The Foundations of the Holonomics Approach to Cultural and Digital Transformation in Organisations
Holonomics is a unique approach to cultural and digital transformation and customer and exployee experience, driven by deep thinking and the belief that long-lasting, impactful change can only be achieved through work that is, at its core, authentic. It enables leaders to create a new soulful way of business which develops new organisational practices through the development of an expanded form of consciousness and the application of universal human values.
This article collates a series of lectures which provide a comprehensive introduction to the underlying method and frameworks of the Holonomics approach. They will help you explore and understanding the dynamic conception of wholeness in nature and human organisations, through phenomenology, hermeneutics and ontological philosophy.
The lectures are come from Henri Bortoft, and are curated with my lecture notes which provide extracts from Henri’s final book, Taking Appearance Seriously: The Dynamic way of Thinking in Goethe and European Thought, as well as extracts from Holonomics: Business Where People and Planet Matter and Customer Experiences with Soul: A New Era in Design which I co-authoured with Maria Moraes Robinson. They have been created to help you develop a profound appreciation for the following:
- Understanding wholeness in systems thinking;
- How we can develop our observational skills through changing our way of seeing;
- How we can become more creative in our thinking by understanding the manner in which phenomena in the world appear to us;
- How to develop critical thinking skills by exploring the different ways in which we construct and know our world;
- The role language plays in the way in which we experience reality;
- How we can develop a science of qualities which can complement qualitative scientific, engineering and design methodologies;
- How we can deepen our connection to nature as opposed to simply experiencing ourselves as separate from nature.
Taking time with this foundational series in Holonomics will help you to develop new analytical and contemplative practices, something that I characterise as philosophical creativity, which enables us to reveal hidden patterns and order in nature, and which is able to help us innovate in both the customer experience and employee experience which can facilitate powerful cultural transformation, leading to more engaging, purposeful and authentic organisations.
I am extremely grateful for the support of Floris Books who have kindly given me the permission to include extracts from Taking Appearance Seriously. I am also grateful for the support of Jacqueline Bortoft for providing me with permission to make Henri’s lectures available.
The Foundations of Holonomics
Preface: The Foundations of Holonomics
1: The Dynamic Way of Thinking
2.1: Bohm, Bohr and the Holographic Approach in Organisations
2.2 Our Lived Experience of Wholeness
3: The Act of Distinction
4: Going Upstream
5: The Metamorphosis of Plants
6: Multiplicity within Unity
7: What is a Phenomenon?
8: Goethe’s Italian Journey
9: Seeing Diversity as Creative Unity
10: Goethe’s Theory of Colours
11: Truth, Method and Experience
12: The Dynamic Way of Understanding
