GLOSSARY @F-L-O-W

A | B | C | D | E | F | G |H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z

[ A ]

a priori
– based on hypothesis or theory rather than experiment

accommodation
– adapting actions to respond to new stimuli (in Piaget’s theory)

accountability
– a situation where an individual can be called to account for his/her actions by another individual or body authorized both to do so and to give recognition to the individual for those actions. See managerial accountability.

achievement
– one of four motive systems discussed by David McClelland in Human Motivation (1988). It is the motivation to perform difficult and challenging tasks successfully. In FL achievement motivation is correlated with the movement toward. See: Affiliation, Avoidance, Power.

affect
– is the feeling dimension of life, part of one’s general outward emotional expression. Someone with a flat affect expresses little emotion.

affective
– characterised by emotion

affiliation
– one of four motive systems discussed by David McClelland in Human Motivation (1988). It is the motivation to seek out and maintain friendly relationships. In FL affiliation motivation is correlated with the movement with.

agency and communion
– terms made current by Ken Wilber. For Wilber, reality is constituted of “holons,” by which he means wholes which are simultaneously parts of larger wholes. Every holon has two tendencies. Agency is its capacity and drive to maintain its own wholeness, identity, autonomy in relation to its environment. Communion is its capacity and drive to align with and support the other wholes constituting its environment on which its survival depends. In FL these words are associated with tendencies identified in Spiral Dynamics and other frameworks as “self-directed” thinking and acting and “sacrifice-of-self” or cooperation-directed thinking and acting.

algorithm
– is a finite sequence of instructions, a step-by-step procedure for completing a task.

alloic
– other-oriented (in Apter’s reversal theory)

amygdala (pl., ae)
– structures in the limbic system of the brain involved in emotional processing and memory. Responses by the amygdala to threat range in intensity from the milder forms of stress response to the most fully aroused fight-flight-or-freeze reaction. An “amygdala hijack,” so named by Daniel Goleman, bypasses the reasoning cortex and goes straight to the amydala often leading to an undifferentiated, disproportionate response to a perceived threat.

analysis of variance
– a statistical method for testing for significant
– differences between groups of data, which may be ‘explained’ by one or more variables

analytic
– focusing on the parts of a whole or on underlying
– basic principles

alpha (coefficient)
– a measure of internal consistency, to be interpreted
– as an average correlation coefficient, showing how well
– a set of test items ‘hangs together’

archetype
– the concept of an archetype /ɑrkɪtaɪp/ is found in areas relating to behavior, modern psychological theory, and literary analysis. An archetype can be:
– a statement, pattern of behavior, or prototype which other statements, patterns of behavior, and objects copy or emulate;
– a Platonic philosophical idea referring to pure forms which embody the fundamental characteristics of a thing;
– a collectively-inherited unconscious idea, pattern of thought, image, etc., that is universally present in individual psyches, as in Jungian psychology;
– or a constantly recurring symbol or motif in literature, painting, or mythology (this usage of the term draws from both comparative anthropology and Jungian archetypal theory).
http://leadu.org/a/archetypes/

assimilation
– absorbing new information and fitting it into existing knowledge (in Piaget’s theory)

authority
– the power vested in a person by virtue of the role to expend resources: financial, material, technical and human.

autic
– self-oriented (in Apter’s reversal theory)

auxiliary function
– See Type Dynamics (MBTI)

avoidance
– One of four motive systems discussed by David McClelland in Human Motivation (1988). In his earlier work McClelland identified six motive systems, each of which could be identified by the condition it moves toward (approach) and the condition it moves away from (avoidance), but in that framework avoidance was not itself a motive system. In Human Motivation, avoidance is a motive system (www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/David_McClelland). In FL avoidance is correlated with the movement away from. See: Achievement, Affiliation, Power.

[ B ]

beneficial behaviors of people flourishing
– higher morale, lower turnover, spend more time in flow (the zone) fully immersed in work, intrinsically motivated, healthier — fewer sick days, better with customers, increased sales, more resilient to stress, perform better in leadership positions, receive higher performance ratings, energetic, emotionally intelligent, forgiving, less likely to be depressed or anxious, more socially connected, enjoy better quality sleep, experience fewer headaches, stay more engaged in the face of difficulty, rise above obstacles more easily, better at their jobs, report more job satisfaction, experience positive emotions such as joy, interest and pride, greater likelihood of working actively toward new goals, more likely to succeed, more likely to recommend their organization to others, spend double the time at work focused on what they are paid to do, feel better about themselves, and enjoy life.

bi-conditional
– a relationship in logic in which q can occur if-and-only-if p occurs.

blank slate
– A current catch phrase from the Latin, tabula rasa, which indicates the view that each of us is born with essentially the same potential capability and anyone who strives hard enough can learn and do whatever all but a few exceptional geniuses can do. According to this view, each of us is born primarily a “blank slate,” so our nature is highly malleable and our development depends on nurture—on prenatal environment, life conditions, prevalent social views, family, and education, which inscribe on our blank slate the specific capabilities we mature into. One implication of blank slate is this: If our potential is so malleable, when there is a gap between us and the requirements of our work and life, our most efficient, effective, and sustainable solution is often to be trained how to do it ourselves rather than assigning the requirement to someone naturally predisposed for it. FL believes this underrates the individual differentiations of genetic predisposition toward varying talents, motivations, personality types and traits, and intelligences which fund our particular profile of capabilities.

blips
–  is Internet Time Lab’s mobile app that captures an individual’s self-report of thriving and displays it on the web in aggregate form.

[ C ]

capability
– the ability of a person to do work.
– the amount of available potentiality already actualized as some ability. See: Potential, Capacity.

capacity
– the complete available potentiality for actualization of some ability. See: Capability, Potential.

catalytic validity
– the extent to which those involved in research become motivated to understand and transform the situations in which they operate

cerebral dominance
– an outdated theory, claiming that one half of the brain controls or takes precedence over the other

clarification
– The second core competency of the Coach2 Coaching Model. Once the coach establishes a connection with the client, their work together begins with a process of clarifying the client’s self-knowledge and self-awareness, values, relevant beliefs, motivations and capabilities, purposes, blocks to realization, and discernment of Right Action. See: Connection, Commitment.

coaching
– regular discussions between a manager and an immediate subordinate in which the manager helps the subordinate to increase his/her skilled knowledge so that the subordinate is able to handle an increasing amount of the full range of work available in the subordinate’s role.

code (e5-4)
– is made up of the rules or algorithms which comprise a person’s operating system. The field of our algorithm-set varies in density.  It is very dense in our areas of skilled performance, where we have immediately at hand a large collection of familiar, differentiated, and nuanced ways to achieve an end. It is sparsely populated in our areas of minimal competence. Because they are maxims of know-how, the rules and algorithms of the code are a set of means.
– These codes as means are in the service of the ends to which we are most attracted, which appear to be given as genetic predispositions by the core. The core also contributes some genetically-guided constraints on the ways we operate, which form a supplementary code. For example, an introvert will typically prefer means different than those preferred by an extravert. This is an example of what we recognize more generally as the interdependencies among the elements of the e5 and between the e5 and the core. The code not only operates in the service of core ends and within constraints rooted in the core, it also uses a reading of the content, context, conditions, and culture together to make a sort-of comprehensive context for the right choice of operating system.
– the algorithmic code of a person is a more permanent, intrinsic, and defining aspect than the other elements of the e5. As a leader, co-team member, or coach, we want to identify and relate to the more stable and guiding code in order to determine the level of capability actually present in someone and to situate and facilitate her work to enable maximum effectiveness, efficiency, and sustainability. Using the e5 and core can help us make this discernment more accurately.
– See also in this order: Epigenetic5, Content(e5-1), Context(e5-2), Conditions(e5-3), and Culture(e5-5).

cognitive
– concerned with the psychological processes of perception, memory, thinking and learning.

Cognitive complexity
– as one type of conceptual skill, includes the ability to use environmental indicators to make distinctions, classify things, identify complex relationships and develop creative solutions to problems. — Yukl G. 2002: Leadership in organizations, 5th edition. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc.

commitment
– the third core competency of the COACH2 Coaching Model. Following upon the establishment of connection between coach and client and clarification leading to discernment of RightAction, the client comes to commitment and RightAction itself. There may follow a recursive process of further clarification and revised RightAction. See: Connection, Clarification.

communion
– See Agency and Communion.

competency
– see strength.

complexity
– determined by the number of factors, the rate of the change of those factors and the ease of identification of the factors in a situation.

complexity of mental processing ( CMP )
– the complexity of mental activity a person uses in carrying out work. There are four types of mental processing.

conative/conation
– refers to effort, endeavour and the will to achieve

Concatenation
–Concatenation (from Latin concatenare, to link together) is taking two or more separately located things and placing them side-by-side next to each other so that they can now be treated as one thing. In computer programming and data processing, two or more character strings are sometimes concatenated for the purpose of saving space or so that they can be addressed as a single item. (Of course, some way may be needed to know how to unconcatenate them later.)

A simple way to remember concatenation is to think of any word. What makes a word separate from other words is that all the letters are lined up together with no intervening spaces. That is, in a word, all letters are concatenated. Sometimes new words can be made by concatenating two existing words – for example, “airline” is a concatenation of the words “air” and “line” into a new word. -Mike

concurrent validity
– support for the meaning of a construct or the value of a test, based on correlational evidence from another set of measurements taken at the same time.

conditional
– a relationship in logic in which if p occurs then q will occur.

conditions (e5-3)
– are circumstances that require a response from us. In framing the response we envision a goal-state which will place us in a desirable relationship to the conditions, for example, changing them, stabilizing them, or fleeing them. This appeal to goals or ends tacitly brings into play our personal core, which is the domain of our end-goals. We are always living and communicating within a network of such conditions and desired or avoided goal-states, large or small in scope, felt urgency, or anticipated duration. Each of us identifies differently what conditions are significant and will move us toward goal states we desire or resist. This factor enables an encoder to further determine his meaning. Yet even this further specification by the encoder leaves in some degree a gap that must be left empty or be supplied by the perceiver.
– See also in this order: Epigenetic5, Content(e5-1), Context(e5-2), Code(e5-4), and Culture(e5-5).

connection
– this is the first core competency of the Coach2 Coaching Model. The connection the coach establishes with the client, involving elements of knowledge, moral commitment, and emotional and social intelligence, creates a habitat of trust which supports the client’s work with the coach. See: Clarification, Commitment.

construct
– abstract or general idea inferred from specific

construct validity
– how far test scores can be interpreted as measuring only what they are intended to measure

content (e5-1)
–  is the most plastic and open to change of the five meme-aspects making up the e5. Using a framework developed by Fritjof Capra, FL defines content as bare form, process, and manner without meaning. Traditional linguistics would call content in this sense a naked “signifier”—letters, sounds, graphics, acts—detached from a “signified” or correlated meaning. The example of content as a single word lets us see most clearly what this means in the communication transaction between an encoder and perceiver. If the perceiver does not know the word, she will spontaneously hunt among words of similar phonetic elements to try to categorize it in some fashion. If the perceiver is familiar with the word, she will depend on that prior association of meaning to impute meaning in this case. In either case, on the level of content, there is little the encoder can do to make an intended meaning of the word more determinate. The decoding perceiver will either abstain from assigning meaning or the meaning will be almost completely meaning she assigns. This is the first appearance of a key principle which the e5 discloses and addresses: Every communication is always incomplete. The e5 is an instrument for discerning relevant incompleteness and making the kind and degree of completeness more sufficient. 
– a question which will help an assessor judge what understanding the decoder may have of the word’s meaning on the basis of the perceived content is: Can the person use the word in a sentence?
– See also in this order: Epigenetic5, Context(e5-2), Conditions(e5-3), Code(e5-4), and Culture(e5-5).

context (e5-2)
– may be an intrinsic part of a communication; or it may consist of facial expressions and postures of the encoder; it may also tacitly depend on the shared intellectual, social, and experiential environment of the encoder and perceiver. The addition of context to content makes the meaning more complex and at the same time more determinate. In pure content, as we saw it at the single-word level, it was impossible for the encoder to make his intended meaning determinate enough for even an imagined perfect perceiver to decode the communication as the encoder meant it. Even content and context leave large gaps of meaning that must be left empty or supplied by the perceiver.
– a question that will allow one to assess the degree to which someone understands the content in context is: Can the person apply or relate it?
– See also in this order: Epigenetic5, Content(e5-1), Conditions(e5-3), Code(e5-4), and Culture(e5-5).

convergent thinking
– thinking directed at finding a single correct solution to a well-structured problem

core
– refers to factors in a person that seem to be in different degrees innate and genetically guided. It embraces a person’s motivational profile, natural capability and talents, the speed, degree, and scope within which a person’s ability to handle complexity matures, and some personality traits like being introverted or extraverted and drawn in thinking to sensory details or intuitive patterns. A person’s core includes areas of incapability as well as capability, motivation for avoidance as well as motivation toward. The core and the meme-based epigenetic5 are always interacting in multiple ways that together form each person.

correlation
– a measure indicating how far two variables are totally unconnected (zero correlation), or are negatively (e.g.–0.5) or positively related, as determined by underlying or outside influences.

culture (e5-5)
–  surrounds us like an ocean we live in. It is what we look out from and what we see before us. On its surface, the memes which culture carries are as iridescent, shape-shifting, and difficult to detach into stable determinate parts as an oil slick riding on water. They are the face of e5-1, sheer Content. In its depths, culture conserves patterned memeplexes and larger groups of memes called co-adapted meme complexes that have proven relatively stable and been copied and passed on together as forms of individual and group development. They become the culture of ways human beings have done things in this family, this religion, this social class, this role as man or woman. Because culture is heavily reinforced among its members, it is mimetically dense and therefore changes only gradually over time. Because culture is rooted in the varied range of human nature and typical human conditions, even when particular cultures have been lost or are only tacitly present, they are not simply past, but remain present potentialities for recurrence. Almost any of them may attract those who find them congruent with their e5 elements and satisfying to their core motivations, personality types, and other innately shaping aspects. In this respect culture is a library of tried solutions to the problems of being human. These solutions surviving in memes of memory constitute culture-borne archetypes.
– has an important role as support and scaffolding in our lives and work. Depending on context, the role may have positive or negative consequences. Positively, cultural support and scaffolding enables workers to perform at a higher level than their intrinsic level of capability, making them more productive. Negatively, such cultural support and scaffolding may lead observers to overestimate a person’s intrinsic capability and send the person into situations of uncertainty, crisis and cultural regression which strip away the scaffolding and leave the person’s capability too low to handle conditions of such complexity. Resilience demands a degree of meme density that keeps one stable under pressure but not so dense that it prevents adaptability. 
– See also in this order: Epigenetic5, Content(e5-1), Context(e5-2), Conditions(e5-3), and Code(e5-4).

current applied capability ( CAC )
– the capability someone has to do a certain kind of work in a specific role at given level at the present time. It is a function of his/her complexity of mental processing (CMP), how much s/he values the work of the role (K/S), and the absence of pathological temperamental characteristics (minus T). We can think of this as CAC=f CMP V K/S (-T)

current potential capability ( CPC )
– a person’s highest current level of mental complexity. It determines the maximum level at which someone could work at the present time, given the opportunity to do so and provide that the work is of value to him/her, and given the opportunity to acquire the necessary skilled knowledge. This is the level of work that people aspire to have and feel satisfied if they can get. When people have work at their CPC, they feel they have an opportunity for the full expression of their potential.

curvilinear
– in a curved line, expressing a non-linear relationship between variables

cynthesis
– is a coinage by Mike Jay from the words “creative” and “synthesis.” The reason for coining a new word is the special range of cynthesis. The Integral Transformative SystemTM of Flawless Living is an example of cynthesis. In the adventure of living flawlessly, we collaborate in our emergence by working with the creative processes both of unconscious natural design and conscious nurtural design to support our emergence. In doing this, we are cynthesizing the crucial elements into a whole at a number of levels. A religious perspective might say it is no surprise that a God who brought forth epigenesis would also bring forth cynthesis and require us to share in the process.

[ D ]

decision
– the making of a choice with the commitment of resources.

deductive
– reasoning from a general statement or definition to a particular instance

defense mechanism
– self-protective reaction to avoid distress or anxiety (in Freudian theory)

diagnosis
– identifying the nature or causation of a problem

dialectic
– involving a contradiction of ideas which acts as the determining factor in their interaction

dichotomous
– dividing into two sharply distinguished part or classifications

disposition
– habit of mind, mood or attitude

discriminant analysis
– a statistical method for assigning new cases to groups on the basis of characteristics shared by the members of existing groups

divergent thinking
– exploratory thinking, seeking different possible ways of coping with ill-structured problems

dominant function
– See: Type Dynamics (MBTI)

dyad
– pair

[ E ]

ecological validity
– the quality of being well grounded in the reality of a particular context

effect size
– a measure of difference or gain in average scores, whereby effect sizes of less than 0.2 are usually
considered trivial; between 0.2 to 0.5 small; between 0.5 and 0.8 moderate; and when 0.8 or more, large.

electroencephalographic (EEG)
– using a technique whereby electric currents generated by the brain are recorded through sets of electrodes glued to the scalp.

emergent
– was coined in 1875 by G.H. Lewes, a psychologist and longtime partner of the writer, George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans), who treated similar shapes of reality, for example, in her novel, Middlemarch. Lewes contrasted an emergent with a simple resultant: Every resultant is either a sum or a difference of the co-operant forces, their sum, when their directions are the same – their difference, when their directions are contrary. Further, every resultant is clearly traceable in its components, because these are homogeneous and commensurable. It is otherwise with emergents, when, instead of adding measurable motion to measurable motion, or things of one kind to other individuals of their kind, there is a co-operation of things of unlike kinds. The emergent is unlike its components insofar as these are incommensurable, and it cannot be reduced to their sum or their difference.
– A current definition of emergence retains and elaborates on the characteristics noted by Lewes, “[Emergence is] the arising of novel and coherent structures, patterns, and properties during the process of self-organization in complex systems.” (cited fromhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence)

emotional intelligence
– the most widely known current body of work dealing with emotional intelligence is by Daniel Goleman. Goleman defines Emotional Intelligence as “the capacity for recognizing our own feelings and those of others, for motivating ourselves, for managing emotions well in ourselves and in relationships.” FL takes into account that EI capability depends in part on genetic predispositions which may not be present in those who share the deficits of the “mechanistic cognition” characteristic of the Asperger’s-autism spectrum. See: EQ, Relationship Management Self-Awareness, Self-Management, Social Awareness, Social Intelligence, SQ. Also: Mechanistic Cognition, Mentalistic Cognition

emotion
– refers to a relatively specific pattern of short-lived physiological responses. Emotions arouse, communicate, direct, and sustain behavior.

employee
– A person who agrees, in exchange for agreed-upon compensation, to:
– apply full capability to all tasks assigned by their manager (there will be an agreed-up range of tasks).
– give their manager their best advice.
– stay within policy.

epigenetics
– a genotype is a set of instructions encoded in the DNA that guides the development of the phenotype, the sum of the organism’s observable characteristics. I as a phenotype write and you as a phenotype read this account of the relationship of genotype and phenotype. 
– in this context epigenetic mechanisms are factors in the inner or outer environment which alter, not the DNA itself (that would be mutation), but the expression of the DNA. They block the accurate expression of the genetic program by activating or silencing particular genes. Therefore the phenotype develops according to a different pattern than that encoded in the DNA. Sometimes these epigenetic changes of the DNA’s instructions continue over a lifetime of cell-division and can even be inherited.
– more generally, the term “epigenesis” is used to describe the full process of interaction between genes and environment that results in the fully developed organism. The epigenetic environment is first the cell but over time extends to embrace all of nature, nurture, and culture in the environment that interacts with the organism’s genetic program. 
– the unit of heredity is the gene. The unit of culture was originally named by Lumsden and Wilson, a “culturgen”(Lumsden and Wilson,1981). Later Wilson adopted the name meme for the unit of culture, following Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene (1976), which made the term prevalent. See: Epigenetic Rules; Epigenetic5 (E5).

epigenetic5 (e5)
– epigenetics examines the interrelations of genetic and cultural factors in organisms. The unit of genetic transmission is the gene. Richard Dawkins, in his book, The Selfish Gene (1976), introduced an analogous unit for cultural transmission, which he named a meme. There are well-developed taxonomies of genes. There are no analogous taxonomies of the parts and transactional processes, internal and external, which characterize memes and their activities. The e5 was created by Mike Jay in 200_ to provide such a 
taxonomy.
– a meme is a unit of meaning embodied in language, ideas, beliefs, any sensory mode, action, practices, all forms of meaningful human relationships from parenthood to war, and any other imitable phenomena which are replicated by means of conscious and unconscious imitation. The meme takes its name from the classical Greek word, mímema, meaning “something made by imitation.”
– Jay identifies five crucial perspectives in which to understand a meme’s functioning. When we look at a meme as a unit, we have a “naive” apprehension of it as a whole. This apprehension is true, but if we want to develop the ability to understand and manage a meme we use, we must differentiate it into its functional parts. In Jay’s taxonomy these are, naming them from the most fluidly changeable to the most stable over time: content, context, conditions, code, and culture. These epigenetic factors pattern our thinking and doing in association with a sixth “c,” our genetic core. Once we have differentiated these in a particular instance, we can reintegrate them, seeing how every differentiated perspective co-creates and is co-created by every other. This replaces the original “naive” apprehension of the wholeness of the integral meme with a more determinate and actionable grasp of its wholeness.
– the e5 has many uses. In FL, for example, it is an instrument for understanding the capability of individuals or team members in relation to the requirements of an undertaking; or to distinguish whether the complexity of a person’s thinking is hierarchical, indicating an ability to handle a more multidimensional quality of complexity at a higher level, or horizontal, indicating an ability to accumulate and assimilate a large quantity of complexity at a single, perhaps low level.
– See also in this order: Content(e5-1), Context(e5-2), Conditions(e5-3), Code(e5-4), and Culture(e5-5).

epigenetics: primary and secondary epigenetic schemas
– epigenesis refers to the interaction between genes and the internal and external cues that change the patterns of gene expression and thus heritably modify an organism. Such interactions are what we might call in the title of Matt Ridley’s book, Nature via Nurture, or in Edward O. Wilson’s phrase, “the co-evolution of nature and culture. For the purposes of FL epigenesis is differentiated into two schemas called the Primary and Secondary Epigenetic Schemas.
– the Primary Epigenetic Schema embraces the genetic processes of organisms. It functions automatically and unconsciously.
– the Secondary Epigenetic Schema embraces the cultural processes of memes, conceived as units of culture generally parallel in structure and action to genes. The action of memes is not altogether independent of the action of genes. Genes create predispositions to think, feel, be motivated by, and behave in certain ways that lead to accepting, using, and transmitting certain memes available in the culture over others. Thus the meme schema is rightly called secondary. Often what the genes determine in such cases is the freedom to choose within a large and variable predisposed range. 
– See also: Epigenetic5 (e5) and references there.

epistemology
– the philosophical study of theories of knowledge.

EQ
– these initials stand for Emotional Intelligence Quotient, understood as analogous to IQ. See also: EQ, Relationship Management Self-Awareness, Self-Management, Social Awareness, Social Intelligence, SQ. Also: Mechanistic Cognition, Mentalistic Cognition

equilibration
– the balancing by managers of the standards being used by their immediate subordinate managers in appraising and directing their own immediate subordinates.

equitable pay differentials
– differences in payment between work at different levels that are experienced by the incumbents as fair and just.

espoused theory
– one of two correlated terms developed by Chris Argyris and Donald Schon, to distinguish two “theories of action.” Espoused theory is what we say and believe or want others to believe when we report what we do. It is usually inaccurate because of elements of self-deception or deception of others. See Espoused Theory.

explanatory style
– how we explain the nature of past events. People with an optimistic explanatory style interpret adversity as being local and temporary while those with a pessimistic explanatory style see those events as more global and permanent.

external validity
– a form of concurrent validity, in which a particular set of test scores is correlated with scores from
another instrument which is supposed to measure the same construct.

extraversion
– the inclination to be involved with social and practical realities rather than with thoughts and feelings

extrinsic motivation
– the desire to do something in order to obtain an external reward

[ F ]

face validity
– support for an assessment tool based on common-sense judgement that the test items appear
to measure what they are claimed to measure

factor
– an underlying dimension or influence

factor analysis
– a statistical technique which identifies underlying dimensions in a set of measures by finding groups of items which vary between individuals in similar ways

factorial validity
– a form of construct validity in which the proposed constructs emerge as recognisable factors when
datasets of item responses are factor analysed

feeling
–  refers to the subjective experience of emotions; feeling can be complex experiences, involve several different emotions at once.

field dependence
– responding to structures in a holistic fashion

field independence
– being able to see parts of a structure distinctly and objectively

formative assessment
– evaluation carried out in the course of an activity in such a way that the information obtained is used to improve learning and/or instruction.

free energy
– is energy available as a reserve potential to be activated in conditions of uncertainty, unanticipated difficulty, or other stressors. It is analogous to the free cash flow kept in reserve by a business for conditions of emergent need. As a precondition and result of following a resilient path, we design our lives to rely on our strengths and preferred motivations and innate personality dispositions, which demand from us less energy for greater productiveness, and assign or hire others to carry out activities in our areas of limitation, which require greater expenditures of energy for less productiveness. Sustaining continued free energy is a key to resilience.

freudian-bernaisian model
– In the early 1900s, particularly following the First World War, Sigmund Freud’s American nephew, Edward Bernays, invented a new profession he named “public relations.” Its purpose was to adapt his uncle’s discoveries about unconscious motivations into potent methods of manipulation of conscious and unconscious desires and fears for commercial, social, and political ends. Bernays was a key figure in the deliberate transformation of American and European-centered cultures into consumer cultures above all else.

future potential capability ( FPC )
– the maximum level at which a person will be capable of working at some time in the future, say at 5, 10, or 14 years from now.

[ G ]

g ( general intelligence )
– an general cognitive ability factor which, in addition to specific abilities and skills, contributes to performance on a wide range of tasks.

gearing ( for talent pool )
– the process whereby the MoR and immediate subordinate managers check their judgments with each other regarding the levels if current potential capability of individuals in the next two layers down.

generati
– A word coined by Mike Jay in the late 1990s. It is a play on two already existing words, literati, the literary intelligentsia, and digerati, the cyber elite. Generati are not concerned with a restricted domain of practice, but with a quality that may pervade the lives of all of us in our dealings with every domain. Generati are those who intentionally design their activity to foster the most generative results collectively for themselves, their work, and their social-political and natural surround.

– People behaving in a generative design: “generative, meaning that you could generate an infinite number of options from a finite set of rules.” — adapted from Chomsky

global
– not interested in detail: holistic

[ H ]

happiness = eudaimonia
– Living well, psychological well being
–  Greek for ”human flourishing.”
– doing well and living well (Aristotle)
– reflective psychological well-being characterized by virtue and reason.
– the joy we feel striving after our potential (Achor)
– a deep sense of flourishing that arises from an exceptionally healthy mind…not a mere pleasurable feeling, a fleeting emotion, or a mood, but an optimal state of being (Matthieu)

happiness = hedonic
– pleasure (Seligman)
– pleasure (fleeting) and passion (flow) (Hseih)
– having frequent positive feelings as well as having infrequent and less intense negative feelings (Gaffney)

haptic
– perceiving through physical contact

hedonic adaptation
–  Habituation. After a while, anything seems ordinary. Also known as the Hedonic treadmill.

heritability
– the degree to which something is inherited, expressed as a percentage

heuristic
– rule-of-thumb strategy intended to increase the chances of solving a problem

holistic
– perceiving a whole object or focusing on the organic nature of a system

homeostatically
– so as to maintain a state of equilibrium

[ I ]

inductive
– reasoning from particular facts to a general conclusion

internal consistency ( reliability )
– the degree to which the items in a test measure the same thing, measured by the average correlation between each item and the other items

intrinsic motivation
– the desire to do something for the sake of the experience alone

introversion
– the inclination to shrink from social contact and to be preoccupied with internal thoughts and feelings

inventory
– detailed checklist

ipsative scoring
– scoring an instrument with forced-choice items, resulting in scores which are not comparable across individuals, artificially created negative correlations and the invalidation of factor analysis

item analysis
– a process for identifying good items in a scale, usually those which have at least a moderate positive correlation with the scale as a whole

[ K ]

kinaesthetic
– perceiving through an awareness of body movements.

knowledge
– consists of facts, including procedures, that have been articulated and can be reproduced.
– is anything you know. It does not exist in us innately, although we may have a natural propensity for acquiring certain kinds of knowledge over others. Knowledge must be acquired through the appropriate kind of formal or informal education. (adapted from the Gallup Organization.) 
See : Skill, Strength, Talent.

[ L ]

level of work ( low ) in role
– the weight of responsibility felt in roles as a result of the complexity of the work in the role. The level of work in any role can be measured by the time-span of discretion of the tasks in that role.

levelling
– tending to rapidly assimilate and oversimplify one’s perceptions (in Holzman and Klein’s theory)

Likert scale
– a scale in which the user can express a degree of agreement and/or disagreement

limbic system
– a group of interconnected mid-brain structures found in all mammals

loading
– in factor analysis, a correlation coefficient between item and a factor

losada line 2.9013
–  the ratio of positive to negative interactions necessary to make a corporate team successful. This means it takes about three positive comments to find off one negative one.

[ M ]

manager
An employee who is accountable for:
– the outputs and working behaviours of others.
– exercise of managerial leadership practices.
– building a team of increasingly capable employees.
– continuous improvement of processes used by subordinates.

managerial accountability
– the accountability managers have for their own effectiveness; the output of their subordinates; exercising effective managerial leadership of their subordinates; building and sustaining an effective team of subordinates.

managerial accountability hierarchy
– an organization of employment roles such that each role is subordinate to one and only one managerial role. The CEO is the only exception as it may be subordinate to a board of directors.

managerial authority
– the power vested in a person by virtue of role to expend resources: financial, material, technical and human.

managerial hierarchies
– organizations used for employing people to get work done. They are employment systems organized into accountability hierarchies of manager and subordinate roles.

manager once removed ( mor )
– the manager of a subordinate’s immediate manager is that subordinate’s manager-once-removed.

maturation
– a process in which a given aspect of a person is biologically innate and grows in a regular way to a predictable end state, so long as the individual does not encounter any severely limiting environmental conditions, especially in infancy.

measurement
– the quantification of a property of an entity by means of an objective measuring instrument.

mechanistic cognition
– one of two types of human cognition described by Christopher Badcock. It focuses on science, technology, and engineering; on objects rather than subjective experiences; on skills of mathematical reasoning, logic and spatial awareness; and is more commonly highly developed in men. It can be present in an individual in a range of degrees and in company with or exclusive of the complementary qualities of mentalistic cognition. In its extreme and exclusive forms it appears as autism. See: Mentalistic Cognition.

memes
– “Cultural evolution, including the evolution of knowledge, can be modeled through the same basic principles of variation and selection that underlie biological evolution (Boyd & Richerson, 1985; Cavalli-Sforza & Feldman, 1981). This implies a shift from genes as (replicating) units of biological information to a new type of (replicating) units of cultural information: memes (Dawkins, 1976). A meme can be defined as an information pattern, held in an individual’s memory, which is capable of being copied to another individual’s memory. This includes anything that can be learned or remembered: ideas, knowledge, habits, beliefs, skills, images, etc. Memetics can then be defined as the theoretical and empirical science that studies the replication, spread and evolution of memes (Moritz, 1990). – Francis Heylighen: http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/Papers/MemeticsNamur.html”

mentalistic cognition
– one of two types of human cognition described by Christopher Badcock. It focuses on moral, spiritual, aesthetic, and psychological matters; on subjective experience rather than objects; on skills of social judgment, empathy, and cooperation; and is more commonly highly developed in women. It can be present in an individual in a range of degrees and in company with or exclusive of the complementary qualities of mechanistic cognition. In its extreme and exclusive forms, a particular subjectivity correlative to the subject’s may be projected onto another, as malicious intent is projected in paranoia or sexual intent is projected in erotomania. See: Mechanistic Cognition.

mental mode
– the highest level of mental processing to which an individual will finally mature.

mental processing
– the use of particular mental process for handling information in order to do work. The four methods of processing information are: Declarative; Cumulative; Serial; Parallel.

mentoring
– a periodic discussion by a manager-once-removed (MoR) to help a subordinate-once-removed (SoR) to understand his/her potential and how that potential might be developed to achieved as full a career growth in the organization as possible.

meta-analysis
– the process of synthesising a range of experimental results into a single estimate of effect size

metacognition
– awareness and conscious use of the psychological processes involved in perception, memory, thinking and learning

metaphysical
– dealing with highly abstract ideas about being and knowing which are not derived from the material world.

Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator ( MBTI )
– this psychological type assessment was developed by Katharine Briggs and her daughter, Isabel Briggs Meyer from an analysis of personality types by the psychologist, Carl Jung. The MBTI measures a person’s preferences in four dimensions of personality. This results in a four letter type designation, for example: INFJ. Position 1 records the preferred source of personal energy of the person assessed. This determines what is named one’s inner attitude: whether one is an Extravert, who renews energy in being outgoing with a lot of active stimulation, or an Introvert, who renews energy by turning within and being quiet. Positions 2 & 3 are bracketed together because both designate cognitive functions of the personality: Position 2 designates the preferred mode of perception for the person assessed and Position 3 the preferred mode of reaching a judgment about what has been perceived. The two perceiving functions from which a choice is made in Position 2 are iNtuition, which spontaneously perceives patterns of meaning implicit in what is experienced, or Sensing, which spontaneously perceives sensory objects and details in themselves. The two judging functions from which a choice is made in Position 3 are Thinking, which utilizes objective criteria and rational methods, or Feeling, which uses emotional intelligence and an appeal to values. Position 4 makes what we may call a meta-distinction, for it designates a preference not within a Position but between the two Positions 2 and 3, designating whether we spontaneously prefer the activities of Position 2, Perceiving our experience, or of position 3, making Judgments based on our experience. This is called a person’s outer attitude: it tells whether the Perceiving function of Position 2 or the Judging function of Position 3 is extraverted or used in dealing with the outer world. Thus the example of a type formula given above, INFJ, designates a person who prefers to turn within and be quiet to restore energy (I), spontaneously sees patterns of meaning implicit in what is perceived (N), relies on emotional intelligence and an appeal to value standards in arriving at judgments F), and prefers to reach judgments about experience rather than to rest in perception (J). Does this mean that someone with the type designation ESTP and the one designated INFJ have no qualities in common? The answer is that all people have all the dimensions of personality in common. For someone whose type is ESTP the personality dimensions designated by INFJ are present but not preferred, so they are less used and therefore take more attention and energy to use. The same is true in reverse.
See: Type Dynamics (MBTI).

mindfulness
– opposite of middlessness
– result of meditation
– paying attentional in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally (Kabat-Zinn)
– keeping one’s consciousness alive to the present reality” (Thich Nhat Hanh)

mood
– refers to a relatively long-lasting state of feeling. A mood sets the emotional backdrop for one’s experience of the world.

motivational density
– .this metaphor refers to the degree to which a particular motivation is present in an individual. Individuals differ in the density of particular motivations in them, giving each person a characteristic motivational profile. See: Motivational Sensitivity, Reiss Profile, Values and Motives., Value-Based Happiness.

motivational sensitivity
– this expression refers to the degree to which individuals are responsive to particular motivating values. Someone who is sensitive to the value of competition may be intensely motivated to enter a fight at what appears to a person indifferent to competition the slightest cue. A high motivational density generates a high motivational sensitivity. See: Motivational Density, Reiss Profile, Values and Motives, Value-Based Happiness.

motives
– See: Motivational Density, Motivational Sensitivity, Reiss Profile, Values and Motives, Value-Based Happiness.

[ N ]

need

–needs are unconscious strivings wired into us by heredity, wants develop as a service to those needs…
-needs can be coopted through means/memes/wants and be obscured by the need of the need

negative capability
– Robert Chia, an international expert on entrepreneurial thinking, writes about “negative capability,” a phrase coined by 19th century poet, John Keats, “Negative capability describes the capacity to be at ease with an inherently vague, unformed, ambiguous and changing world (Chia, 28).” This describes the accelerating, many-layered, shifting complexity of every aspect of the world today. Negative capability instills “a cultivated resistance to [premature] conceptual closure (Chia, 27).” As Jay writes about this space of “contemplation, rather than problem solving:” “We learn to be with our problems, to allow our non-conscious processes to work with our inquiry about self-knowledge…, so that the actions we do take are in concert with capability, our understanding of requirements, and our design needs.”

neuroticism
– state of, or tendency towards, nervous disorder

[ O ]

orthogonal
– at right angles; meaning, in factor analysis, independent or uncorrelated

[ P ]

parameter
– a factor that defines a system and determines (or limits) its performance

paratelic
– activity-oriented and intrinsically motivated (in Apter’s reversal theory)

pearson r
– a measure of correlation, indicating the extent to which two measures co-vary (with 1.00 indicating
a perfect correlation)

pedagogy
– theoretical and procedural knowledge about teaching

percentile
– a point on a scale below which a given percentage of a population will score

perception
– interpreting and understanding information received through the senses

phenomenology
– the study of human experience, based on the assumption that there is no reality other
than human consciousness

positive emotions
–  joy, gratitude, serenity, interest, hope, pride, amusement, inspiration, awe, and love. They reinforce one another. More is better.

potential
– the amount of capacity for some ability not yet actualized as capability. See: Capacity, Capability.

Postmodernism

–A general and wide-ranging term which is applied to literature, art, philosophy, architecture, fiction, and cultural and literary criticism, among  http://www.pbs.org

power
– one of four motive systems discussed by David McClelland in Human Motivation (1988).  It motivates us to impact and influence others and may be personal or social.  In FL power is correlated with movement against. See: Achievement, Affiliation, Avoidance.

predictive validity
– the extent to which a set of scores predicts an expected outcome or criterion

prosocial
– acting in support of others or to meet their expectations of good behaviour

psychometric
– concerned with psychological measurement

psychoticism
– a tendency towards a state of mind in which contact with reality is lost or is highly distorted

pygmalion effect
–  when our belief in another person’s potential brings that potential to life.

[ Q ]

quadrature
– construction of a square with the same area as that of another figure

[ R ]

Radical Constructionism
– Today, those constructivists who are “radical” because they take their theory of knowing seriously, frequently meet the same objection–except that it is sometimes expressed less politely than at the beginning of the 18th century. Now, no less than then, it is difficult to show the critics that what they demand is the very thing constructivism must do without. To claim that one’s theory of knowing is true, in the traditional sense of representing a state or feature of an experiencer-independent world, would be perjury for a radical constructivist.

Radical constructivism
– Adds a second principle to trivial constructivism (von Glasersfeld, 1990) :Coming to know is a process of dynamic adaptation towards viable interpretations of experience. The knower does not necessarily construct knowledge of a “real” world. Knowledge is therefore is result of a self-organized cognitive proces

Reiss Profile
– This assessment creates an individual profile of high and low motivators among 16 basic desires. The list of 16 desires was developed from analysis of 10, 000 interviews which Steven Reiss and his colleagues conducted across several cultures. The Profile is used in a broad range of areas, including human resources management, sales, coaching, therapy, and professional sports to improve fit and performance by aligning an individual’s life and work choices with his or her intrinsic high motivations. See also Motivational Density, Motivational Sensitivity, Values and Motives, Value-Based Happiness.

Relationship management
– In Emotional Intelligence theory, an ability to influence others, handle conflict, develop, lead and work with others. See: Self-Awareness, Self-Management. See: Emotional Intelligence, EQ, Self-Awareness, Self-Management, Social Awareness, Social Intelligence, SQ. Also: Mechanistic Cognition, Mentalistic Cognition.

reliability
– the coherence (internal consistency) of a set of test items, or the stability (test–retest) of a set of test scores over time.

requisite organization
–  is comprehensive system of organizational structure and managerial leadership. It was designed by Elliott Jaques. It shares with FL a concern for careful definition of the requirements of structure and performance in different contexts and the specification of the capability needed for optimal performance in each defined role. Here are three RO concepts that suggest the similarity of concern. Complexity of Information Processing (CIP) refers to the level of complexity of an issue one is capable of exercising judgment about. CIP is embodied in the way one organizes, groups, and extrapolates information in order to solve problems. The level of complexity defines an organizational stratum. A role in a given stratum can be measured by the time span it takes in view. There are eight stratums. Here are four examples of correlated stratums, roles, and time spans taken in view: Str. I Bank Teller up to three months; Str. IV Area General Manager 2 years-5 years; Str. VII CEO 20 years – 50 years; Str. VIII CEO (only in the largest corporations) 50 years – 100 years. Definitions are adapted from:www.peoplefit.com/LearningLibrary/Requisite-Organization-Glossary-of-Terms.html

resilience
– Mike Jay introduced the following definition of resilience in CPR for the Soul: Creating Personal Resilience by Design (2006): “Resilience is the differentiated power to persist when things do not work out at first, the capability to navigate ambiguity and uncertainty, the motivation to transcend common problems and barriers and to collaboratively anticipate the future in sustainable ways.”

[ S ]

scaffolding
– the word names a way of distributing work in a project we undertake. Once we know the “programming language” of our core predispositions and the requirements of a goal-state we are attempting to achieve, we can assign to ourselves the project tasks aligned with our intrinsic motivation and capability and provide a supportive scaffolding for our efforts by delegating, trading off, or paying others whose intrinsic motivation and capability are aligned with the requirements of the goal-state in a way that complements ours. This process of reaching out for various forms of scaffolding is a key to sustaining resilience.

self-awareness
– In Emotional Intelligence theory, self-awareness is defined as knowing your emotions and their effects. Self-awareness capability depends in part on genetic predispositions which may not be present in those who share the deficits of the “mechanistic cognition” characteristic of the Asperger’s-autism spectrum. FL therefore depends on self-knowledge derived from an array of assessment instruments and coaching conversations, opening to ways in which the deficits of self-awareness can be overcome by forms of support scaffolding. Emotional Intelligence, EQ, Relationship Management, Self-Management, Social Intelligence, SQ. Also: Mechanistic Cognition, Mentalistic Cognition.

self-management
– In Emotional Intelligence theory, self-management includes knowing how to manage tour emotions, keep disruptive impulses in check, being flexible and comfortable with new ideas. Emotional Intelligence, EQ, Relationship Management Self-Awareness, Social Awareness, Social Intelligence, SQ. Also: Mechanistic Cognition, Mentalistic Cognition.

self-regulation
– the process of setting goals for oneself and then monitoring and evaluating progress

serialist
– step-by-step: sequential (in Pask’s theory)

sharpening
– tending to separate new perceptions and respond accurately to complexity (in Holzman and Klein’s theory)

signal and noise
– In engineering the signal-to-noise ratio is the ratio of a signal to the noise interfering with the signal. It is often used as a metaphor for the ratio of true or useful information in a message to the interfering false or irrelevant data that makes the intended “signal” hard to discern.

skill
– are basic abilities to perform the fundamental steps of a task. Skills do not exist in us innately, though we may have a natural propensity for certain skills over others. They must be developed through formal or informal training and practice. (adapted from the Gallup Organization.) See: Knowledge, Strength, Talent.

social awareness
– In Emotional Intelligence theory, Social Awareness embraces an ability to listen, to be persuasive, to collaborate, and to nurture relationships. Emotional Intelligence, EQ, Relationship Management, Self-Awareness, Self-Management, SQ. Also: Mechanistic Cognition, Mentalistic Cognition.

social intelligence
– the intelligence that lies behind group interactions and behaviors as described by a range of researchers. Emotional Intelligence, EQ, Relationship Management Self-Awareness, Self-Management, Social Awareness, SQ. Also: Mechanistic Cognition, Mentalistic Cognition.

spiral dynamics
–  is an analysis of individual and social development based on the work of psychologist, Dr. Clare W. Graves, who gave his theory the name, the “Emergent Cyclic Double-Helix Model of Adult Biopsychosocial Systems Development.” After Graves’ death, Don Beck and Chris Cowan elaborated Graves’ theory in their book, Spiral Dynamics (1996), combining Graves’ value systems with the emerging theory of memetics to form “value memes” or “vMemes.” These value systems were differentiated and ranked by ascending order of complexity correlated with increasing complexity of life conditions. Most people are motivated by a mixture of several vMeme codes of varying intensity. As Beck later wrote, “The model describes and makes sense of the enormous complexity of human existence, and then shows how to craft elegant, systemic problem-solutions that meet people and address situations where they are…” Later, Beck and Cowan separated, due to differences over the further development of Spiral Dynamics. Beck went on to create Spiral Dynamics Integral in conversation with integral theorist, Ken Wilber, which resulted in a degree of mutual influence.

split brain research
– studies of psychological function in patients who have had the largest bundle of fibres linking the two halves of the brain severed, in order to control or limit the effects of epileptic seizures

SQ
– these initials stand for Social Intelligence Quotient, understood as analogous to IQ. See: Emotional Intelligence, EQ, Relationship Management, Self-awareness, Self-Management, Social Awareness. Also: Mechanistic Cognition, Mentalistic Cognition.

strength
– is the ability to produce consistently a positive outcome through near perfect performance in a specific task. The components of strengths are skills, knowledge, and talents. (adapted from the Gallup Organization) See: Knowledge, Skill, Talent.

subjective well being
– Ed Diener’s term for judging life positively and feeling good. A person has high SWB if she or he experiences life satisfaction and frequent joy. Diener chose it because studying happiness sounded frivolous.

successful failure
– When resilience is understood as emergent from a path rather than as defined by single events, each failure becomes an experimental result which informs one how to be more successful next time. The individual episode of failure becomes not an end of something but a valuable instrument of ongoing success.

summative assessment
– evaluation of performance carried out at the end of a piece of work

[ T ]

tactile
– perceiving through the sense of touch.

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