In this talk, the speaker uses the science‑fiction series The Three‑Body Problem as an analogy for organizational dynamics. The story’s planet experiences alternating stable and chaotic periods due to the unpredictable interactions of three suns. The speaker argues that leaders must recognize whether their organization is in a stable or chaotic era and adapt their approach accordingly. In stable eras, effective leaders anticipate upcoming turbulence and prepare their people, systems, and strategies for the inevitable chaos. In chaotic eras, leaders must create a sense of stability by offering clear frameworks and comfort, even when many problems remain unresolved. The speaker also notes a pattern where women are sometimes thrust into leadership during chaotic times, which can lead to gender‑based blame when outcomes are poor, though this point is not explored further. The overall message is that leadership success hinges on the ability to both foresee and mitigate chaos in stable times, and to provide structure and reassurance when chaos is already present.
Chapters
seen this movie series, The Three-Body Problem, or read the book. I've done both and found them fascinating. The Three-Body Problem science fiction story, and basically it's about a planet somewhere else that is in a tri-solar system. So there are 3 suns, and when you've got 3 objects that are interacting, it creates chaos. You never quite know whether all the suns are going to be up or down. Is it going to be— your planet going to be boiling, or is it going to freeze? So the people on this planet go through this series of chaotic periods and stable periods. So in a stable era, they can create, learn, create a government, do science. In a chaotic era, most of the people die, or they're kind of dehydrated and put aside for the next stable era. What you need to do as a leader is to consider this. It's really easy to lead in a stable era. You can look good as a leader in a stable era. It's difficult, challenging to lead in a chaotic era. And sometimes there's actually some studies about it that certain kinds of people are pushed into leadership as they know that the organization is going through a chaotic era so that they can blame that person for the chaos that has already come before. There's lots of documented stories about how women often get into leadership during a chaotic era so that when things go wrong, they can say, well, women's leadership. Anyway, we won't get into that today. But as a real liminal leader, as a leader who's really looking towards this, you've got kind of 2 jobs depending on where you stand. One is that you're in a stable era, relatively stable era in your organization, but because you're paying attention, you're anticipating the chaos and you're preparing for it. You're preparing yourself, your organization, and your people for the coming chaos. The other way it could be is that you're a leader in a chaotic era, but because you've got the competency that is required, you're able to create a sense of stability for your people. You're able to give a framework of, we haven't resolved everything, but we still know what we can do, that we, we can still move forward in the space. So you create the sense of, of comfort for them, a sense of stability, and, and that's what your leadership is really about.
