I’m trying to create a model that describes employee development in organizations. Please feel free to help me improve this model if you have any suggestions. Maybe you can identify more options than what I present here. Please remember, however, that a model is simply a way to squeeze reality into a manageable form. No model captures the full complexity of real life.

To understand the model, we need to first ask the question: What do employees bring to the organization? I suggest that people bring a combination of knowledge and wisdom. I am using the term “knowledge” as referring to our understanding of the way things work in the external world of material objects and people. Wisdom, on the other hand, has to do with our understanding and ability to tap into the internal, intangible, realities such as personal motivation, aspirations, dreams, and vision. It also has to do with discerning the demons that incapacitate the soul such as disconnection from oneself and a sense of meaninglessness. Wise people understand how and to what degree these internal realities interact with and influence the external realities. Saint Augustine makes the distinction between these two kinds of attributes in the following quote:

The knowledge of things terrestrial and celestial is commonly thought much of by men. Yet those doubtless judge better who prefer to that knowledge, the knowledge of themselves; and that mind is more praiseworthy which knows even its own weakness, than that which, without regard to this, searches out, and even comes to know, the ways of the stars, or which holds fast such knowledge already acquired, while ignorant of the way by which itself [sic] to enter into its own proper health and strength (Preface to Book IV).

This latter kind of “knowledge of themselves” is what I am calling wisdom. It is the combination of these two kinds of understanding that marks the mature individual and the highly valuable employee.

Some people come to the organization highly skilled at what they do. Others are much lower on the knowledge scale. Regarding wisdom, some employees have honed this inner sense to such a degree that they can rapidly size up and make the connection between that intangible world and its effects on the behavior of people and organizational systems. For example, one might notice that certain employees respond defensively at efforts to assess their department. They may even engage in passive resistance to the process by dragging their feet when it comes time to write up the reports. What’s more, they are probably unaware that they are even engaging in these kinds of subversive behaviors. These are all possible indicators of weak ego strength and, consequently, the inability to face objective assessment.

These two qualities (knowledge and wisdom) provide a double continuum from which we can develop a matrix as follows:

Knowledge-Wisdom Matrix
The Knowledge-Wisdom Matrix

  1. In the first quadrant where both knowledge and wisdom are low, people are basically useless to the organization. Most people are likely not to be hired if that is their situation. However, some companies like Chrysler, have partnered with area community colleges to take young people from even this stage and develop them into capable auto mechanics.
  2. The second quadrant represents those individuals who are high in knowledge but low in wisdom. They may be completely unaware of the spiritual dimension of life. When others try to bring up these issues, they try to downplay their importance. For them, the only relevant issue is what’s happening out there where we can see it, touch it, feel it, smell it, and hear it.
  3. The third quadrant is where we find the mature employee who has a high level of knowledge in his or her area of expertise and has also developed a profound understanding of the value and influence of the intangibles. Such people make great leaders and can be a tremendous asset to the organization.
  4. The fourth quadrant is where it really gets interesting. People who have a well-developed base of wisdom, but who lack knowledge are usually those who have grown personally beyond their position. They are ready for larger challenges, perhaps for the challenge of moving into a position of leadership. Such people need to add new knowledge to their skill set to fit new possibilities. In many organizations, however, such people are stuck and their potential is not allowed to flourish because of some inhibiting assumptions on the part of the top management; but that’s for another post.

What do you think? Does this model have some potential? What are its flaws? Where does it differ from the realities of the workplace? How might it apply in the church?

[Post a Response]

Notes

I want to acknowledge my borrowing from Blanchard, Hersey and Johnson’s “Situational Leadership” model for the basic design of the matrix. However, their model focuses on the leader’s behavior in response to the employee’s growth and development. Instead of comparing knowledge and wisdom, their model posits the dimensions of directive as opposed to supportive leadership behavior.

Works Cited

Augustine. “On the Holy Trinity.” In A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, ed. Philip Schaff, 3. New York: Christian Classics Ethereal Library, 1890.