A systems theory of deliberative meetings in organisations and its implications for management practice

Abstract

This thesis explores ways for people to interact at meetings to get better outcomes. It conceives meetings as self-regulating social systems with regularities in their properties that emerge from the manner of interaction of their members. It seeks insights by constructing a new way to frame a familiar situation drawing on autopoiesis, a cognitive systems theory created by Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela. The frame was used to interpret meetings at the Museum of New Zealand during its development phase over 1995-97. It also generated an alternative theoretical approach to issues in the literature, including Janis' groupthink. The theory concludes that attendees can choose to become members of a social system and act according to shared premises that become organising principles. The most valuable of these is a non-possessive warmth one can call love. At the museum, biculturalism was an important value. We can join with others in a creative interplay of difference. We are each responsible for what we do; the system is responsible for what we achieve. The knowledge we generate with others is always subject to validation in a wider system frame. Group action is an experiment.