Ben van der Hilst

350 The theory concerning the learning organization emphasizes the importance of teamwork as a link between individual learning and organizational learning. Strong teams promote individual learning and are the nodes through which internal and exter- nal innovation initiatives find their way between individuals and the organization as a whole. Strong teams therefore contribute to the agility of the organization. The indivi- dual professional development of team members (personal mastery) in turn supports team learning. The professional behavior of teachers (especially type 2) is promoted by powerful teams and vice versa. Literature on leading self-management stresses that this leadership does not so much concern itself with the content of the work but rather with the functioning of the self-managing teams. Managers support and encourage the teams to fulfill their responsibilities without getting involved with the competencies of the team. This type of leadership is also referred to as involved leadership . When organization change fails, this is often caused by a lack of change in leadership behavior when introducing self-managing teams. Management also has an important role in identifying possible symptoms of regression, and counters these in a timely manner. The theory about social complex adaptive systems offers a distinctive and unique perspective. Unpredictable chance encounters between actors at a local level lead in an unpredictable way to changes at system level enabling the system to adapt to changing circumstances. However, the large number of weak connections obser- ved in most schools, leads to the conclusion that these schools should be characteri- zed as chaotic systems rather than adaptive systems. The TOS seeks to reinforce the connections in such a way that the system can become more adaptive. The organi- zational structure influences the frequency and significance of the local interactions, both the planned interactions in the teams as well as the spontaneous professional encounters. A strong and shared vision ensures that adaptation at system level mate- rializes in a specified direction. Conclusions The two lines of research both lead to the verification of the proposi- tions, thereby validating the design theorem. The research also generates a number of suggestions for improving the TOS. For example, it could be better to denote team leaders as process supervisors, because the former implies a hierarchical relation. The need for strong process control requires great skill from the process supervi- sors. Another example for improvement would be stressing the product definition (and therefore responsibility) of education teams compared to educational program teams: the goal is not providing education, but the (comprehensive) development of students. In addition, the research contributes to an enrichment of the organization model. The model is strengthened by including the systems and support services as part of the organizational model. This inclusion means that it is better to talk about the