Bonds of Power, Bonds of Trust

The Social bonds within an organisation cross over the formal structure: whilst formal relationships are forged on bonds of power, social ones are founded upon reputation and trust. The Organisation is able to see, own, and control the formal bonds, with the Social often entirely out of site and, most certainly, beyond control. I’ve been working on a couple of illustrations around this, which will probably end up in the book on ‘Change – building the Socially Dynamic Organisation‘, that i aim to complete by the summer.

It’s important to understand the relationships between Formal and Social systems, to understand how we can build the Socially Dynamic Organisation: it relates directly to the Landscape of Trust research that i have running at the moment, the ways that we support the building of wider networks of trust and reputation, rather than simple, formal, power.

The ‘Landscape of Trust‘ is a global research project running through 2017. You can sign up to take part here.

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