Electrifying Haikus

How many of you remember writing haikus in junior high? I do. I wasn't adept at this poetic form, but I do remember the 5-7-5 construction - five syllables in the first line, seven in the second, five in the third. They usually involve non-rhyming prose - and allude to nature.

Never did I imagine haikus could be used to advance our work of transforming the governance of the world. But, Beverly Stein, one of my partners, recently learned more about haikus in a workshop that covered cross-cultural ways of learning. Beverly learned that Buddhist monks have traditionally used haikus to solidify - and recall - the central learning of each day.

An opportunity to try them out soon appeared.

Last month, Beverly and Camille Barnett were working with over 100 of the top leaders of British Columbia Hydroelectric (BC Hydro). They were introducing these leaders to what PSG considers the key levers for transforming public organizations. Frequent readers of this column should recognize them as "the 5 C's."

Beverly and Camille presented information on the five and asked BC Hydro leaders to give stories illustrating them. After a full day of this, the last exercise was to write a haiku. Here's a sample of the ones that were turned in.

About customers...

Customer service
Cometh in many flavours,
Don't sip. Drink deeply.

Hear with open ears
Your customer's needs and wants.
Deliver results.

Customer service
Bends like a tree in the wind
Stronger and stronger.

About compliance...

Like recycling
Compliance flows freely forth
Less internal audit.

About change...

To grow and flourish
We must prune the dead growth
To free the new shoots.

Great intuition
Along with courageous work
Yields timely results.

Utilities change
And with change become stronger
Like diamonds from coal.

And, BC Hydro is facing a number of challenging changes. They are being required by the provincial government to spin off the transmission system to a separate crown corporation. They are facing their first rate case before utility regulators in ten years (because rates have been frozen). They exist in a time when all electric utilities are figuring out how to operate in post-Enron environment. Given this environment, their CFO wrote the most introspective haiku.

Will the weight of our
Bureaucracy fall from us
Like leaves from the trees?

Rather than changing with the seasons, he stated that they seemed instead to spend their time trying to hammer the leaves back onto the trees. He used this haiku the next day in a challenge to them to move beyond bureaucracy!

I love these haikus. I love their potential for organizational learning. I especially love how they capture the very essence of these transformative levers. Thanks to Beverly and Camille for being brave enough to test out their use! I consider them electrifying!