Newton’s Cradles & Pinball Machines – Reading Barry Oshry

Barry Oshry’s work is filled with insights on recurring patterns that emerge within various parts of a system…whether that system is a team, department, family, tribe, classroom etc.  His work is worth the read for any HR professional.  He talks about common patterns of issues confronted by actors in homologous parts of a system…tops, middles, bottoms.  Tops in a family for instance may well be middles in a team, but their challenges and behaviors in each role would be consistent with the recurring patterns for that part of the system. 

He summarizes the pattern of the Tops as the burden of unmanageable complexity, being caught in destructive turf warfare, fighting fires instead of shaping the future etc. – the world of complexity and accountability.

The pattern of the Bottoms is the sense of being oppressed by distant and uncaring Tops, feeling the pressures to conform, and resentment towards the Tops and Middle that prevents them channeling their creativity – the world of invisibility and vulnerability (towards “them”). 

The pattern of the Middles is being torn and confused between conflicting demands and priorities coming from the Tops and Bottoms, feeling alienated from their peers, in noncooperative competition with them, and being isolated from each other – a tearing world.  Every request to them is difficult as they need to go somewhere to get it. 

The result of this is that the focal point of the system – the customer – feels neglected and ignored.   

Oshry’s punchline for me is the essence of systems thinking – that most organizations tend to explain failures and dysfunctions as being a person issue (that’s just the way he/she is), or a company issue (that’s just the way we are).  But the issues are usually systemic. Human systems inevitably call forth these patterns along the same broad lines, unless the system becomes aware of itself and breaks the pattern with intention.  This requires insight, empathy, and the ability to see things from a balcony view.

A big takeaway is how most of the system challenges wash up to the Middles – middle management in organizations, who are whip-sawed and slammed on both sides.  Two visual metaphors come to mind…the Newton’s cradle, which captures for me the sense of paralysis felt by the middle in terms of effectiveness, and a ball caught between Pinball machine “bumpers”, which is how the middle feel in terms of effort.