Lions or Peacocks?

Lions, or peacocks?

I once took an executive group to a local zoo for a conference about open and closed systems.  Roughly, open systems are systems that interact freely with their environment; closed systems do not.  A marketing department might be quite open, interacting a lot with everyone around it, while an assembly line more closed and self-contained.  Each has its own set of rules.

Breakout groups were challenged to find examples of each in the animal kingdoms, a great deal of fun!  One group defined the lions as being in a closed system.  The only interaction with the outside was through glass, a moat and fencing, keeping distance in place.  Another group studied peacocks, deciding that they were an open system, wandering freely throughout the zoo.

One executive teasingly asked an animal handler “Why the unfair difference, why are the peacocks allowed to roam freely, while the lions are not.” Rolling her eyes messaging “duh”…she said: “If we allow the lions in an open system, we will have no peacocks, and frankly, not much of a zoo!”

So how do we, as a human kingdom, function?  More open and free-flowing, like the peacocks?  Or more closed and contained, like the lions?  What do our rules tell us?