Reviews by: Booklist | World Business Academy | Success Magazine

To the Tofflers and Naisbitts of futuristic world visions, add another two names; Land and Jarman. What they propose and outline in their first collaboration transcends pure and simple business philosophy. The focus is on change and on the three phases that define the progression of history, business, even personal lives: entrepreneurial, management, reinvention. Breakpoint, according to the authors, is the state of the world at present; what is needed to "shake out" society is a combination of creativity, connecting, and future pull. Lest one perceive this as New Age babble, the pithy case histories and examples point to the Kennedys and Kings, the Body Shops and Herman Millers as proof that the principles work. Specific "rules"-or at least, viewpoints to be adopted - are listed under each principle - don't expect, however, step-by-step instructions. Sadly, the nature of modern business and the almost terrifying pace of change today may force those very individuals and organizations in dire need of change to disregard these notions. - Barbara Jacobs

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John B. Pehrson is a chemical engineer and manager in the polymer products sector of Du Pont. He is active in both the New York and Washington chapters of the World Business Academy and also serves on the board of directors of Open Center, Inc., of New York, the largest urban holistic learning center in the world.

"The pattern for civilization has been exhausted, and if we are to move to a higher level, a new pattern must be created." With that bold conclusion, Academy fellows George Land and Beth Jarman join the ranks of visionary thinkers such as Willis Harman who are telling us that the world is going through a period of unprecedented change. Harman calls it a "paradigm change," a fundamental shift in worldview. Land and Jarman refer to it as being at "breakpoint," where the rules for success change abruptly and dramatically, breaking the links with the past in ways powerful enough to completely reorder all we know about living in this world. We are, they say, up against an extraordinary circumstance-tomorrow is guaranteed to be nothing like today.

Living at breakpoint, in this time when our very foundations are shifting, is a bit like dancing on a slippery floor. It is unsettling; it is hard to keep our balance, and we are tempted to simply stand still. In Breakpoint and Beyond, Land and Jarman give us something to hold on to so that we can move forward. They build us a new framework for under- standing the world, a framework based on discoveries in modern science. They show us how the forces of change really work. In the midst of accelerating change, Land and Jarman give us hope through a compelling view of our potential to create a future of unparalleled opportunity. Finally, they provide us with a road map to get there.

The bold ideas presented in Breakpoint and Beyond are woven from the threads of their more than fifty combined years of observing and applying the natural forces behind growth, change, and creativity. The theories grow out of Land's research across the disciplines of biology, genetics, chemistry, anthropology, psychology, cosmology, and atomic physics. But the book is a product of the combined experience of both Land and Jarman as leaders of change within education, government, business, consulting, and the media. These are credentials that make us sit up and take note of what they have to say. Breakpoint and Beyond begins by describing the master pattern of change that is common across all of nature-- plants, people, organizations, and whole civilizations. Nature's process of growth, we find, is neither logical nor predictable--despite what most of us have been taught to believe. Abrupt shifts, or breakpoints, are everywhere in nature, from the shift that a tree goes through when it slows its growth and produces fruit to the more spectacular metamorphosis of the caterpillar into a butterfly.

Growth proceeds in alternating waves of divergence and convergence, order and disorder. Our lives and our organizations grow in this same way, moving through phases of forming, norming, fulfilling, and then, ideally, transformation to a higher level where the cycle begins again. The tough part is negotiating the breakpoint changes that occur between phases. It is here that the rules for success suddenly shift a full 180 degrees. Many of us as individuals and many of our organizations get stuck playing by the rules of what worked in the past when success depends on adapting totally new strategies for growth in the future. This book helps us recognize when a shift in our mind-set is necessary and how to avoid common traps.

One such trap the authors call the "back to basics bump." Problems begin to arise when organizations shift from a second-to a third-phase environment, as many of our businesses are doing today. Just when the organization needs to open up and permit greater flexibility, it retreats to what feels safe. It goes back to the basics. Land and Jarman describe this as a period when companies re-centralize control, reduce costs, eliminate unnecessary people and programs, and trim the management team. Often this results in an immediate short-term improvement in productivity and earnings. But it can rob the organization of its knowledge base, creativity, and commitment to a common vision. The cure can some- times kill the patient. Breakpoint and Beyond helps us recognize and avoid this and nine other common traps so that we can make the shift into a more flexible and empowering third-phase environment in our organizations.

Next, Land and Jarman show us how to master the future through the principles uncovered by the revolutionary discoveries of quantum physics. In simple terms, we learn how to apply these principles in our lives and in our organizations. It is in this explanation that the book draws its most inspiration and power and provides the basis for a creative new worldview. As the authors point out, the human community, with few exceptions, has not followed the path of change laid out by new discoveries in nature. The deeper and more powerful rules of nature that have driven our technological revolution have been ignored in our daily lives and the methods we use to manage our businesses. Natural change, say Land and Jarman, operates on the principle of being pulled to a future unlike the past, not perpetuating past patterns into the future. As Einstein noted, the world will not evolve past its current state of crisis by using the same thinking that created the situation. To cope success- fully with breakpoint change, we must leave the past behind and adopt a new worldview.

All of the dominant, foundational ideas from the orthodox view of science have been totally overturned in the last half century. In contrast to this orthodox view, Breakpoint and Beyond provides us with a creative new worldview based on the discoveries of modern science. More importantly, Land and Jarman show us how these apply in our personal and professional lives.

The Creative World View

1. How does change happen?

The creative process forms the dynamic of all nature. Within the invisible realm of the atomic world, modern science has completely demolished the notion of an orderly and predictable cause and effect material world. What scientists have found instead is that all matter exists simultaneously in two states-both as material particles and as invisible waves. A particle, obviously, is a concrete physical object that has mass and occupies a definite and limited space. Our bodies are made up of millions of these "particles." Everyone can identify with that. However, the wave reality that accompanies all matter, including you and me, is made up of an invisible field. That wave spreads out in space and cannot be localized as an object can. It has no mass and no material substance. Thus, it has become clear to scientists, at least, that everything in our universe has aspects that are somehow both solid and invisible-at the same time. Now, here comes the fascinating part. As Jarman and Land describe it, a wave in physics is actually a description of the probable futures of a material particle. That means that all the building blocks that make up our physical world carry in their present state a wave of their own future potential. They are both being and becoming at the same time. For us, the wave of our human potential is primarily our beliefs, attitudes, and assumptions. Our invisible thoughts shape our unexpressed potential, the probable future of our own becoming. When you imagine the possibilities for your future, you actually create not only your future but also your present! And just by imagining possibilities, you expand or contract your reality. The implication is that we all need to be more aware of our thoughts, and the kind of future we are creating. And, the importance and power of focusing on a positive vision and purpose become clear.

2. How are things connected with one another?

Everything exists as sets of connections with the world around it. Experiments conducted by physicist I. S. Bell and his colleagues have shown that all things are connected-at all times and instantaneously, at any distance. The orthodox view that material objects exist independently of one another is factually wrong. The truth is that everything and everyone are connected. Everything affects everything else. No matter how different, no matter how far away, we are all part of an interconnected whole. This is a scientific truth. Just think of how our world will change when we really internalize and act from this sense of connectedness.

3. What impels change to happen?

The most powerful force driving change comes from the future. From the point of conception in the womb, humans grow into people, not beautiful butterflies. Encoded in our DNA structure is the invisible pattern that pulls us inexorably toward its fulfillment. Similarly, the world is just as surely being pulled by the future. Land and Jarman note that concrete scientific evidence shows a world progressing inevitably toward more complex relationships and deeper connections. According to them, this is possible only if change has a purpose. The principle is that change is driven by the pull of the future to connect everything at broader, deeper, and more penetrating levels. This future pull manifests itself in our visions, our hopes, and our waves of probable futures. For each of us and each of our businesses, it emphasizes the need for clarifying these questions. What is pulling me? What is pulling my organization? What is my purpose? The remainder of the book translates key learnings from nature and the three aspects of the creative worldview into practical skills and tools needed to handle the accelerating changes in our world. It provides a framework for breaking with the past, shifting paradigms, and living creatively.

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Adapted from Breakpoint and Beyond by George Land and Beth Jarman.

Copyright © 1992 by George Land and Beth Jarman.
A HarperBusiness book.
Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers.

In the Beginning
Finding the Critical Pattern of Success

In their new book, Breakpoint and beyond, authors Landand Jarman describe Phase One of organizational growth as being: entrepreneurial, divergent, inventive, creative, exploratory.

WHEN ANY ORGANIZATION starts out, it instantly becomes subject to the dynamic rules of nature's method of growth. Organizational start-ups, whether they are in education, business, volunteer groups, or government, are trying to discover an efficient and effective pattern in order to grow and survive.

The first phase of an organization is the entrepreneurial stage. Entrepreneurs believe, for any of a diverse number of reasons, that they have an idea for a product or ser- vice that will solve some- one's problem. They are convinced, with a deep fervor and obsession, that their idea will be needed and wanted in the marketplace; it could make a real contribution.

The entrepreneur:

• imaginatively probes and explores the environment in extremely creative and dynamic ways to learn everything possible;
• experiments by attempting all manner of things to find what succeeds and what fails;
• rebounds between the terror of survival and having fun, bouncing ideas around;
• brings together an essential blueprint of success with the desirable resources that marries the product or service with the market.

This period is very ingenious and unpredictable, a time of trial and error, of success and failure, of untold frustration and great triumphs. Yet, it certainly isn't a period to merely survive, but to find, in the most creative and inventive way, how to operate and structure the enterprise in order to connect with the larger environment. The successful entrepreneur is, in the words of Tom Peters and Bob Waterman, "a maniac with a mission."

Edwin Land of Polaroid fame personifies the entrepreneur. He had such tenacity that he wouldn't be stopped from realizing success with instant photography. Many people concluded that he could never succeed. He worked in a laboratory atmosphere of chaos and confusion. He and his associates weren't "manageable." The young George Lucas, the guiding force behind the Star Wars epics, admits that when he wanted to star two robots, "They said I was nuts." The type of creativity in this first phase of organizational growth is invention. At its most elementary level, behind the process of imagination and exploration is the basic drive to find a repeatable pattern of success.

Because of the tremendous difficulties in creating a new pattern, if the entrepreneur does not have a clear goal, exceptional determination, and commitment, along with ideas, resources, and an ability to cultivate good market contacts, success is unlikely. The entrepreneur must explore the environment relentlessly, almost obsessively, to discover that special pattern and then go out and win acceptance for it. This period requires great flexibility and adaptability to meet the unpredictable circum- stances that inevitably appear.

Most first-phase organizations, whether for profit or not for profit, fail to find a pattern of success. In nature, new cell mutations typically fail well over 99 percent of the time. One acorn out of thousands will grow into a healthy tree. In business organizations, 84 percent of those that make it past the critical first year fail within five years. They don't find or invent the successful product or service, or they don't discover a real need. Some entrepreneurs just give up too soon. Business is totally "natural" in that most small businesses fail to find that critical pattern of success.

The start-up period has little or nothing to do with the classic idea of management. It has every- thing to do with inventiveness, decisiveness, commitment, and flexibility. We characterize the most successful entrepreneur in Phase One as a sort of benevolent Genghis Khan. Quick decisions, bold initiatives, and resourceful ways of solving problems are the only standards. To the entrepreneur, none of this is risky; it is necessary! The underlying success factor in Phase One is the willingness to fall down, pick oneself up, and start all over again. The rules - do it, try it, fix it - totally agree with what happens in the beginning for everything in nature.