Gareth Morgan uses the example of a spider plant as a metaphor(Morgan, 1997) for the following exercise.

1. Select an organisational unit such as a team, department,project or company.
2. Write down all the characteristics of a spider plant. Forexample, they grow new shoots when they are too big for their pots.As the plant reaches out to find new ground it gets nourishmentfrom the mother plant. When the new plant has roots and can sustainitself, the linking shoot is not needed.
3. Identify which characteristics have parallels to theorganisational unit you selected, and which don’t. For example,“Unlike a real spider plant, the only thing growing in thisteam happens in the original pot. The offshoots have nowhere togo.”
4. Consider how well the metaphor fits the organisational unit.Does it create any new insights? For example, “If the offshootscontinue like this they will die. If the offshoots represent ourteam’s knowledge and skills, this could mean that other units inthe company will be missing out on useful input from ourteam.”
5. Extend the metaphor of the spider plant to think about how yourorganisational unit could be. In other words, use themetaphor as the basis for a new organisational design. For example,“The offshoots need to be strong and healthy so that skills andknowledge can flow both ways. This will encourage more offshootsand help with cross-departmental initiatives.”
6. What are the differences between the newly-designed and theexisting organisation? What new insights for shaping managementprocesses emerge? For example, “We’ve been so focused on what’sin the pot that we’ve neglected the offshoots. We need to developthese offshoots and use them to benefit our team andothers.”

Have a go at this exercise yourself and share any insights you gainwith your group in the forum. You can use the spider plant too, orfeel free to select another metaphor that you think fits better foryou. This exercise may seem a little tricky at first but give it ago and you might be surprised with what you come up with.