Gears Look Neat. A Mobile Tells the Truth.

Stop me if you heard this one before, I had an amazing teacher in principal school who dropped some knowledge on us that I still use. I’ll admit, I had some generational level teachers in my time. Like my other stories, it’s a lesson that still resonates with me and it still comes through when I’m working with individuals or groups when we’re focused on planning.

First, let’s do a little interactive thing. Take a minute and think about something “strategic”. Planning, thinking, scheduling. Whatever. Now think of an image for the process of whatever it was you envisioned. Nothing crazy, just the first thing that you think you would see if you came across a simple metaphor for your strategic example.  

Is this your card?

It’s gears. You’re looking at some form of gears, aren’t you? It happens to the best of us. Gears are EVERYWHERE when “strategic” enters the conversation. Cute or color coordinated or plastered with your organization’s symbols.

Here’s the first part of that lesson: gears are usually the wrong image if we want to really get to the heart of our strategic strategic-ness. 

Simple Flat Connection

Gears imply a simple connection. Gears look neat and tidy. They’re flat and one dimensional. They’re predictable. One gear spins and another moves. But is your organization a simple, flat, predictable two dimensional construct? Not even close. And neither are the people who make up your organization.

Systems, and system thinking, like the people that make up these systems, are much more complex than gears and cogs. To better represent this we need an image that conveys depth, balance, and movement.

Three Dimensional Balance

Take a minute to think about a mobile. I’m talking about those things your kid had hanging over their crib. Or those amazing pieces of kinetic art you’ll find hanging in museums. They don’t just sit there, they hang in balance. Each individual piece at the end of the string or wire but all still part of a larger whole. Even the smallest pull sends the entire mobile swinging dramatically. This was the metaphor that professional bad ass of a teacher gave me years ago, and it’s stuck with me ever since.

What happens to the mobile when your kid grabs one of those hanging pieces? The whole thing swings wildly! The same will happen if you do this in the museum but , trust me on this one, they are really not cool with you doing this even when you tell them, “but it’s for science!” 

A Mobile Example in the Wild:

One principal on a campus decides that adding one highly impactful instructional coach would spark tremendous growth in their teachers’ classrooms igniting student performance.

Just one coach.

A tiny pull.

Someone at the district level agrees. One campus and one coach. Call it a pilot and watch to see how to scale. 

Just one campus.

One pull. A little shift of the mobile.

Enter the finance and budgeting department. The tight budget is already set so adding a position means trade offs, salaries, benefits. What or who gets cut to make room?

Just one campus budget. One cut.

The whole mobile swings.

Our mobile isn’t just shifting. It’s swinging now.

All of this from one small change. At one campus.

The whole system feels the swing.

Is it worth the swing?

So, in our example, is it worth the swing? Sometimes, yes. Sometimes that is exactly what the organization needs.

But here’s the lesson of the mobile: 

Every pull moves the mobile, however small or innocent they seem.

Every decision shifts the balance.

So before you pull, ask yourself, “Is this going to be worth the swing?”

And if it is, “How am I going to steady the mobile once it’s moving?”

What we settle for:

Gears might look neat. But they don’t convey depth, complexity, and balance.

What we need:

A mobile tells the truth.

Go build your mobile.