Law of Nature | The Manifesto

For More Than Two Decades

Available solutions of high-to-highest impact get stuck in the system by default

Today

Our long-standing approaches — supposed to solve problems and provide efficiency — were designed for a world gone by

Future

Bureaucracy and fixed ways of thinking prevent us from solving the problems

Possibility

An enormous solution potential is waiting to be unleashed 

May we invite you, for a few minutes, to:

Let go of the practices and thinking we have come to rely on and…

…listen to what a group of senior experts — faced with this getting stuck situation — discovered when they asked questions like:

What do decision-makers and initiative owners REALLY NEED…

To make the problem-solving decisions?

&

Get the impactful solutions through the system? 

Where is the bridge between… 

Theoretical models of science lacking executability

&

The requirement for solutions being executable, scalable and durable at the system levels?

We Are All Part of Nature

So are the organizations we work for, the environments around us, and the systems we have created

Nature thrives when the environment is healthy

We are all part of Nature

Nature’s Wisdom is waiting to be (re-)discovered — to resolve the getting stuck situation and unleash available and new solution possibilities

Let’s bring Nature’s principles and a few of its easy-to-apply Laws back into decision-making — the place where the difference between fueling or solving these problems is made

Let’s do it by TOGETHER asking Hard-to-Ignore and Guiding Questions as One whenever decisions are made

Invitation to Contribute — at Any Level That Feels Right

From

Simply sharing Calls to Action containing Hard-to-Ignore Questions anyone can ask

Puzzle pieces

To

Concrete intervention possiblities & 

Co-creating impactful solution packages

Simply share the Calls to Action and/or invite others to ask the Hard-to-Ignore and Guiding Questions in One available through the calls.

Published calls and notifications for new Calls to Action:

When decisions are to be made, simply ask the related Hard-to-Ignore Questions (see also Level 1).

When more information is needed, you can point people to where additional details are available. This information can be found in the Calls to Action, our collection of questions and the health check.

Example questions to prevent costly mistakes and foreseeable failure:

  • Will the decision to be made improve or worsen the health of people, the organisation, the environment, or planet?
  • What Laws of Nature could apply? What practices do they demand?
  • Why accept high costs and risks when a simple health check can substantially reduce them?
For quick access after reading through potentially interesting parts below:

At this level, the door toward fresh thinking is opened. In your environment, you ask relevant Hard-to-Ignore & Guiding Questions in One, and start the dialogue. You might do the exercise in Manifesto Tutorial 3.3.

You are free to use your own approaches, practices, and tools, or those of third parties. However, there are a few requirements:

  • Relevant gaps and conflicts identified through this Manifesto initiative, as well as environment-specific gaps and conflicts, are addressed
  • What is being done is in line with relevant Laws of Nature, Core Human Values, and Essential Behaviours
  • The Integrity Law and its practice, Adaptive Integrity, are applied

A personal goal could be:

  • Get a problem-solving activity or project initiated
For quick access after reading through potentially interesting Manifesto parts:

At Level 4, an Executable Solution Framework is co-created for a specific task or project. This can be done by yourself, or with individuals who have the necessary experiences and skills.

In addition to Level 3, the following applies:

Requirements:

  • The Solution Framework includes Manifesto-based education and coaching needs (or third-party alternatives that match these requirements) for involved decision-makers, their advisors, task or project members, as well as target audiences 
  • The Solution Framework is confirmed by representatives of the groups involved and impacted as being executable, scalable, and durable at the desired system level(s)

Your goals could be

  • Get an Executable Solution Framework created
  • Obtain approval for project design and execution

You have familiarized yourself with the following Manifesto tutorial as well:

Why accepting:

  • Ongoing firefighting, stress, and burnout
  • High failure rates that drain time and resources
  • A crippling bureaucracy and capacity bottlenecks all over—like skill shortages
  • Blame, frustration, and shame
  • Risks to your role and credibility

When much of it can be resolved and prevented through:

  • What delivered needed results where long-standing solutions failed us
  • Principles of Nature and easy-to-apply Laws of Nature that unlock intervention possibilities at a fraction of the usual costs and risks
  • A single word that enables professionals to choose practices that reduce—rather than worsen—bureaucracy, capacity bottlenecks and failure rates

Getting started:

  1. See the Case for Change below 
  2. Someone in a leading role takes responsibility to stop the waste of time and resources caused by outdated approaches — while preserving what works and guiding efforts toward what has worked where our long-standing approaches have failed
  3. The person in point 2 has the skill set to solve complex problems — or is coached by someone who does
Possibly helpful:

Getting Started

Case for Change

Our long-standing practices, models, best practices, and frameworks — supposed to solve problems and provide efficiency — were designed for a world gone by

In today’s world, they tend to cross Tipping Points

Continued use of these practices, models, best practices, and frameworks
beyond the Tipping Points has created:

1. 

An EXPONENTIAL GROWTH of UNNECESSARY bureaucracy and complexity

2. 

Capacity Bottlenecks everywhere — waiting lists, shortage of skilled personnel, full agendas, and so forth

3. 

Bureaucracy-reduction projects that create more bureaucracy and complexity at the system level than they reduce within their scope

4. 

Scale-up of impactful initiatives getting stuck by default — because the obstacles created by Points 1 to 3 now exceed what these initiatives can realistically afford to address.

Two Laws of Nature have guided us to the highest-impact solution for Points 1 to 4:

One word to select what works well and avoid what does not,
a simple policy, and
using the existing bureaucracy to embed the policy in decision-making

The extended case — including the policy — is available through Manifesto Tutorials 1 to 3.3

After More Than Two Decades of Failed Solution Attempts

The only solution left may be ...

No mathematics required

Examples: Tipping Point and Capacity Bottleneck Laws —
as undeniable as the Law of Gravity

Beyond the Tipping Points, further Nature-aligned approaches
— adaptive, relational, and intuitive — 
can restore flow, trust, system balance, and effectiveness

Emile van Essen, Founding Chair of World Sustainability Fund:

As far as I know, this is the only initiative worldwide responding to the following at the level required:

  1. What prevents us from unleashing the available solutions?
  2. Where and how do we have to intervene to unleash the solutions of high-to-highest impact within the deadlines set by Nature and deadlines agreed on by international treaties?

The Skill Set for Solving Complex Problems was Applied

The Polymath Skill Set and Approach guided this Manifesto’s co-creators  

Chaos of directions

From:

  • The overload of conflicting guidance and directions
  • Well-working communication practices of the past now creating disbelief and opposition — for bottom-up and top-down initiatives
  • Best practics and frameworks optimized for a world gone by
  • Theoretical models lacking executability and scalability
  • Sympthom treatment 

To:

1.

How SOLVABLE ROOT CAUSES can be identified in highly complex environments

Example: The lost ability to apply relevant Laws of Nature in decision-making — especially when these Laws cannot be expressed in exact ways

2.

A few Laws of Nature and SOLVABLE ROOT CAUSES guiding towards highest-impact solutions at the lowest costs and risks

3.

A common foundation and path to restore the health of systems — in institutions, organizations, across systems, and in everyday life

Applicability across … 

  • Aviation
  • Business services
  • Construction
  • Education
  • Energy
  • Health Services
  • IT
  • Public services
  • Manufacturing
  • Science
  • Social enterprises

     And more

  • Agility 
  • Artificial Intelligence (AI)
  • Best practices & Methods
  • Education
  • Finance
  • Health
  • Human Resources
  • Indigenous knowledge
  • Innovation
  • Knowledge Management
  • Land use
  • Management
  • Natural Earth Systems
  • Organisations
  • Politics
  • Project management
  • Research
  • SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals)
  • Societal matters
  • Youth & Children

      And more

  • Agile yet reliable decision-making
  • Artificial Intelligence: Downside prevention
  • Automation
    • Beneficial versus counterproductive 
  • Bureaucracy & Complexity reduction
  • Cooperation & Co-creation
  • Circular economies: Making them happen
  • Education and skill gaps
  • Fixed ways of thinking & Behaviour
  • Food security
  • Health of
    • People
    • Projects, organizations and  environments
    • Planet
  • Innovation
    • High(est)-impact getting stuck by default
    • Out-of-the-box, social and organizational  
  • Marine life
  • Safety
  • Security
  • Trust: (Re-)creating trust
  • Truth finding
  • Productivity improvements
  • Project failure rates far to high
  • SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals)
  • Social and organisational innovation needs
  • Water security

       And more

Free to Use

Provided the spirit of the Manifesto is maintained, the Mainfesto parts are free to use and can be shared via Creative Commons (CC) license, even commercially. 

Polymath Practices Applied

Polymathic - Team appraoch

Please observe that in complex environments — depending on the specific situation — practices shown after OVER remain necessary. Combining and complementing both types of practices can create far greater value than applying them separately.

Listening to what is REALLY NEEDED in TODAY’s WORLD to solve the growing problems we face

OVER

Applying what worked in a world gone by

Listening to what worked where our long-standing solution approaches failed us

OVER

Applying established models, best practices, frameworks, tools, trends, and long-standing ways of thinking

Taking on responsibility for the whole — at the system level

OVER

Partial solutions that leave too many obstacles, gaps and conflicts unsolved

Seeking the exact and verbal rules of the highest impact — at the highest system level

OVER

Seeking only exact rules or rules for a part

Designing Executable Solution Frameworks of high-to-highest impact for the system level — FROM THE BEGINNING

OVER

Designing solutions for a part and assuming what works in a part can be scaled up in complex environments 

More information about this skill set is available at Wikipedia and
 through Manifesto Tutorial 3.4.3: A Skill Set for Solving Complex Problems

This led to

Fundamental Gaps and Conflicts in Today’s Thinking

Sunrise

The following gaps and associated conflicts prevent us from recognizing and unleashing the vast potential of available solutions

Gap 1: 

What needs to be done DIFFERENTLY to unleash the enormous solution potential available today?

Gap 2: 

We have not found people or entities working on or willing to address the gaps in this box to the required levels for executability and scalability in TODAY’s WORLD

What do decision-makers and their advisors REALLY NEED to make the problem-solving decisions?

What do initiative owners, innovators, experts, and project managers REALLY NEED to make their solutions executable, scalable, and durable at the SYSTEM LEVEL?

What delivered the needed results where our long-standing solutions failed us?

What delivered the HIGHEST IMPACT at the LOWEST COSTS and RISKS at the SYSTEM LEVEL?

Question:

Where are our leaders and influencers who take on the responsibility to get these questions answered to the levels required and give solution attempts a fair chance?

Gap 3: 

New patterns observed

To solve complex problems, multiple groups need to work together. But the same expressions and practices — that get people on board within one’s own group — trigger people in other groups to conclude”this won’t work.” Consequences are a lack of support, resistance, and getting stuck.

As multiple groups must work together, adjusting communications and practices to fit each group’s expectations does not work anymore

Question for top-down and bottom-up initiatives:

Why communicate “my initiative won’t deliver the promised results or will fail”  when this can be prevented?

Gap 4: 

High-level demands and calls from movements, initiatives, and institutions

versus

Decision-makers, their advisors and experts missing the education, experience and knowledge to resolve gaps identified here 

Question:

Where are the demands and calls that address what decision-makers, advisors, and experts actually need to make problem-solving decisions?

Gap 5: 

Today’s typical approach to go about complex problems like those at the top of this page is to break them into parts

The following patterns emerged:

Solvable root causes of the highest damage and impactful solutions are missed, as they lie outside the addressed parts 

Individuals with the skills and experiences to solve complex problems (Polymaths, neurodiverse, etc.) have been excluded by vacancy criteria and job advancement processes for more than two decades

Questions:

How can complex problems – let alone the Polycrisis – be solved while these patterns appear to be the standard situation in organizations?

The Law of Nature ManifestoTM

For Solving Complex Problems

Manifesto Approach

Solidarity hands

What matters is that the gaps and conflicts identified above, as well as environment-specific gaps and conflicts, are resolved to the level where:

1.

Decision-makers, their advisors, and experts know the Laws of Nature relevant to their fields and how to apply them — especially when they cannot be expressed in exact ways

2.

Solutions are designed — FROM THE BEGINNING — for being executable, scalable and durable at the desired system level (implementation can start in a small environment)

3.

Available and new solutions of High-to-Highest Impact get through the systems with high speed and reliability

When using the Manifesto:

  • Only select relevant Manifesto elements — representatives of the groups involved and impacted decide what is relevant
  • It doesn’t matter whether points 1 to 3 are achieved through Manifesto elements or through elements from elsewhere

The Manifesto

Leverage effect

INTERVENTION POSSIBILITIES of the HIGHEST IMPACT at the LOWEST COSTS and RISKS

1.

Let go of the thinking that created the growing problems. Keep what works well: what works well and fresh approaches complement each other for far-reaching effects.

Patterns of what communicates “too much of the same thinking that created the growing problems”

  • Splitting complex problems into parts: Makes causes and impactful solutions outside the addressed parts invisible
  • Money-based decisions and methods overruling relevant Laws of Nature, Core Human Values, and Essential Behaviours
  • Jumping from failed approaches to opposite approaches while:
    • Both failing to listen to what is really needed to solve the problems
    • Well-working parts of the dropped approaches get lost and need to be ‘re-invented’
  • Assuming that what worked in a world gone by will work in today’s world:
    • While the guidance for why they fail in today’s world and how they can be made to work is missing
    • Examples: ‘Break into parts, start small, and grow’; best practices; movements, etc. 
VERSUS

These 8 Manifesto intervention possibilities and 7 more in two extensions

The only solution powerfull enough may be ...

2.

Listen to what delivered the needed results where our long-standing solution approaches failed us

3.

Intervene where the highest impact can be made at the lowest costs and risks™ AT THE SYSTEM LEVEL

After 2+ decades of failed solution attempts, large groups have learned to intuitively recognize when a new solution attempt or movement applies too much of the same thinking that created the growing problems. They respond with a lack of interest and support or opposition.  

Thinking

Common patterns of ‘the same thinking that created the problems’ include:

  • Complex problems are broken into parts, but only a few parts receive priority and funding, while causes located outside the addressed parts receive no priority nor resources. 
  • Relevant Laws of Nature are missing or overruled. 
  • Every complex environment is different. Yet, it is assumed that what worked in a small environment, earlier or elsewhere, will work in the particular environment. 
  • Lessons learned are lost and re-learned again and again.
  • Movements, methods, frameworks and the like assume that people in target audiences can find problem-solving solutions to highly complex problems while they do not have the necessary training, knowledge, and experiences.
Nature waterfall

Hard Laws of Nature, typically available from physics, mathematics, chemistry, and biology cannot be overruled or ignored. Nature does not allow it. Yet, it happens day in and day out, resulting in huge damage, such as crippling bureaucracy, available solutions getting stuck in the system, resistance, and violent opposition. Several of the same laws provide practices to intervene where the highest impact can be made at the lowest costs and risks AT THE SYSTEM LEVELS. That’s without worrying about mathematics and across industries, fields, and challenges.

A simple introduction of the two Laws of Nature almost certain to occur in complex environments is available through the Manifesto Tutorials 1 & 2 of the Guidance Package of Intervention 4. 

One word, derived from two Laws of Nature, is bound to provide the highest-impact solution at the lowest cost and risk for the crippling bureaucracy and overwhelming complexity. It prevents decision-makers and experts from unconsciously fueling bureaucracy and enables them to select practices that reduce bureaucracy, resistance, and opposition.

How this word can be applied is available via the Guidance Package of Intervention 4, Tutorial 3.3: One Word to Make …

4.

Resolve the knowledge-experience-solution gap of how complex problems can be solved by TREATING IT AS A SINGLE GAP

With the growing problems being complex and the long-standing solution attempts having failed us for 2+ decades, it has become evident that the gap of how to solve complex problems must be resolved with a fresh approach. 

When the Manifesto’s co-creators could not find any group, institute, or organisation addressing or taking on this matter at the required levels in the field, they took it on. Highest-impact knowledge from science and experiences with what delivered needed results where our long-standing approaches failed us, led to an extension of this closing-the-gap intervention and a Guidance Package of surprisingly short video tutorials. 

5.

Get solution possibilities EARLY ON over the Tipping Point where they become executable, scalable, and durable at the SYSTEM LEVEL

The Guidance Package of Intervention 4 includes a fresh approach to get over this Tipping Point EARLY ON. This approach is available through Tutorial 3.4.2When, despite the efforts, it remains unclear how this Tipping Point can be crossed, foreseeable failure can be prevented by:

  • Reducing the ambition to something achievable
  • First executing the enterprise or system-wide project of Intervention 8
  • Stopping the initiative or putting it on hold until the time is right

It is clear how the system level can be achieved and this is part of the identified approach. Differences with the long-lasting but failed approach of ‘start small, scale up (and get stuck)’ are: 

  • Many obstacles are out of the way from the beginning
  • Solving further obstacles is integral to the project design and can be addressed before they hit
  • Resistance and opposition are (much) lower as many obstacles are out of the way    
  • Instead of ongoing firefighting, project members can focus on what provides value 
  • The identified solution may involve a (small) percentage of the effort and costs normally seen   

Scalability and system-level needs can be dropped when the problem to solve is within a small environment and the following criteria are met:

  • The individuals involved (and impacted) know and see each other regularly
  • The following criteria are in balance with each other:
    • External dependencies are well understood, addressed, and proactively resolved when they create new  damage outside the small environment
    • The value1 created by the solution within the small environment is greater than the new damage the changes may cause outside

The early-on need can be dropped when the criteria for a small environment are met, and the analysts and solution designers are highly experienced in the cross-disciplinary knowledge and solution possibibilites of this Manifesto. 

1 Value includes non-financial value such reducing (virtual) capacity bottlenecks like those of skill shortages, productivity improvement from motivated employees, and clients trusting vendors and institutions

6.

Ignite the PROBLEM-SOLVING thinking by asking THE SAME HARD-TO-IGNORE QUESTIONS which guide DECISION-MAKERS and EXPERTS to the HIGHEST-IMPACT SOLUTIONS

Examples

When decisions are to be made, the following questions can be asked:

The Manifesto’s collection of HARD-TO-IGNORE questions guiding to HIGHEST-IMPACT SOLUTIONS

7.

Verify decisions against relevant Laws of Nature, Core Human Values, Essential Behaviours and Value Cases

Decisions with far-reaching consequences are made day in and day out. Decision-making is the ‘place’ where the difference between fueling or solving the growing problems we face is made.

Manifesto Tutorials 1, 2, and 3.2 of the above-mentioned Guidance Package identify:

  • Why we are trapped in problem-fuelling decision-making
  • How this trap led to an exponential growth of bureaucracy and complexity
  • Why this situation is undermining ‘everything’ we do

Tutorial 3.3 identifies how a single word, derived from two Laws of Nature, opens the door to get out of this trap and how this drastically reduces bureaucracy and complexity.

What created the gap: Observed patterns

Until the late 1990s, decision-making was based on a combination of numerical and pattern-based information1. Thereafter, it was believed that decisions should be predominantly based on hard information such as numbers, dollars, and euros, along with step-by-step proof. However, this approach only works up to the Tipping Point of complexity, and this critical limitation was overlooked. Beyond this Tipping Point, even mathematics cannot provide reliable outcomes.

Missing this limitation led to pattern-based information being overlooked and overruled by numerical and bureaucratic requirements, resulting in the LOSS OF A STRUCTURAL FOUNDATION FOR SOLVING COMPLEX PROBLEMS –More on this and the following is available throughout the Guidance Package and in particular Tutorials 1, 2, 3.2 and 3.3.

1 Creating patterns is how our brains makes sense out of complex information.

Consequences of this gap: Observed patterns 

Initially

  • While managers believed they were following state-of-the-art practices, so-called management mistakes became common occurances
  • The problem-fuelling trap identified under ‘Why verification simplifies’ above and its devastating consequences developed

Large groups learned to recognise when  

  • An element of trust and integrity failed: Delivering to a promise remained more important than adjusting to new insights or changed situations (an agility requirement)
  • Methods, theories, and practices, designed for recurring situations failed as, in complex environments, every situation can or will be different
  • The new approaches of agility and self-organisation failed for higher levels of complexity as executable guidance was missing (exceptions granted)

The situation escalated

Large groups withdrew their support from the establishment and backed other movements, even if it meant creating an additional dimension of problems, and moving us further away from solving the exponentially growing problems. 

Solution needs

Over the past two decades, we have seen many attempts to solve this decision-making gap, such as demanding ethics, value-based decisions, regulations, and the like. Even if they are brought in line with the relevant Laws of Nature and further elements of this Manifesto, it remains hard to see how they can be made executable during decision-making processes and provide the value required. This led to these needs:

1. Value Cases need to complement business cases 
2. A set of Core Human Values & Essential Behaviours is required:

  • Short enough to be remembered 
  • Suited for quick alignment verification during decision-making processes

If needed, they can be complemented with executable elements of ethics, regulations and the like. 

Core Human Values, Essential Behaviours and a Value Case approach are available through the extension to this intervention.

8.

Consider one enterprise or system-wide project removing mountains of obstacles

Across industries, fields, and subjects, a common pattern emerged

High-to-highest-impact strategies, solutions, projects and the like are undermined and get stuck by the same obstacles, such as the obstacles of bureaucracy, complexity, and practices of a world gone by. These obstacles are usually outside the sphere of influence of these strategies, solutions and projects, and hiding below the surface. To create powerful strategies, make hidden solutions visible, and unleash their value potential, an enterprise or system-wide project aimed at removing these obstacles may be necessary.

Example: Simplification project –Good intention, but worsening the problem

What do we do when environments become too bureaucratic or complex? We start simplification projects in a few boxes. However, bureaucracy at the system level easily increases more than it is reduced within these boxes. This happens when the damage created from the changes outside the boxes exceeds the value created inside. In our connected world, it worsens when different groups chose different solutions and drift in different directions.   

More on this and the simple solution are available in Tutorials 3.2 and 3.3, as well as in section 3.4 of the Guidance Package.

  • One word, derived from two Laws of Nature, is bound to provide the most powerful solution for drastically reducing the unnecessary bureaucracy. How this word can be used and easily integrated into decision-making processes is available through Tutorial 3.3 of the Manifesto’s Guidance Package.
  • Designing and executing this project with a small team should be far more effective than using a large team.
  • Implementation starts by training and coaching key personnel
    • Those trained and coached should, in turn, coach others as part of their daily activities
    • Key personnel typically include higher-level decision-makers, their advisors, strategists, senior innovation and project managers, and senior solution designers
  • Implementation uses the existing bureaucracy and natural process flows to speed up implementation and reduce project costs 

Manifesto Extension 1 — to Intervention 4:

Resolve the knowledge, solution, and experience gap of how complex problems can be solved

4.A

Learn practices for analysing complex problems and designing impactful solutions

When we understand where the highest damage is created, we have guidance on where the highest-impact can be made. Further patterns became:  

  • Analysis paralysis can be prevented 
  • The overload of information, lessons learned, symptoms and methods can be reduced to manageable levels 
  • Various so-called wicked problems turned out to be solvable

With the growing problems we face, humanity can no longer afford to miss out on fundamental principles of science. 

Yet, WHEN PROBLEMS TO BE SOLVED WERE COMPLEX, the Manifesto’s co-creators could not find anyone working with or responding to applying the following principles of science, neither in organisations nor in science itself. Typical responses were “doesn’t fit my discipline,” “what’s a Law of Nature?” or no response at all. 

The following principles urgently need to be (re-)integrated into decision-making, research, strategy design, innovation processes, and much more:

  • SEEK THE TRUTH
    • Identify what decision-makers REALLY NEED to make problem-solving decisions
    • Identify what initiative owners REALLY NEED to get high-to-highest-impact solutions through the system
  • IDENTIFY AND APPLY LAWS of NATURE relevant IN COMPLEX ENVIRONMENTS
    • Especially when they cannot be expressed in exact ways, which is common in complex environments
    • Like Darwin did, various laws need to be expressed in phrases or sentences when they cannot be expressed in exact ways   

Experience: A small number of such laws can have a huge problem-solving impact

  • APPLY the EINSTEIN-NEWTON-DARWIN PRACTICES
    • Utilise the key practices they applied to find deep insights to highly complex challenges and Laws of Nature
    • These key practices are available through Tutorials 1 and 2 of the Manifesto’s Guidance Package

Example of where these principles were applied: this Manifesto

The following practices emerged as foundations for re-creating trust. To make it happen, relevant practices may need to be part of a larger package designed to get over the Tipping Point where the package becomes executable, scalable, and durable at the system level (Intervention 5): 

  • Listen to and deliver what decision-makers, employees and initiative owners REALLY NEED to make the problem-solving decisions or get their job done in normal ways
  • Co-create with representatives of all groups involved and impacted
    • Small co-creation teams of knowledgeable representatives of the groups appear to be (far) more effective than large teams
    • Small teams may find solutions large teams cannot find
  • Provide Laws of Nature that cannot be expressed in exact ways, Core Human Values and Essential Behaviours in the most condensed form possible so they can be
    • Understood and applied by professionals unfamiliar with the subject at hand
    • Remembered

For Core Human Values and Essential Behaviours, see Manifesto Extention to Intervention 7

  • Verify important decisions against RELEVANT LAWS of NATURE, CORE HUMAN VALUES, and ESSENTIAL BEHAVIOURS
  • Apply Manifesto Interventions 1 to 8 
  • Provide SIMPLE solution elements that COMPLEMENT EACH OTHER for far-reaching spin-off effects and highest impact

This is to enable people of various groups, fields and subjects to move into a common direction and act as a single entity

  • A single entity can be a project, movement, institution, company or a system like health services

The guidance

  • Is provided in a highly concentrated form, yet reasonably complete to make problem-solving decisions or a real difference
  • Contains simple but complementary solution elements for far-reaching impact
  • Uses simple language to ensure people unfamiliar with vocabulary of different groups, fields, and subjects can understand each other
  • Is reasonably complete to help users get their solutions and projects over the Tipping Point of Intervention 5 above

4.B

From the Manifesto, the Laws of Nature and the Guidance Package, select what is relevant

Knowledgeable representatives of the groups involved and impacted decide TOGETHER what is relevant and will be used. The rest can be ignored.

Other solution elements you or the groups involved and impacted may have, as well as third-party guidance packages can be used, provided they:

  • Align with other Manifesto elements identified as RELEVANT  
  • Complement the selected solutions
  • Are equally effective or better

4.C

Integrate relevant guidance into decision-making at all levels, problem analysis, solution design, innovation processes and Best Practices 

  • Training and coaching of key personnel in relevant Manifesto elements
    • Key personnel typically include higher-level decision-makers, their advisors, strategists, senior innovation and project managers, and senior solution designers
  • Creating highest-level policies that override, for example, rules in conflict with relevant Laws of Nature
    • More on this and a policy example are available in Manifesto Tutorial 3.3
  • Making further coaching of employees a ‘natural’ part of decision-making processes
    • Ideally, this should be carried out by the key personnel already trained and coached

4.D

Create complementary research and innovation processes

Based on:

  • The fundamental principles of science under Intervention 4.A above
  • The problem-solving practices of individuals like Steve Jobs (iPhone / smartphone), Jacinda Ardern (former Prime Minister of New Zealand, compassion and leadership style) 
  • Technical and NON-technical innovation 
  • Value creation over bureaucratic requirements; value includes non-monetary value like the health of the people, organisation, environment, or planet

Funded by:

  • Reducing today’s high failure rates of innovation and research projects by applying relevant elements of this Manifesto, such as the fundamental principles of science under Intervention 4.A and establishing executability per Intervention 5 early on 
  • Moving, for example, 30% of today’s innovation and research budgets to these processes

For more information, see Manifesto’s Tutorial 3.4.4

Manifesto Extension 2 — to Intervention 7:

Togetherness

Core Human Values, Essential Behaviours, Value Cases & Hard-to-Ignore Questions

Health

This is the health of the people, organisation, environment and the planet1

As health requires biodiversity, it includes a healthy biodiversity

Safety

Includes climate and peace1

Basic Needs

Clean water and air, shelter, food, and energy1

Truth Seeking

What may be seen as the truth today can change over time. Establishing truth can be challenging. That’s why this value is truth seeking.

Freedom by being in harmony with each other

Everyone should be able to live freely. However, the freedom of one person ends where the freedom, health, or safety of another person begins.

1 Based on “Sustainocracy: The new democracy.” Jean-Paul Close. https://sustainocracy.blog/what-is-sustainocracy/

Acting With Adaptive IntegrityTM

We give our word (a promise, commitment, etc.) when we have sufficient confidence that we can keep our word. As soon as we know that we cannot keep our word, we inform all parties counting on us and clean up any mess that we caused in their lives. 1, 2

People, objects (organisations, products, services, etc.), and systems are IN or OUT of INTEGRITY.3

This is the practice of the Integrity Law

1 Integrity: Without it Nothing Works. Jensen, Michael C. Harvard Business School. Jesse Isidor Straus Professor of Business Administration, Emeritus. April 6, 2014. https://ssrn.com/abstract=1511274 
2 First sentence adjusted to meet an executability need
3 Seminar. Jensen, Michael C. Erasmus University, Rotterdam. 2011. 

Seeking the Truth

  • Exploring multiple perspectives
  • Authentic listening
  • Constructive criticism
  • Responding to new insights and changing situations
  • Respecting each other
  • Questioning oneself: Is this the truth or do I want it to be the truth?

Being Authentic

Originality, worthiness, seeking the truth, kindness and compassion to see beyond ourselves and without neglect

Listening Authentically

  • Avoiding prejudgement
  • Do, those listened to, have the feeling they are fully understood?
  • Empathetic listening: Listening to what is not being said
  • What can I do or must I do with what I have heard or learned?
  • Is the person or group listened to given sufficient time and means to contribute their views? 

Of course, this cannot mean listen to everybody and everything. Such approaches would quickly be in conflict with the Tipping Point and Capacity Bottleneck Laws of Nature. As such conflicts occur, a switch to other practices is required, like those most relevant to everybody, which brings us to the Core Human Values and Essential Behaviours provided here. A further practice is that of co-creation on equal terms, and with knowledgeable representatives of the groups involved and impacted.

Learning From Failure

In complex environments failure is guaranteed to happen as every situation can or will be different and the ‘unexpected unexpected’ keeps popping up. The following pattern surfaced: Learning from failure and an attitude of preventing the same failure from re-occuring reduces failure rates structurally.  

Take Ownership

Taking ownership is about taking the initiative and communicating regularly with stakeholders to ensure that expectations are shared transparently

Personal responsibility and accountability

Within boundaries, individuals and teams are given the freedom and means to solve complex problems:

  • Only a few goals and boundaries are agreed on with the owners and senior experts of the analysis and solution design team(s)
  • Individual’s knowledgeable and experienced in a field AND individuals who have demonstrated to have found solutions that delivered needed results in multiple fields can or will complement each other for optimum effect
  • The Analysts, solution designers and project owners are educated in
    • How to design solutions that are executable, scalable, and durable at the system level
    • Resolving gaps and conflicts in today’s solution thinking
    • Co-creation on equal terms with representatives of all groups involved and impacted

Like Business Cases identify high-to-highest impact information in the form of money and numbers, Value Cases do the same with patterns. For more information, see the additional information at Manifesto Intervention 7 above.

Patterns are reliable practices because creating patterns is how our brains make sense of complex information. A benefit is that we do not have to go through endless discussions, for example, about agreeing on definitions. Everybody can have a somewhat different view. As long as we understand each other, decisions can be made.

With the numbers AND patterns at hand, hard-to-ignore Guiding Questions — such as those in the dropdown box below, and in the collection of Manifesto Intervention 6are responded to. 

Example patterns:

  • Gaps and conflicts like those we have identified above 
  • Growing hidden costs nobody feels responsible for until it is too late, for example:
    • Tipping Points were missed; this led to the exponential growth of unnecessary bureaucracy and complexity. See Tutorial 3.2
  • Words, phrases, sentences and the like
  • Emotions like those creating interest and support versus those emotions creating lack of interest and opposition
  • Worsening or improving situations

When decisions are to be made

Does the decision improve or worsen the health of the people, organisation, environment, or planet?

When stress, burnout rates, or cost saving-pressures are high

When productive employees are laid off

When decisions are made

Where is the project to reduce the unnecessary bureaucracy and complexity to healthy levels by applying the Tipping Point and Capacity Bottleneck Laws of Nature (more in Tutorials 1, 2 to 3.3)?

On Adaptive Integrity

Is the person, group, organisation or system IN, or OUT of INTEGRITY? 

Is the object (i.e. a product), solution, or service IN, or OUT of INTEGRITY?

On Attitude  

Is the person’s attitude in line with relevant Core Human Values, Essential Behaviours, Value Cases approach, and Laws of Nature?

Is it based on 

  • Preventing the same problems from re-occurring? 
  • Value Cases beyond money
  • Motivating employees?
  • “Don’t fool clients”?

On Learning from Failure

Is the organisation’s culture one of learning from failure, or is it one hit by the same failures being repeated?

The Manifesto's Guidance Package

What delivered needed results where our long-standing approaches failed us

What delivered needed results where our long-standing approaches failed us

Examples that applied relevant elements of the Manifesto

Tutorials

For everyone

20 to 30 minutes

Those who want to know where and how to intervene

2 hours only 

Those designing and executing transformation projects

2:30 hours only 

The Manifesto's Co-Creators

A group of independent individuals with extensive experience in what provided needed results where our long-standing solution approaches failed us

Core Team

Netherlands, Germany

Polymath | Initiator of the Manifesto

Senior Analyst, Consultant, Inventor 

Arti Ahluwalia

India

Polymath
Coordinator of Publications UN Commons Cluster NGO Major Group

Ecocivilisation Country Chair India

Director at Dimex India 

Netherlands

Former CEO

Sustainocracy: Initiative owner and author

John Scholtz

Netherlands

Program Manager

Passion for sustainability

James N. Rose

United States

Biologist (retired)

General Systems Analyst

Developer of Integrity Paradigm

Marion van den Eijnden

Netherlands

Avatar Master

Former Occupational Therapist

Elly Rijnierse

Netherlands

Senior Advisor 

Civic Leadership and democratisation in Integrated Area Development

Belgium

Journalist

Founder of Re-Story

Contributing Co-creators 

Emile (Glans) Van Essen

Netherlands

Founding Chair WORLD SUSTAINABILITY FUND 

Polymath

Many sustainability projects across the globe have received (large) funds. Emile became a co-creator when he discovered that the Law of Nature Manifesto was addressing many of the obstacles undermining the projects funded and he didn’t see anyone else doing this. 

Stephanie Barnes

Canada

Creativity for doing things differently

Sharon Bowes

Canada

Life of Meaning Strategist
Nature’s Wisdom Strategist

Prof. Manuel Casanova

United States

SmartState Endowed Chair in Childhood Translational Neurotherapeutics & Gottfried and Gisela Kolb Endowed Chair in Psychiatry (retired)

Margie Charpentier

Netherlands

Background support and out-of-the-box contributions

Prof. Michael Fitzgerald

Ireland

Einstein-Newton-Darwin Researcher

Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (retired)

Ukpeme Okon

United States, Nigeria

Ambassador for Peace

Barrister

Catherine Schoendorff

Germany, France

C-Suite Coach

Former CEO

Serene Seng

Singapore

Executive Coach

Speaker

Dr. Mahendra Shah

Indonesia

Director

Co-author UN-IIASA climate change report 2002

Former IIASA scientist

Adina Tarry

United Kingdom

Polymath
Organisation & Leadership Development, HRM Strategy, Quality & Process management, Business & Consumer Psychologist, Mentor, Master Coach & Supervisor, Lecturer, Author, Speaker

Harry van der Velde

Netherlands

Holistic analysis and visualization of organizational issues

Owner, ZICHT Visie en Verbeelding

Sponsors

AiREAS Cooperative

Cooperatieve Vereniging AiREAS U.A. 

A value-driven co-operative organization: Together for clean air and health in local environments

ComDys

Website maintained by ComDyS

Experience and knowledge contributions