"It is the function of science to discover the existence of a general reign of order in nature and to find the causes governing this order."

Dimitri Mendeleev, 1901

THE URGENT NEED FOR SCIENTIFIC METHODS IN ORGANISATIONS 

An HR department is like an appendix.  Nobody knows why it is there.  Organisations are in big trouble today and HR has done little to pick up the baton.  HR evolved two centuries ago when factories needed four things - men, machinery, money and materials.  

Men were uneducated, uncouth, unhealthy and often drunk.  What better way to manage the unruly fellows than to set up a human resource department?  After all the factory was, in any case, like a giant adult creche, which needed rigid supervision and control.  And what better model to use than the military and prison systems that had worked so well for centuries?

Fortunately times have changed.  The tragedy of the pandemic has at least brought one silver lining.  Remote work and the simultaneous eradication of the need for an HR department in the traditional sense, and the urgent need to replace it with a science based Leadership Lab.

ORGANISATIONS ARE IN DEEP TROUBLE

Here are a few realities facing organisations today.  Clear opportunities that HR has ignored.

• The lifespan of organisations has dropped dramatically in the past fifty years.  They are now on a withering half-life scale of ten years.  (Basically organisations are systemically clueless.)
• At least 90% of so-called transformations fail. Clearly systemic ignorance is a global pandemic.  (Would you go to a doctor who boasts a 10% success rate?)
• Organisations spend 400 billion dollars a year on leadership development. Research on the impact of this investment suggests a return of investment close to zero.  
• We are living in a new world of science and technology, where over 90% of CEO's, senior leaders and politicians are scientifically and environmentally illiterate.
• 85% of employees identify their bosses as unpleasant, incompetent and the greatest barrier facing them at work.

The organisational fire is raging.  Organisations appear caught in a timewarp, frozen like a deer in the headlights.  

The reality is simple and obvious.  If leaders and their organisations wish to survive they urgently need to embrace scientific thinking and methods.  And eradicate the old and primitive ways of doing things.

A SCIENTIFIC SOLUTION - THE LEADERSHIP LAB

The purpose of the leadership lab is to provide leaders with the scientific tools and methods that will generate the knowledge and skill to make the organisation sustainably successful on a complex, chaotic and competitive landscape.

Knowledge and skills required in the leadership lab will include systems thinking and complexity, scientific thinking, evolutionary science, neuroscience and most importantly - the ability to train effective leaders in managing people in our brave new world of science and technology. 

7 REASONS TO SET UP YOUR OWN LEADERSHIP LAB 

1. A scientific solution to the current organisational crisis.
2. A competitive advantage for the early adopters.
3. A scientific basis for evaluating current leadership energy and system capability.
4. An independent structure, free from traditional rules and meta-rules that stifle creativity.
5. A systems design centre, based on evolutionary science, to create the tools and practices needed to survive and compete.
6. A method for introducing scientific thinking to all levels in the organisation.
7. A new science based organisational structure that is flexible, adaptive and capable of continuous evolution.

THE FOUR HORSEMEN ARE ALREADY USING THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD

In case you have any doubts about the above, take some time to think and read about the four horsemen that have created Apple, Tesla, Microsoft and Google.  Their success is all based on one thing.  The scientific method.