Tag: DTF

In recent months, Otto Laske's work on human development has become more widely known on account of  CAD, the Center for Applied Dialectic directed by Bernhard Possert. In addition, Dr Iva Vurdelja has worked with film maker Mark Stanic on the film "Forging a Life", a documentary now available for distribution (http://vimeo.com/884507807; Password: Otto). The documentary traces Otto Laske's creative life in both the arts and sciences, showing how it lead to the creation of the Constructive Developmental Framework in 1998 to 2002. CDF takes a philosophical and empirical step beyond "developmental theory". It transitions from a stale and limited notion of development as social-emotional, based on R. Kegan's and Loevinger's work, to a much broader, philosophically grounded. dialogical epistemology, by including in developmental work  and thinking practices built on Laske's and his collegues' consulting, coaching, and team development work. In this more highly developed form, CDF links to philosophical traditions as well as new philosophical streams of thought as represented, e.g.,  by Roy Bhaskar's Dialectical Critical Realism and Gilbert Simondon's work on the philosophy of becoming as transduction (of which human development is a special case). From G. Simondon's vantage point, a theory of human development over the lifespan... Read More...

  Those interested in dialectical thinking will be pleased to know that Otto Laske's volume 2 of 'Measuring Hidden Dimensions'  of 2008 has been thoroughly revised and is in the process of becoming available again in the form of a three-part monograph under the title of this blog. The title does justice to the fact that the monograph has relevance far beyond applications in work contexts and is a must-read for systems thinkers venturing outside of the purely logical domain of intellectual endeavor. Since its first publication the scope of interest in complex thinking -- beyond the mechanics of using thought forms -- has broadened. Outside of being of interest to organizational thinkers, a broader, evolutionary, perspective , spearheaded by John Stewart and Lawrence Wollersheim, has emerged that centers on the planet's global crisis. These authors address two capital aspects of human flourishing: (a) self-evolution, and (b) meta-systemic wisdom the core of which is dialectical thinking (see https://www.evolutionarymanifesto.com/SpandaArticle.pdf, by John E. Stewart). Another target audience of the monograph comprises high-level systemic thinkers with an integral focus, whether they are active in think tanks, government, or intelligence agencies, as well as architects and artists whose work focuses on transformation. The three... Read More...

When it comes to acquiring developmental and dialectical thinking, "philosophies of the mind", "theories", and "world views" are insufficient. They are all abstractions that can be moved around like pieces of furniture, and in dazzling ways. What matters are PRACTICES based on them, and such practices require METHODS. The Constructive Developmental Framework (CDF), which includes DTF, the Dialectical Thought Form Framework, is a set of practices and associated methods. They have little to with "adult developmental theories" and "developmental models" in the conventional sense, although they synthesize and refine the latter for greater evidential power and effectiveness in real time work. Practically speaking, CDF and DTF are TOOL SETS people learn by doing, viz., working as members of a cohort in IDM workshops. In addition to long-term (1-2 year) case study workshops, beginning in 2022 IDM also offers shorter-term, ten session (15 hour) Practica. These Practica are attended by up to 10 participants working together for up to 6 months, to acquire a professional grounding in the practice of dialectical thinking and developmental coaching. Applications of this practice are found in areas such as permaculture, city planning, ecological rewilding, architectural design, art making, not solely organizational or institutional work. For... Read More...

The IDM program that leads to fluency in the use of CDF tools, now 20 years old, has unusual features that set them apart from other professional offerings. Among these features are: (1) professional learning closely linked to personal self-development, (2) comprehensive introduction into developmental and dialectical thinking, (3) exercises set in social contexts that make it easy to transfer them to professional practice, (4) teaching CDF tools in a social-ontology framework that opens participants' eyes to the social and cultural constraints they encounter in launching life and work projects, (5) unremitting modeling of developmental and dialectical practice in all workshop sessions in which participants enable and coach each other at a high level of awareness of their own internal conversations. For more details, see the description below: Description of IDM's CDF Program Read More...

In this article, Otto Laske emphasizes the lack of a social ontology in present managerial and consultative thinking. Such a discipline helps social and cultural actors understand the antecedent social and cultural structures their concerns and projects are embedded in, as well as strengthen the likelihood that executing their projects will come as close as possible to the intended organizational and social results they are envisioning. Social ontology, deriving from R. Bhaskar's and M. Archer's work since 1980, offers managers a sense of place from which to view their meaning- and sense-making stance, not just their perceptions, from an objective place. More than that: it helps them understand "where they are positioned when they open their mouth to speak" and listen to others. In contrast to empiricist frameworks of individual decision- making (like the Cynefin model), a social-ontology (SO) framework treats decision-making as a response of social actors to antecedent social and cultural structures they are unaware of as determinants of their project designs. Decision-making is seen as derivative of project design which in turn is conceived of as rooted in concerns linked to vested interests associated with roles in a social role matrix that is open to change by... Read More...

In the book and consulting project sketched in this blog, Otto Laske shows how to facilitate societal transformations by elaborating Margaret Archer's work on "Structure, Agency, and Internal Conversations" (2003). He thereby extends both Bhaskar's "The Possibility of Naturalism" (1979) and Archer's work into dialectical practice. To deepen Archer's logical approach, Laske introduces adult-developmental and cognitive-developmental foundations of the "internal conversations" that, in Archer's view, mediate Bhaskar's structure/agency dialectic, introducing three interrelated dialectics: The ontological dialectic of Moments of the real (being) issuing in generative mechanisms as distinct from actualities and experiences (Bhaskar 1979). The epistemic dialectic of human thought forms (TFs) operating within individuals’ internal workplace (in contrast to their external workplace), -- the mental space in which ‘work’ is done and ‘agency’ is launched (Laske 2008). The dialectic of generative mechanisms by which human thought forms (TFs) assume and exert causal power as determinants of needs and reasons based on which agents are in unceasing interaction with each other and thus the real world, natural and social (Laske 2021). Sketch 2 of new Laske book Read More...