System Boundaries

by
Kathryn Maloney M.A. ABS

An appreciator of contrast and the exquisite beauty found in the spaces between, Kathryn operates at the dynamic intersection of system complexity and applied behavioral science design, relentlessly driving outcome-based results. With over 25 years of transformative experience, she has been a catalyst for change, seamlessly weaving visionary systems initiatives into strategic priorities. As a trusted advisor and partner, she empowers leaders, founders, and teams to build robust businesses and effect profound change. Drawing from her extensive expertise, Kathryn immerses herself in the intricacies of leadership, communication, operational system designing, horizontal functioning, connective tissue knitting, and collective intelligence. She infuses presence, power, and profound self-awareness into comprehensive organisational strategies, implementing actionable changes that elevate your system’s potential and amplify its human value. Kathryn’s approach transcends mere complexity management; it’s about mastering it to forge meaningful impact. She empowers organizations to navigate challenges with unwavering clarity and purpose, ensuring that every initiative resonates deeply with the core mission and aspirations of the people involved. Her work isn’t merely about strategy; it’s about transforming visions into reality, creating a legacy of innovation, status quo disruption, and evolutionary growth.

more about Kathryn
, New York City

Systems, how they operate, and any leadership ethos and strategy fall into three categories: Diffused, Rigid, or Clear.

System Boundary Types

Clear is the rigorous, mature adoption. You cannot mandate clarity. You must wire, model, and be clarity.

As intentional organisations. As dynamic teams. As conscious leaders. As self-sovereign, accountable individuals.

Running with the principle of clarity, you define and decide on the functioning and running. You aren't defined. You aren't decided for.

You do the work. You build. You lead. You make and own decisions. You change as needed without needing to blame, deflect, project, or play the victim.

You understand the outcomes of your actioning are emergent properties.

Clear. Not diffused. Not rigid.

Nobody is getting in or out of 2025 without serious boundary awakenings. Everything you thought you knew about the art of a boundary will likely be challenged. Be open to re-factoring how you think about (1) what they are, (2) how you "set" them, (3) why they matter, and (4) if you have them built.

A system becoming a more mature, evolved, and strategic cast of characters is highly reliant upon how it imagines its strategic boundaries.

  • Open boundaries are diffused boundaries. We don't like diffused boundaries.

  • Rigid boundaries are the makings of redundant, reductive, gerbil wheeling as an operating design. Not good.

The evolutionary goal?

A system of clear boundaries.

Clarity is your system design objective. Open communicate all the way home to clarity. Stop confounding open information or open communication with open boundaries. They are not the same.

Clarity holds a system in the rigor. Clarity is demanding. Rigid and/or diffused are defaults, immature, and lazy ways of the past.

Clarity is the work of dimensional, real-time, rigorous, honest, effective whole system designing through intentional people in crafted roles achieving outcomes — to elevate and expand continuously.


by Kathryn Maloney M.A. ABS
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