Regenerative Design Principles

We Create Organizations With Life

We believe organizations are complex living systems and require a very different approach to design, management, and monitoring.

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Regenerative Organizations

Regenerative organizations are thriving, living systems where resilience and dynamic adaptation are recurring outcomes of underlying health.

We've been treating organizations as if they are machines, pushing productivity and efficiency at the expense of long-term health. In this model, humans are resources to be lined up on an org chart ― just like cogs in a machine. But organizations (like humans) are not machines. Organizations are complex living systems and when designed, managed, and monitored as such, can be thriving, regenerative systems where resilience and dynamic adaptation are recurring, emergent outcomes of underlying health. We call this a Regenerative Organization.

The With Life Approach

With Life is an approach to organizing that holds the patterns of living systems at its foundation. Whether organizing in business, policy, government, or community work, the With Life approach empowers us to build healthy, resilient organizations.

Patterns of Living Systems

Creating organizations with life means ensuring organizational design and management align with the foundational patterns observed in all living systems. We recognize the following patterns of life:

Patterns of Holism

We recognize that the patterns of living systems can only be understood from a holistic view. They cannot be understood by only examining individual parts. The unique qualities of living systems, namely resilience and dynamic adaptation, are emergent outcomes of the whole system.

Patterns of Organization

Living systems undergo constant change, yet there is continuity of overall form. They exist at dynamic equilibriums, not single optimal states. Living systems are not centrally controlled. Life organizes itself into decentralized networks.

Patterns of Relationship

Living systems are networks of interdependent relationships and processes. Energy and information are transformed through cycles of life, death, birth, and regeneration through these diverse and interdependent relationships. Living systems maintain a dynamic evolution with their environment. They not only adapt to changes in their environment, but also actively create conditions conducive for life.

Regenerative Design and Operating Principles

To create organizations with life, we use these patterns of living systems to inform a set of regenerative design and operating principles unique to each organization. These design principles guide how organizations design, manage, and monitor all operational functions such as governance and decision making, business models, fundraising and revenue generation, communication, investment, strategic planning, succession planning etc. Here is one example of a set of Regenerative Design Principles.

We design and operate in a way that...

Recognizes that the whole is more than the sum of its parts and creates conditions for emergent outcomes to arise.
Recognizes the inherent value of all relationships and creates conditions for resilience and potential to emerge from the diversity of all relationships.
Recognizes that all members of an organization are original, and nurtures the possibility for all members' unique expression of their genius and potential.

Maintains a dynamic balance with an ever-changing surrounding environment and actively creates conditions that support life in our organization and in our environment.
Is not centrally controlled and organized and that resources and decision making are equitably distributed throughout the entire system.
Equitably invests in the growth and health of all members,  not just a few.

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nRhythm’s bi-monthly newsletter explores a new theme each month through a living systems perspective. Rooted Reflections invites you to reflect on its deeper meaning in your unique context, while Patterns to Practice helps you bridge theory and action in your work.

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