The challenge is rooted in, and given importance by, the profound scope and urgent nature of problems we human beings face as co-inhabitants of one planet. These problems, too numerous to list here, are global in their nature, destructive in their consequences, and impact, in one way or another, every inhabitant. For a more detailed overview of these global problems, refer to Agenda 21 (1992 Earth Summit), the UN's comprehensive listing of issues facing us. That document breaks these global problems down into four major inter-related categories:

1. Social and economic dimensions: developing countries; poverty; consumption patterns; population; health; human settlements; integrating environment and development.
2. Conservation and management of resources: atmosphere; land; forests; deserts; mountains; agriculture; biodiversity; biotechnology; oceans; fresh water; toxic chemicals; hazardous radioactive and solid waste and sewage.
3. Strengthening the role of major groups: women; children and youth; indigenous peoples; non-governmental organizations; local authorities; workers; business and industry; farmers; scientists and technologists.
4. Means of implementation: finance; technology transfer; science; education; capacity-building; international institutions; legal measures; information.

As the problems confronting our planet intensify, an expanding number of people worldwide are recognizing their urgent nature and banding together to form organizations committed to addressing and solving them. Stimulated by their personal principles, values, and concerns, and understanding that addressing immensely complex issues requires joining together in planned, structured ways, talented and sincere people have formed organizations to generate the collective energy and attention required to solve these problems.

Some of these organizations are huge, with global scope and capacities. Their names are familiar to us all. Their contributions are immense. Countless other organizations, distributed worldwide, are small, largely unknown, with a very local focus, restricted to making more limited contributions. The issues confronting us are of such magnitude that all efforts, large or small, are important. The human welfare that lies in the balance, the purpose of all these organizations could be said to be noble. And, toward their noble purpose, and in their efforts, all are sincere.

But their sincerity¾our sincerity¾is possibly not enough.

The Challenge

A review of the literature on sustainable development clearly identifies two primary targets of necessary change: 1) people in client groups and/or target populations (typically those people who are in need of education, assistance, development, expanded opportunities, jobs, resources, etc.), and 2) people who either passively ignore, unthinkingly accept, or actively support the current destructive global conditions and actively oppose the significant reorientation required. Obviously, successfully addressing these two targets of change is imperative.

But I would suggest there is a third, equally important target of change: the very people¾ sincere people, and the organizations they have created¾who are actively pursuing change in the world by building a healthier, more just and sustainable society.

It is clear that the problems being addressed are so large, the issues so complex, the causes so deep-rooted, that individual efforts, unfocused and uncoordinated, no matter how sincere, will not remedy the world’s plight. Only through coordinated, collective efforts, only through organizational endeavors, will the world’s problems be solved.

However, we must also understand that the sincerity of 10 (or 10,000) people coming together in an organization committed to addressing global issues does not ensure, to any significant degree, that that organization will achieve more than average or mediocre success. The challenge to the people in the human service and development fields is that the demanding issues which currently afflict the world will only be successfully addressed by the degree to which organizations committed to their solution can effectively forge, focus, and sustain genuine collective human excellence.

The conviction, the motivation, the principles, the values, the purity of motive, and the earnestness of the people sacrificing themselves in their pursuit of rectifying global issues cannot be challenged. What must be challenged is our knowledge, understanding, and skill at forming and operating organizations. What must be challenged is the sufficiency of the processes of organizations that sincere people create to accomplish the task they pursue.

On the one hand, we clearly understand that the ultimate solutions to the problems with which our global civilization struggles require that the world and its peoples experience a change of heart, a restructuring of principles, and a reprioritization of values, goals and objectives. Yet often we pursue these changes in organizations utilizing outworn models of management and leadership, relying on dysfunctional mental models of workplace relationships, motivation, and commitment, and employ structures, principles and procedures unable to achieve and sustain the social contribution we are attempting to make.

In other words, while we understand that the values, attitudes, beliefs, and mental models that shape and control global dynamics are outmoded and ineffective we do not recognize that the values, attitudes, beliefs, and mental models that shape and control the internal dynamics of the very organizations attempting to change the world are often equally outmoded.

Extraordinary people are drawn into the development field because of the noble purpose that development agencies have. And extraordinary people are driven from the field because of the processes utilized by those self same agencies. If they do not leave the field, their motivation is undermined and their commitment, not to the client, but to the agency, is tarnished. In either case the human potential latent within the organization is never fully achieved.

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