The urban analogue of distributed leadership
The urban design of towns and cities, is like the design of organisations. They can be complex, messy, yet structured. There’s multiple players, and people are at their heart.
r over time with multiple hands in its design. Organisations are no different and urban design of cities is analogous to leadership in organisations, distributed leadership in particular. Let’s consider the ways…
Cities are emergent
Even the most highly planned cities become increasingly emergent over time. The parts that are valued are retained, those less valued deteriorate and/or replaced. New visions and desires are overlaid, and the city evolves and changes in a distributed manner. Each part of the city informed and influenced by others. Yet at the city scale it might not be clear how that’s happening or why.
Likewise leadership within organisations can be emergent when encouraged and nurtured, especially when it’s allowed at all levels of an organisation. It mirrors how urban design projects might emerge at different scales.
People are not born leaders, they must develop the skills, experience and confidence to choose to lead. It’s development of the people across the whole organisation, not just at the top and distributed throughout. The organisation subsequently benefits at all levels and a scales.
The city benefits from variation, diversity and emergence, as does leadership within an organisation.
Diversity adds value
Monotonous unrelenting landscapes of self-similar buildings are regularly portrayed as the epitome of inhumane city making. Most would agree that’s not a way to make a city. Diversity is not an outcome, it’s the point. We want cities to richly reflect the diversity of it’s inhabitants, uses and geography. Diversity makes cities better.
Monotonous, unrelenting, self-similar white male execs filling the majority of leadership roles are rightly vilified. Most would agree that’s not the way to run an organisation — except those with a vested interest. Diversity is not an outcome, it’s the point. Organisations without diversity fail. We want organisations to reflect the diversity of their people, those they serve and the community. Diversity makes organisations better.
Diversity doesn’t start at the top. It doesn’t start at the bottom. Nor does it start in the middle. It happens at all levels. Whether we are talking about cities or organisations. Diversity must be distributed, by definition.
Greater than the sum of its parts
Cities are wonderful because they’re diverse, but it’s not only because they’re diverse. The diversity contributes a rich contrast, poetry and complexity to the city. Each part on it’s own wonderful but more so through these relationships. The availability of choice, inclusion, the common and uncommon, is what makes cities desirable and liveable places to inhabit. A diverse city takes advantage of difference and is always greater than the sum of it’s parts.
Organisations similarly benefits when the diversity is distributed, encouraged and supported. Taking advantage of the diverse range of skills, knowledge and expertise its people have. Embracing this diversity allows for cross-pollination, upskilling and avoids groupthink. The organisation is all the greater for the sum of the parts.
Hierarchy isn’t always helpful
Most people have felt the pain of a questionable urban design decision being imposed by a governing body. The implementation a seeming fait accompli and public consultation lip service to a democratic process. The higher body supposedly representing everyone’s interests, but mostly work in service of themselves, not those they represent. For those lower in the hierarchy there’s little agency or ability to influence decisions. Good ideas, expertise and knowledge left ignored, unheard or unimplemented. Opportunities lost in the maintenance of a strict hierarchy and power structure.
Sound familiar?
It’s not so much an analogous situation as cities mirroring the organisational structures governing our cities. The parts of the city we often value the most are the older parts, those parts that have had less hierarchical structures imposed upon them. Those where an unseen and distributed democratic approach has allowed an urban form to emerge through a process or engagement with the many. Encouraging those with expertise, interest and knowledge to influence the outcome, no matter their position. This is one of the strengths of distributed leadership.
Agency overcomes inertia
Change is hard.
People often resist and fear it. Preferring the familiar.
It doesn’t matter whether this is within a city or an organisation. Even when the disfunction is clear, there’s often distrust in change. Especially when people have no apparent agency in what is being proposed.
Agency and a sense of ownership is key in initiating change. Whether it’s through democratic processes in urban design or empowering leaders distributed at all levels of an organisation, agency plays a key role in driving positive change.
Boundaries are everything
I know of no great world city that’s ongoing evolution is without design controls acting as boundaries on what’s not acceptable. They operate with varying degrees of success, but it’s inconceivable any city would dispense with all controls, even those with poor outcomes. Controls are designed with the outcomes in mind. Constraints and boundaries create a vision for the future. One that’s been co-designed by its leaders.
Organisations that successfully navigate change and the future are no different, their boundaries defined documents that might be titled: Vision, Mission, Values Statements, or similar. Such documents define the constraints on decisions organisational leaders make. They define how the organisation might want to grow, but also guide new and old leaders distributed throughout the organisation and how to approach their work.
Distributed leadership is not utopia
To an organisation with a well established leadership structure, distributed leadership might appear unattainable, if not utopian. Yet change always takes time. And time must be given to it.
Amsterdam was once dominated by cars, yet it’s now held up as an exemplar of a bicycle friendly city. To many at the time this would have been a seemingly utopian goal, but it happened. It took decades, but step by step, change was achieved.
Big, instant, scary change is seldom possible within an organisation. They must be allowed the time to change. Boundaries must be established to allow it to emerge in the way envisaged. It might appear utopian when only the end is in mind, but change is best achieved in smaller steps — we overestimate what we can do in a week , but underestimate what we can do in a year. Starting with the end in mind, unexpected outcomes and possibilities must be allowed to shape the change when they make things better. The entire vision might not be fully realised but it’s likely closer than might appear possible at the start.
Caveat
Analogies can be fraught, there’s often a fine line between clarity and over-reach. Trying to find that line here is tricky but nevertheless it’s useful to consider how distributed leadership is a lot like the design of a city. Happy to be called out when I’ve crossed that line, but also what I might have missed or could add into the analogy.
Michael is an Architecture Leadership Coach
Supporting architects in mastering a creative model of leadership to build a more adaptable and efficient practice.
Unleash the collective energy, passion, and capabilities of your people.
Find him at Unmeasured
