Isis Group Network

Structure of the Isis Group Network and Its Blogs

2007-12-14T13:10:00-06:00

The Isis Group Network's structure is evolving as a Nodal Network of eight Business Units and one Business Unit for the overall Isis Group Network. Each unit is an essential component for implementing the Isis Group's Purpose. The Isis Group Network is organized as a Limited Liability Company, an LLC, with eight internal units. Eventually each Nodal Business Unit will become an LLC in the Isis Group Network.

This Diagram gives you a Visual Representation of the Structure of the Isis Group Network. Click on the Diagram to enlarge it.

Below in this Post each of the Isis Group Network Business Units is briefly described.

A previous post entitled Why a Network of Blogs explained why a Living System business organization, like the Isis Group Network, naturally chooses a network of Blogs as the primary base for its Internet presence.

Recall the principle that a Living System must be embedded within, and continuously interact with, an enabling and nurturing environment. This underlying environment helps the system to structure itself and guide its operations - Such an environment is called a "Morphic Field".

A Living System cannot be separate, independent or just simply connected to its environments like a Linear System busness can be. It must be integrally embedded within its enabling and nurturing environments and inseparable from them.

For a Living System Business, the Internet is its "Morphic Field". Thus, the foundation for every Living System business is its embedded Internet presence - This is not just some on-line technical connection and extension of the business - It is at the heart of the business as a network of multi-dimensional interactions.

Therefore, the Internet presence of a business is best made with web-based, and if possible open source, information tools. They have the greatest capacity for embeddedness and network interactivity within the Internet. And we believe the primary tools for Internet presence are Blogs - Networks of both Business and Personal Blogs - plus other web-based tools like specialized websites, Google Apps and various communication, collaboration and audio/visual services.

Above I introduced you to how the Isis Group Network business organization is structuring itself. Now I outline how its network of Blogs is structured.

Down the left column of the Blog page you are now reading, you see Three types of Typelists - Isis Core Knowledge Blogs, Isis Group Network Blogs and Isis Team Member Blogs. These are the three categories of Blogs the Isis Group Network uses to embedd itself in the Internet. The links within each Typelist are the names of the individual Blogs. By clicking on these links, you can navigate to any other Blog of the network. Using other links within the posts of each Blog you can navigate directly within the Isis Group Network and its relationships outside the network.

This Visual defines the structure of the Isis Group Network Blogs. Click on the visual to enlarge it.

Each Blog of the network is a constantly growing structure of posts, links and interactions for information and actions involving persons and organizations both within the Isis Group Network and linked with it anywhere the Internet reaches. This cannot be easily handled by conventional websites and bookmarked pages.

Isis Core Knowledge Blogs

Four Blogs for the bodies of Core Knowledge underlying the work of the Isis Group Network. The name of each Blog and a brief description of its content are:

Human Living System Science & Principles - Discusses the emerging scientific foundations for Living System Life and Work from the viewpoint of the Human Psyche System rather than from conventional non-human living system viewpoints such as biology, plants and animals and ecology - Defines Ten Principles underlying the structure and dynamics of Human Living Systems guiding the life and work of individuals, groups and organizations.

Human Psyche System & Living System Psychology- Defines the Human Psyche System as the most fundamental Living System, the Morphic Field, underlying and guiding all human affairs, individual and collective - Presents the foundations of Living System Psychology including the process of individual and collective human psyche stage evolution; the patterns through individual life and collective history for human motivation and behavior, purpose of life, organization and leadership/management; the sources for world transformations through history; and the source of the current world transformation to the most recent emerging stage of the human psyche, the Stage A' - Living System Life and work.

Living System Leadership & Business Strategy - Defines the transformation to the practice of Living System (Human Psyche Stage A') Leadership and Business Strategy from the conventional practices of Linear System (Human Psyche Stage E) and Relativistic-Collectivist System (Human Psyche Stage F) Leadership and Business Strategy - Discusses specific actions to implement Living System practices.

The Mega-Forces & New Pattern for Success - Defines Four Mega-Forces now underlying transformations in world geopolitics, financial and business affairs, and predicts three more future Mega-Forces now forming - Discusses how the Mega-Forces create critical needs for human and business transformation worldwide that are driving the emerging pattern of Living System Life and Work and its Nodal Network Business as the New Pattern for Success.

Isis Group Network Blogs

Nine Blogs - One Blog for each of the eight Isis Group operating business nodes being created by Isis Group Members for enabling and implementing Living System Life and Work and one Blog for the overall Isis Group Network. The names of each blog and a brief description of its content are given below. Click on the links to navigate to the Blog content.

The Isis Group Network -
Content that relates to the overall Isis Group Network and the single focus of its work to create, develop and implement the theory and practices of Living System Life and Work.

Isis Development -
Content that relates to the Isis Development Team work to continuously question everything the Isis Group knows, believes and practices for Living System Life and Work; to enable us to detect the need for Isis Group change and continued transformations that assure our work remains on the leading-edge; and to assist other organizations to create, develop and operate their own Development Teams for implementing Living System Life and Work.

Isis Systems -
Content that relates to the Isis Systems Team work to create, develop, configure and implement Web-Based Open Source (WeBOS) systems needed to implement Living System Nodal Network Business organization and operations; and to develop the Web-Based Open Source system portions of the Isis Institute's learning and application services.

Isis Institute -
Content that relates to the Isis Institute Team work to create, develop and operate a Web-Based Open Source system for collaborative learning and making applications for Living System Life and Work. There are no Courses, there are areas of learning/applications called Conversations composed of Topics; there is no required curriculum, there are suggested topics and materials that start open-ended Conversations; there is no controlled sequence of learning, the Topics are pursued and developed as the learners are motivated to do so; there are no formal classes or teachers, we are all both learners and teachers and we organize our own learning groups as we need; there are no exams, there are personal and team evaluations as the learners desire to assure their learning and applications of Living Sytem Life and work are advancing.

Isis Creation -
Content that relates to our work to create and develop Isis Creation as the Isis Group Network node devoted to a new practice of Living System Marketing. Isis Creation will become the Human Leading-Edge for Living System Business Strategy and Entrepreneurship - The "Morphic Field" for any new Living System business. Its process proceeds through four overlapping areas of work using new Living System concepts and practices for Branding, Design, Marketing and Buying.

Isis Consulting -
Content that relates to the Isis Consulting Team work to create, develop and publish methods, tools, systems and practices for Living System Leadership, Business Strategy and Operations; to assist clients to transform to Living System Life and Work and operate Nodal Network Business; to assist clients to align their organizations with the coming Living System pattern of world business to gain unique competitive advantage.

Isis Ventures -
Content that relates to our work to create and develop Isis Ventures as the Isis Group Network node devoted to a new concept and practice of Living System Entrepreneurship. It will become the Isis Group node for discovering and analyzing new business opportunities; for forming and training new business venture teams; and for creating, developing, starting-up and operating Living System Business Units and Networks. The work of Isis Ventures will be closely interrelated with Isis Creation and Isis Resources.

Isis Resources -
Content that relates to our work to develop Isis Resources as the Isis Group node devoted to a new concept and practice for acquiring, administering, and financing the business resources needed for creating, developing, on-going operations and expansion of Living System Business Units and Nodal Networks outside of conventional banking and public markets. In addition, Isis Resources will develop new investment processes and services for the personal and familiy resources of Isis Group Network related persons, groups, organizations and owners of Living System Businesses in which the Isis Group Network has an interest.

Isis Media -
Content that relates to our work to develop Isis Media as the premier source for creating, publishing and distributing materials for Living System Life and Work and Nodal Network Business.

Isis Team Member Blogs

Blogs for those Isis Team Members who wish to present a personal Blog.

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Your inputs and participation are needed and welcome. Please make Comments on any of the Blogs. The Isis Institute

John Clayton Caris

Purpose of the Isis Group Network

2007-12-11T13:30:00-06:00

The Isis Group Network is dedicated to two things:
1) Enabling, learning, developing and practicing Living System Life and Work as the New Pattern for Success; and
2) Being the core of the human community of individuals and organizations who wish to master Living System Life and Work.

In terms of the World Human Transformation now in progess, this dedication means two things:
1) Becoming the Right Person; and 2) Using the Right Means as a Right Person for Living System Life and Work.

Isis Group Network is developing a prototype, or Morphic Field, for business organization structure and operations for any Living System business. Its leadership and management practices are emerging examples of Human Living System principles.

Right Person and Right Means for Living System Life and Work

2007-12-11T13:00:00-06:00

An ancient Chinese wiseman wrote: "If the wrong man uses the right means, the right means will work in the wrong way". His wisdom guides us today during our time of world transformation - When who used to be right persons for leadership have become wrong persons and what previously were right means for success have become wrong means.

Therefore, Isis Group Network work first focuses on becoming a Right Person for the New Pattern for Success and secondly on the Right Means for a Right Person to use. Both the Right Person and Right Means are discontinuous transformations from what generally exists. Personal and organization transformations are required.

The Conventional is Now Dangerous

2007-01-30T15:55:31-06:00

To do Conventional things based upon Conventional human identity, knowledge and actions is becoming dangerous – Why? Because they no longer work successfully as they did in the past.

In fact, the Conventional is failing everywhere in personal and public life. Evidence is the growing numbers of human, business and governmental failures worldwide in organization, leadership/management and finance. In addition, there is a widening crisis of leadership almost everywhere. The most creative and productive people are no longer aligning with the Conventional as they previously did. They have growing dissatisfaction with what generally exists around them.

The term Conventional of course covers a wide range knowledge and action. My focus now is to discus the Conventional in the limited sense of business.

In this arena, Conventional means the whole pattern of linear, functionally divided, Machine System organizations that are led and managed by the Command-and-Control Model - With its vertical downward flow of authority and orders and its vertical upward flow of obedience and subservient compliant actions. The present and the future of Conventional in business is pessimistic.

The newly emerging "Unconventional" Living System pattern of business is the antithesis of how I defined Conventional. It is already proving to be optimistic for the future of business.

You should not really care how many prestigious business schools still teach the Conventional. You should not really care how many corporate giants still practice the Conventional - While bombarding us with public relations programs purporting to show us that that they are not really what we experience them to be - inhumane machines.

The Linear System model of business is obsolete. It is incongruent with what we can now see as the new reality. We are finding thtat it is not aligned with best practice for either the present or the future of your life and business. What we want and need is to make a trascending leap to what is coming – Not continuing to align with what is failing and trying to fix-it-up.

The new "Unconventional" of Living System Life and Work can be outlined as follows:

It enables you to understand and to make the transformations you need to align with the new reality emerging. It enables and facilitates you to become a Right Person using the Right Means for the critical challenges you face in your life and business – Especially during the next decade. It begins your personal path to understanding the chaos of our times and turning it to your advantage – No matter what the size of your business or the stage of your new venture. It involves dramatically new mindset, concepts, methods and tools necessary to understand and to implement the new Nodal Network Business Practice. It shows that the greatest promise for your life as a leader/entrepreneur lies in transforming to the Living System pattern – And for your business the greatest promise lies in being organized and operated internally as a Living System nodal network of unique business segments led by small teams – That are voluntarily linked together internally and externally with other Living System leaders, teams and companies into still larger networks. That is the optimistic future of living system newtworks of successful business.

The Isis Institute is the authentic source of expertise for you to learn the theory and develop the practice of Living System Nodal Network Business because we discovered them and are leaders in developing them together with other emerging leader/entrepreneurs.

John Clayton Caris

Why a Network of Blogs - Rather Than a Website

2007-01-26T14:44:23-06:00

The Isis Group Network is developing its primary Internet presence as a network of Blogs - And its secondary presence as special Websites linked to the Blog network. Conventional practice has been to use one or more Websites as primary and Blogs as supplementary. Why would an organization reverse conventional practice?

A short answer is that a network of blogs is more consistent with the Principles of Living Systems and the Isis Group Network is a pioneer in the emerging theory and practice of Living System Life and Business. Therefore, a network of Blogs is the natural thing for Isis to implement.

The Isis Group Network is a developing prototype for a Nodal Network organization whose Strategic Identity is to be the enabler, to be the "Seeds" or "Stem Cells", for creating, developing and operating Living System Business Units and their Nodal Networks - The Coming Pattern of World Business.

Its Purpose is to serve as the human and professional enabler and nurturing environment for Living System entrepreneurs whose interest is transforming existing businesses and creating new ones consistent with what is becoming the high performing pattern of Living System Network business, not consistent with the declining performance pattern of linear, machine like business using vertical command-and-control management. I outline some examples of companies with elements of Living System nature Here.

Click on the Continue reading link below to read about how the Principles of Living Systems apply to the decision to use a network of Blogs.

A basic Principle is that a Living System naturally organizes as a Network of Nodes in which each Node is itself a living system. A Living System Business organizes the same way - As a Nodal Business Network in which each Node is itself a fully functioning business unit. We call each of these nodes a Business Segment. The Internet presence for such a company, which is its "Platform", naturally takes form as a Nodal network.

Two more Living System Principles are important for explaining why a network of Blogs is more effective than websites. First, a Living System cannot function, or even exist, as an independent thing. It must be embedded in an enabling and nurturing environment that is also a Living System. Second, it must be open to its environments and be in continuous, collaborative interactions with them.

For Living System business, the enabling and nurturing environment is the Internet. Interactive Internet collaboration among colleagues, clients, supporters and suppliers (as originally defined by Tim O'Reilly as Web 2.0 and later refined by Paul Graham in his paper Web 2.0) is the direction for effective business platforms. Blogs are primary tools to implement such web-based business platforms. They are consistent with Living System Principles.

Thus it is appropriate for a Living System business to develop its Internet presence in the form of an inter-linked and inter-active network of Weblogs (or Blogs) rather than vertically structured trees of conventional static websites. I know that websites are becoming more dynamic and interactive - But Blogs and linked networks of them are more interactive and easy to use for bi-directional and multi-directional communication than are Websites. We intend to also use Websites, but as secondary sources of information that is less dynamic and interactive, like some of the book publications of the Isis Media node.

This Isis Group Network of Blogs is the primary Platform for our business network. Its current structure and content are described in my post entitled Structure of the Isis Group Network and Its Blogs.

John Clayton Caris

A Few Examples of Emerging Living System Nature

2007-01-06T14:26:23-06:00

I am often asked, "Are there any examples of persons or orgnizations who demonstrate Living System Life and Work?" My answer is Yes.

There are a growing number of persons, groups, businesses, institutions and movements in a widening range of human affairs that are acting, at least in part, consistently with the emerging Stage A' - Living System human psyche stage pattern. They are examples of emerging Living System Life and Work and of portions of the new concepts, methods, tools and systems of Nodal Network Business Practice.

This list is incomplete. There are many more examples I am aware of and, of course, there are still more that I am not yet aware of. I present these examples to demonstrate the wide scope of emerging Living System Life and Work. They are listed in no particular order or significance.

This list is a starting point to stimulate your interest and hopefully your own studies and suggestions. So, with these disclaimers, here are only a few of the examples we will be commenting on in this Blog network:

- W.L. Gore & Associates – nodal network organization and operations as described in a Fast Company article called The Fabric of Creativity
- Google – nodal network organization and operations
- The Hollywood movie industry – nodal network reorganization and operations - Why Every Business Will Be Like Show Business
- Dee Hock – "Chaordic" re-organization of Visa - Birth of the Chaordic Age
- Linus Torvalds and LINUX - the open source software movement
- The Internet and its World Wide Web – the world’s central living system nodal network
- U.S. Military Special Forces – nodal network military organization and operations
- The Free-Agent Professional movement - Free Agent Nation
- Carl Jung’s, Erich Neumann’s, Carl Rogers’ and Claire Graves’ psychologies (A number of links will be given for Jung, Neumann, Rogers and Graves in the posts of other Isis Group Network Blogs)
- Louis deBroglie – Theory of the Double Solution
- Teilhard de Chardin – The Phenomenon of Man
- Rudolph Steiner - Theosophy
- Lancelot Law Whyte – The Next Development in Man
- Rupert Sheldrake – Morphic Fields and Morphic resonance, A New Science of Life
- Stephen Wolfram - A New Kind of Science
- Lawrence Lessig - Creative Commons
- George Soros of the Open Society Institute – Open Society and Theory of Reflexivity - The Alchemy of Finance and The Age of Fallibility
- Karl R. Popper – The Open Society and Its Enemies
- Eric Raymond – Hacker community -The Cathedral and the Bazaar
- Paul Graham – Web based software and entrepreneurship - Hackers and Painters
- Christopher Locke, Rick Levine, Doc Searles, David Weinberger – The Cluetrain Manifesto
- Howard Rheingold – Smart Mobs and network collaboration
- Larry Dossey, M.D. – a 2nd Renaissance medical man - Reinventing Medicine
- Ervin Laszlo - World Transformation - Macroshift, The Chaos Point, Science and the Reenchantment of the Cosmos

John Clayton Caris