that is infused with culture. And that’s all over the place. So, I don’t think if we just change the structure of organizations, that we’re really going to make that big of a change. Because the deeper assumptions about what is it to be Simone? What is it to be Nora, or Stina has to do with these — What’s an identity? What does it take, to be respected, to be loved to be relevant, to be sexy, to be, right, in a lifetime? And so much of life that is producing the information around that is actually playing out in the worst possible ways through organizational structures and in legitimization, of exploitation that we see. So, this question of distributed integrity is going to require it being possible to — I mean, I don’t know. And I guess, in a way, have this conversation, right? I think the first thing we have to do is start talking about it. Because right now, it’s like a completely foreign object. Right? It’s difficult to even point to where that systemic accountability or integrity would reside. How would we call upon it? How would we lean into it?

Stina Heikkila:
Right. Very interesting. So, linked to this, I’d be curious if you could lay out a little bit to our listeners, this idea of warm data that you’re working with. Because we’re talking around the sort of practice, it seems like. So, do you mind to more explicitly, maybe talk about that practice and how you think that that helps us in the context that you were describing?

Nora Bateson:
Sure. So, the warm data practice, there’s a whole bunch of ways to talk about warm data. But the warm data practices, basically, work with groups of people and allow them to explore various questions and ideas through trans-contextual conversation. So, they’re talking about more than one context at a time, and they move through various groupings. And the process itself allows for assumptions and perceptions, to be relocated through different contexts. And when you look at things through different contexts, they sometimes are surprisingly informative of what they can tell you from another direction. If you look at the question of identity through contexts that are about whatever health or education or politics or culture or family or all of those things. And then if you have another conversation and it’s about education, and you run it through those same contexts, and the stories that you find yourself telling, start to really reframe your family life, your memories, your participation in these inter systemic and interdependent processes of life.

So, the process itself is a very subtle and embodied very personal and intimate exploration of the way in which multiple contexts come together in everyday life. And I guess the reason that’s important is that as those kinds of insights starts to arise, one of the sort of side effects is a kind of integrity and generosity that is absolutely not driven by what’s in it for me. And the accomplishment of having those insights is absolutely not your own. It is only possible through this relational exploration. And it isn’t so much collective intelligence as it is collective exploration and attention to a sort of a different approach to thinking about life.

So, the warm data practices are opening this space up. And kind of central to all of this is what occurs is in a trans contextual conversation, it is almost impossible. I say, almost because some folks are hard nuts. It’s almost impossible to stay in your role. Okay. Your role is your scripts, we all have these scripts that we live within, that were things we’ve said, and we’ve said, and we’ve said and things we believe, and we, we stand by them. And when someone talks about the economy, you have a thing you’re going to say. But if I ask you, what’s your relationship with family and economy and education, and your experience about that? Bringing those together, is going to produce a different kind of communication than you’re used to. So, that little loosening right there allows for, actually, I can be someone different in that conversation. You can be someone different. And we can actually perceive things we haven’t perceived before and talk about them in ways we haven’t talked about them before. So, we get out of roles, out of scripts, and into this sort of blurry zone where these insights start to appear.

Now, what’s interesting about this is, it is not about what actions get taken or what strategies get produced at the end of the warm data process. It’s actually about who you are becoming. And the way that you are in your next meeting, or the way that you are in conversation with your partner when you go home. And maybe that conversation that you have at the dinner table is different. And maybe tomorrow morning, your kids are actually in a different kind of relationship with each other because they sensed a different possible way of being. And it’s this attention, not to the first-order solution, but to the way in which that the second-order, the third-order, the fourth-order relational processes from that moment are made possible. So, that’s a different thing. And I don’t know, it’s been a beautiful process to sort of discover and to play with. And the community of people that are working with it, and the new students; it’s just been really exciting because there’s so much in the world that feels so stuck right now. And it’s a place where there is a kind of mutual learning and unsticking that’s really very exciting.

Simone Cicero:
Nora, my feeling is that, for example, in our research, the research that we released in November 2020, on the New Foundations of Platforms and Ecosystem Thinking, one of the topics that strongly came out of the research was this idea of the need to re-entangle the organization with the landscape and with the community. So, I was reflecting on this idea of trans contextual organizing, and it looks increasingly to me that entanglement, this idea of the entangling with the community and the landscape is solely one phase of trans contextuality applied to organizing. So, essentially, maybe entanglement reflects the need to be trans contextual with the context of your communities, the communities your organization is related with and the landscapes, your organization is also in relationship with and also maybe track a trans contextual organization, goes beyond the entanglement. If you want it’s about re-entangling your organization with all the contexts as part of. So, that’s one insight that I think it has brought up to me.

And so basically, the reflection I was having is that maybe it’s not really about changing the organization, but it’s much more about changing the way we perceive the organization, and the way we perceive through the organization. But to also bring the perspective that I also wanted to bring at the start of this conversation that is this perspective of, I would say, friction and paradox and polarity. The question for you will be, how do you reconcile — I mean, it’s more a question for us. But how do we reconcile this need to deep dive into the contexts and perceive through the organization in a different way, with an urgency to build resilience and the urgency to change our bureaucratic organization? You started this conversation by saying our institutions are failing. So, how do you reconcile these two things?

Nora Bateson:
Well, I don’t think that they’re separate actually. I think that shift in perception permeates everything. And I guess the mistake is to think that if you’re just changing perception, nothing changes structurally. But I would argue with that. I would say that that shift in perception is going to change everything. In fact, I think this is what, you know, when you see sort of what has happened over the past few years with, whether it’s Cambridge Analytica or other forms of information manipulation, that those bodies have recognized absolutely, that first, you shift, you create the context where epistemologies and ways of perceiving shift and then the structures change. This is something that requires a different level of understanding, actually, of how potent those relational shifts actually are. And that you can’t measure them. You can’t go out there and control them. But what you can do is set into motion these stochastic processes. And the ones that have been set in motion, are set in motion with divisive and devitalizing processes at their core.

What would it mean to help set in motion the stochastic processes of revitalizing our relationships with our identities, our bodies, our children, our parents, our communities, the land? And also, this is hyper-local, but it’s beyond hyper-local too. Because it needs to matter to me that whoever it is, has, I don’t know, made my garden hose that they can actually feed their children and that they are living in dignity, and with well-being with their land and their children and their ancestors. So, the hitch is no one’s going to get rich on it. Okay. For me, that’s the incongruence in the middle of it. That is the stickler.

Stina Heikkila:
And I kind of want to loop back to my previous sense of the urgency of finding a solution. And it reminds me of something that I heard from Rob Hopkins from the Transition Movement about the urgency to slow down. And it kind of resonates with what you’re talking about. And it’s this idea that the perception will lead to unexpected — -the perception change sorry — will lead to outcomes that we don’t really know, that we can’t really predict. And that’s where the acceptance needs to start in the relationships that you’re talking about: that living in that perception change is what we can do at the moment, to unlearn some of the structures that we have embodied in our way of being, and in our way of conceiving our organizations. So, I just wanted to look back and catch that point for people who might be in a similar sense, to me, in that being caught in a reflex that is very deep-rooted within us, I think.

Nora Bateson:
Yeah. I often tell a story about the rattlesnake and the moose, and I’m going to reframe it a little bit for you. But the story goes like this, I’m a kid that was grown up in California, and I learned how to see rattlesnakes as a little child. I learned how they sun themselves in the morning, after a cool night, and where they are on the path. And my eyes learned to see their form of camouflage. I can find them, you know? And then I moved to Sweden, and in Sweden, there are no rattlesnakes. So, this ability to perceive rattlesnakes wasn’t very useful here. And here, what there are, is moose. And the moose are by the side of the road, or they’re in the forest, and they can cross the road, and if you’re driving a car, you can do some serious damage to yourself and the moose, if you hit the moose.

So, you would think that a moose is a pretty big thing that I would be able to see a moose. But I can’t see the most, and I can’t see the moose because I’m not able to perceive those nuances in the conditions of the landscape that produce those kind of alerts to watch out for the moose. And I’m not familiar enough with the forest and the shadowings of the forest to catch that nuance that’s going to give me the outline of the moose in the forest. Right? I don’t have the sensitivities to perceive the nuances so that I can see that most. So, my husband has to point them out to me. So, the reason I’m telling you that is this is that, first of all, if I were to just go along and say well, what I need to do is do an analysis of this landscape and I don’t see the moose, the analysis that I’m going to do is going to be mooseless. My ability to sense make in the landscape is actually not including the moose, because I don’t see the moose. My sensitivities to those nuances of mooseness are not there.

So, this is a really big problem because we’re running around doing all kinds of sense-making. But if the perception and the sensitivity isn’t enhanced, to be able to perceive relational processes in first, second, third-order, and beyond. Then it doesn’t matter how much sense-making we do because we’re just doing analysis on the landscape and not seeing the moose. So, that’s where you get this real depth is if you have a shift in actually the world you’re able to perceive. And then the analysis is so different.

Simone Cicero:
So, the question that I would like to use of say for closing, the reflection that I’m going to offer for closing is the following. So, as we agree that, let’s say, building the trans-contextual organization goes through changing perception, and we also said that the entanglement in the landscape and the community, for example, is one of the expressions of building this trans-contextual organization. So, the point that I wanted to raise, again, reconnects with the outputs of our recent paper that we released in November, is that things such as the economies of essentials, I mean food or welfare or education, most likely need to regain a certain importance in our scale of priorities, let’s say. And the point that I wanted to raise is that to some extent, this connects to these big also frictions in culture that we are seeing at the moment all around us. And also, for example, there is this big return of the traditionalists. And, to some extent, this idea of regionalization that we are seeing in the economy and politics.

So, the point for you would be, if there is a way or if you have been thinking about this, how do you reconcile, let’s say, this push towards what seems to be a bit of a romantic, let’s say, traditional way of organizing, or priorities, that push towards this idea of a more co-existential, let’s say, way of organizing in the landscape, in the community with technological progress, the ideas that have been building up in the last century at least, and that, I mean, seem to be still on our table. So, how do we reconcile this with the progress and with evolution, and with technology?

Nora Bateson:
I think that it’s really important to imagine that or utilize the metaphor of addiction. And one of the things about these processes that have been totally legitimized is that they have been completely destructive. So, I guess, whatever the relationship will continue to be, a shift in perception will shift those relationships. I think that’s the most important approach to that. Will there be technology? Of course, but what is the relationship to technology? Right now let me just say, I think there’s an awful lot of moose that are not being seen in the landscape. And as we start to perceive those moose, it’s like dog poop. If you see the dog poop, you don’t step in it. But the perception right now is a perception that is one of legitimization, and continued and cultured participation in very destructive processes. Because actually, let’s say I’m going to go give a talk on equality and ecology. I’m going to get on a plane, I’m going to put on some shoes that were made somewhere. There’s going to be all kinds of processes that I’m going to have to engage in to get there that are going to undermine both the equality and the ecology that I’m going to talk about.

And so there’s some real shift that we’re going to have to do. And I guess, one thing that’s interesting right now is as it is the middle of March in 2021, a lot of people have been in a very different set of rhythms of their life for the last year. From the lockdowns and from not traveling and from all sorts of shiftings in behaviors. From not hugging and not going to parties and weddings and funerals and visits and communication with family members, etc. There are changes that have taken place within us, between us, and in the outside world, and our assumptions of what the future is, of who we are, etc. There are all sorts of changes we haven’t even seen yet. And I’m curious how those will play out, and how those things that we’re not even really able to perceive right now will actually play out in large sizes in the coming years. And, yeah, so the shiftings are there. And I guess for me, it comes back to, it always comes back to a way of being, a way of perceiving not a methodology or a strategy but a whole approach to life.

Simone Cicero:
Right. So, the idea would be probably that the organizations we want, should be aiming at making more mooses visible, let’s say, at least trying this metaphor to reflect on what’s coming up. So, Nora, as a closing remark, maybe you can share with our listeners the best place where they can find your latest work. And also maybe if they are interested in knowing more about the warm data, how they can learn more, and maybe learn how to master these approaches to understanding that you are praising.

Nora Bateson:
Okay. Well, thank you. So, I guess my written work, mostly. I’ve just been writing things just sort of free-range. And they’re on my blog on WordPress or on Medium or wherever. They’re kind of all over the internet. And then the warm data work is there are a couple of websites, there’s the Bateson Institute, but also the Warm Data Network. And those sites are where the new courses are for learning to be a warm data host, as well as just information about what all this is about. Yeah. So, if it sounds interesting, contact us. Thank you.

Simone Cicero:
Right. And everybody should really catch up with your book, Small Arcs of Larger Circles that Stina was mentioning at the start. It’s really an important book that everybody on this podcast should really find a moment to read. And I guess there’s also the new book coming up. How’s it going?

Nora Bateson:
Slowly. It’s going slowly, but it’ll happen. It’ll happen.

Simone Cicero:
Right. Stina, do you want to add something more?

Stina Heikkila:
I just want to say thank you and I and again, encourage people to discover these ways of shifting perceptions. I think we’re really onto something interesting for the future of organizing.

Simone Cicero:
Thank you, Nora. Thank you for sharing with us this conversation and pointing out that maybe we shouldn’t really rush our conclusions in terms of what the future of organizing holds for us. So, it’s really about having the right time to dive deeper, I think. Thanks for the conversation you shared with us.

Nora Bateson:
Thank you, Simone. Thank you, Stina. It was really nice to be with you.

Simone Cicero:
And thanks to our listeners, and we’ll catch up soon.