Teal organisation


A Teal organisation is an emerging organizational paradigm that advocates enabling employee autonomy and to adapt as an organization grows. It was introduced in 2014 by Frederic Laloux in his book on Reinventing Organizations. It also rests on previous studies done by evolutionary and social psychologists including Jean Gebser, Clare W. Graves, Don Edward Beck, Chris Cowan and Ken Wilber who explored the stages of development and impact of human consciousness.

Overview

A Teal organisation is defined by the three following ideas in contrast to the paradigms of Amber, Orange and Green organisations.:
  1. self-management suggests a system based on peer relationships with no need for hierarchy, consensus, nor central command and control;
  2. wholeness is about enabling employees to present their full personas rather than just their work personas;
  3. evolutionary purpose is the idea to follow the natural evolution of how the organization grows
The paradigm is that an organization is similar to an organism in that the inner biology of the organism operates autonomously to sustain its' health. This includes adapting to change, enabling employees to bring all their skills to the organization and to do so without direct leadership.

Examples

A number of notable organisations around the world have adopted and operate with the Teal organisation model including The Morning Star Company, Patagonia , Sounds True, AES , Buurtzorg Nederland, ESBZ, Heiligenfeld , Nucor, Varkey Foundation, Thomsen Trampedach.