Assessment

Continuous Assessment 40% + Summative Assessment 60%

Module Aims

This module aims to prepare learners to embody systems leadership within ministerial contexts. It endeavours to build their capacity to bring forth or foster active participation and collective leadership (also referred to as authoritative membership) in the face of complex, systemic challenges, which impact effective ministry in the contemporary world. This learning is valuable to those active in any part of a community or organisation, not only those appointed to formal positions of leadership. The module develops learners’ capacity to engage in interdisciplinary work, contributing to their development as Practical Theologians. The module thus introduces learners to the Living Systems approach of organisational theory; specifically, to the key concepts and principles, tools, practices/disciplines of the Compassionate Systems Framework (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), and related theories and methodologies (e.g. Theory U). It further introduces learners to organisational dynamics theory, based on Grubb Institute’s theoretical frameworks concerning role, power, and authority. Learners are enabled to become aware of and deepen their understanding of the interconnectedness of systems awareness (systems thinking and systems sensing) and theology. Drawing on theologies for and of ministries, it enables learners to explore the implications of systems awareness for ecclesiology and ministerial practice in diverse settings.

Indicative Syllabus:

The Discipline of Shared Vision

Core Capacities of a Systems Leader – cocreating rather than fixing.

Week No.	Topic
1	Practice: Check-in/Check-Out Exercise ‘Models of Learning Groups’ and Jane Vella’s Twelve Principles of Effective Adult Learning. Learners’ existing visions of ‘leadership’. ‘System’, ‘Boundary’, ‘Purpose’. Distinguishing Linear and Spiral Learning.
2	‘Compassionate Systems Framework’ & ‘Generative Social Fields’.
3	Subgroup simulated Role-Play activity to connect with learners’ existing experience of church, ministry, and human dynamics in ministry scenarios.
4	‘Living Systems’, interconnectedness, complexity, and nested systems.
5	Practice Triad Work: Being a Player in a System.
6	‘Role’; person-in-role; finding, making, and taking roles; working in role; role-relatedness.
7	‘Mindwalk’ film. ‘Systems and Power’: Power Over people, information, agendas, ideas, and relationships; Power With; Power Within.
8	Tool: Iceberg Tool and ‘Mental Models’.
9	‘Power and Authority’: Personal, Official, Instrumental, and Projected (Positive & Negative).
10	Structural dynamics in human systems, communicative competency
11	Tool: ‘Four Player Model’ of relational dynamics in groups
12	Opportunity for Spiral Learning - learner to choose a reading already processed in the semester.
13	‘Organisation of Work’, deepening understanding of open systems, purpose, task and anti-task. Leadership as ‘management at the boundary’.
14	Tool: Four Models of Organisation Tool: Four Styles of Leadership Distinction between leadership and management.
15	Subgroup activity: drafting Ministry-Informed case-studies of ineffectiveness and simulated role-plays of indicative scenarios.
16	Mental Models and Communication. Tool: Ladder of Inference. Tool: Ladder of Connectedness. The Learning Congregation (Hawkins).
Asynchronous	Communication as the Life-Blood of the System Tool: Four Levels of Listening Tool: Four Fields of Conversation.
17	Attending to Theological Awareness.
Asynchronous	Making Theological Sense & Connections.
18	Purpose/vision; personal awareness Wheel of Emotion; Empathy, Compassion The Discipline of Personal Mastery – creative tension with current reality.
19
20	Processing Pastoral Context as a Living System Transforming systems, transforming relationships, transforming self.

Learning Outcomes

• — On successful completion of this module, the student should be able to:
• — LO1) describe the context in which they minister in terms of System-Centred Thinking, identifying effective and ineffective practices and approaches
• — LO2) reflect on self as ‘a player within systems’ and on relational dynamics within groups and systems with specific reference to the unique system of the module group and ministerial pastoral settings
• — LO3) apply theoretical frameworks, key concepts and principals from the “Compassionate Systems Framework” and related organisational theory to the systems in which the learner participates
• — LO4) distinguish different models of organisation and different leadership styles and how power and authority are exercised in a systems context, relating these concepts to ecclesial and pastoral settings
• — LO5) identify paths and processes, skills and practices from the “Compassionate Systems Framework” that enable more effective taking up of ministerial roles
• — LO6) make theological connections between learning and insights from a systems perspective with pastoral theology, ecclesiology, and a theological understanding of ministry.

Bibliography

• — Bazalgette, John, Bruce Reed, Ian Kehoe, & Jean Reed. Leading Schools from Failure to Success: How Three Christian Headteachers Transformed Church Schools. Cambridge: UIT Cambridge, 2006.
• — Bohm, David. On Dialogue. London: Taylor & Francis Group, 1996.
• — Codd, Anne. ‘The Pastoral Context as a Living System: Implications for Theology and Practice.’ In Pastoral Ministry for Today: 'Who Do You Say That I Am? Conference Papers 2008', edited by Thomas Grenham, 64-89. Dublin: Veritas, 2009.
• — Downey, Paula. ‘Systems and Power, exploring the economy of change.’ In Global Aspirations and the Reality of Change: How can we Do Things Differently? (Ceifin Conference Papers) edited by Harry Bohan and Gerard Kennedy, 82-105. Dublin: Veritas, 2004.
• — Gaillardetz, Richard R. ‘Ecclesiological Perspectives on Church Reform.’ In Church Ethics and Its Organizational Context: Learning from the Sex Abuse Scandal in the Catholic Church edited by Jean M. Bartunek, Mary Ann Hinsdale, and James F. Keenan, 57-68. Oxford, UK: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2006.
• — Gaillardetz, Richard R. ‘The Ecclesiological Foundations of Ministry within an Ordered Communion.’ In Ordering the Baptismal Priesthood: Theologies of Lay and Ordained Ministries, edited by Susan Woods. Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical Press, 2003.
• — Gaillardetz, Richard R. and Edward P Hahnenberg, eds. A Church with Open Doors: Catholic Ecclesiology for the Third Millennium. Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical Press, 2015.
• — Groome, Thomas H. ‘Theology on Our Feet: A Revisionist Pedagogy for Healing the Gap between Academia and Ecclesia’. In Formation and Reflection: The Promise of Practical Theology edited by Lewis S. Mudge and James N. Poling, 55-78. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2009.
• — Hahnenberg, Edward P. ‘Serving in the Name of the Church: The Call to Lay Ecclesial Ministry.’ In In the Name of the Church: Vocation and Authorization of Lay Ecclesial Ministry edited by William J. Cahoy, 35-55. Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical Press, 2012.
• — Hawkins, Thomas R. The Learning Congregation: A New Vision of Leadership. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 1997.
• — Isaacs, William N. “Taking Flight: Dialogue, Collective Thinking, and Organizational Learning.” Organizational Dynamics 22, no. 2 (1993): 24–39.
• — Isaacs, William N. "Toward an Action Theory of Dialogue." International Journal of Public Administration 24, no. 7-8 (2001): 709-748.
• — Kantor, David and Nancy Heaton Lonstein. Reading the Room: Group Dynamics for Coaches and Leaders. 1st ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2012.
• — Kantor, David, Deborah Wallace, Sarah Hill, and Tony Melville. ‘Putting Theory into Action: The Evolution and Practice of Structural Dynamics.’ Reflections: The Society for Organizational Learning (SoL) Journal of Knowledge, Learning, and Change 14, no.1 (2014): 1-9.
• — Kasper, Walter. Theology and Church. London: SCM Press, 1989.
• — Plutchik, Robert. ‘A Psychoevolutionary theory of emotions.’ Social Science Information 21, nos. 4/5 (1982): 529-553.
• — Quine, Colin. ‘Reflections on Authority and Power in Groups & Systems.’ Course Materials, Diploma in Consulting and Facilitation, Craighead Institute, 2002.
• — Reed, Bruce. ‘An Exploration of Role.’ Grubb Institute Lectures, Nov 2001.
• — Roberts, Vega Zagier. ‘The organization of work, contributions from open systems theory’, in The Unconscious at Work: Individual and Organizational Stress in the Human Services edited by Anton Obholzer and Vega Zagier Roberts, 28-38. London: Routledge, 1994.
• — Scharmer, C. Otto. Theory U: Leading from the Future as it Emerges; the Social Technology of Presencing. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2009.
• — Senge, Peter M. The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of The Learning Organisation. London: Random House, 2006.
• — Senge, Peter, Hal Hamilton, and John Kania. ‘The Dawn of System Leadership.’ Stanford Social Innovation Review (Winter 2015): 27-33.
• — Sweeney, James, Gemma Simmonds, and David Lonsdale. Keeping Faith in Practice: Aspects of Catholic Pastoral Theology. London, UK: SCM Press, 2010.
• — Vella, Jane. Learning to Listen, Learning to Teach: The Power of Dialogue in Educating Adults, rev. ed. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2002.
• — Wheatley, Margaret J. Leadership and the New Science: Discovering Order in a Chaotic World. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2006.