Critical Practices Strengthening Autonomy, Developmental Diversity, and Stratification

In this chapter, we review empirical research on adults’ social-emotional and cognitive development over the life span that has a direct bearing on management theory, not just the theory of human resources. Specifically, we briefly review “stages” of social-emotional, and “phases” of cognitive, adult development that have found broad consensus in the developmental research community. Together, a contributor’s stage and phase of development are thought to make up his or her developmental profile at a specific point on his or her life journey. In addition, such a profile is shown to anchor a contributor’s frame of reference in the broad sense of “interpretive framework” and “world view.” On account of this review, the reader is enabled to engage with what we call the three “We-Spaces” or “dialogue-spaces” that together constitute an adult-developmental outline of organizations’ mental architecture: the continuous improvement We-Space, the rethinking value stream We-Space, and the rethinking business model We-Space. We show each of these dialogue-spaces to produce dramatically different team dynamics that directly shape collaborative practice.