Maps/Gear | Palette of Possibilities | Rainbow Lens

We manage to that which we measure
Not everything that counts can be counted
The Rainbow Lenses can help us transform the above dilemma into an important new source of insight and creative energy. Most of us are able to sense the energy in different settings but don't have a language to express what we feel, much less appreciate the consequences of energy quality. Below is an illustration depicting a hypothetical continuum of organizational energy ranging from the most toxic (life-diminishing) to the most generative (life-giving).

Quality of Organizational Energy


The quality of an organization's energy field will vary throughout the organization and will fluctuate through time. However, as transformational leaders and practitioners, there is much we can do to help organizations evolve in ways that will dramatically improve the overall quality of their energy fields — and therefore improve most areas of performance. Creating and working with Rainbow Lenses can be a powerful first step toward making that shift. The Generic Rainbow Lens can be used as a template for creating such lenses.

Generic Rainbow Lens

Well-designed and creatively-deployed Rainbow Lenses serve two vital eye- opening functions:

• They help cut through patterns of collective denial about the true state of an organization's health. They open the door to conversations that acknowledge and heal.
• They can enable us to see beyond today's limiting definitions of excellence.

The Generic Rainbow Lens is intended to be used as a tool-makers tool, a template to aid developmental practitioners in creating Rainbow Charts. Rainbow Charts are especially valuable for focusing attention on those variables that are essential to organizational health and sustainability but difficult to measure. There are numerous such variables, e.g.,

• Quality of Relationships
• Quality of Agreements
• Quality of Accountability Loops
• Quality of Developmental (B/C) Work
• Quality of Climate