Harold Jarche

Networks thrive in complexity

by

In complex environments, weak hierarchies and strong networks are the best organizing principle. One good example of complexity that we can try to fathom is nature itself. Networks thrive in nature. As Howard Bloom stated in a speech at Yale University:

One the many lessons bacteria teach with their colonies of trillions is this. When it comes to groups, Nature does not favor tribes, she favors size … She favors humongous social groups that network their information so well that they form a high-powered collective intelligence, a group brain.

The Internet has given us a glimpse of the power of networks. We are just beginning to realize how we can use networks as our primary form of living and working. David Ronfeldt has developed the TIMN framework to explain this – Tribal; Institutional; Markets; Networks. The TIMN framework shows how we have evolved as a civilisation. It has not been a clean progression from one organizing mode to the next but rather each new form built upon and changed the previous mode. He sees the network form not as a modifier of previous forms, but a form in itself that can address issues that the three other forms could not address. This point is very important when it comes to things like implementing social business (a network mode) within corporations (institutional + market modes). Real network models (e.g. wirearchy) are new modes, not modifications of the old ones.

Another key point of this framework is that Tribes exist within Institutions, Markets AND Networks. We never lose our affinity for community groups or family, but each mode brings new factors that influence our previous modes. For example, tribalism is alive and well in online social networks. It’s just not the same tribalism of several hundred years ago. Each transition also has its hazards. For instance, while tribal societies may result in nepotism, networked societies can lead to deception.

Ronfeldt states that the initial tribal form informs the other modes and can have a profound influence as they evolve.

Balanced combination is apparently imperative: Each form (and its realm) builds on its predecessor(s). In the progression from T through T+I+M+N, the rise of a new form depends on the successes (and failures) achieved through the earlier forms. For a society to progress optimally through the addition of new forms, no single form should be allowed to dominate any other, and none should be suppressed or eliminated. A society’s potential to function well at a given stage, and to evolve to a higher level of complexity, depends on its ability to integrate these inherently contradictory forms into a well-functioning whole. A society can constrain its prospects for evolutionary growth by elevating a single form to primacy — as appears to be a tendency at times in market-mad America.

Each form also seems to be triggered by major societal changes in communications. The written word enabled institutions, the printed word fostered regional and global markets, and the electric (digital) word is empowering worldwide networks.

Here is David Ronfeldt giving a 20-minute overview of TIMN.

You are social!

by

Here are some of the observations and insights that were shared via Twitter this past week.

@ChrisNahr – “Socrates would haunt discussion forums. And probably get banned for trolling.” – via @lemire

@nilofer – “In the Industrial Era, the unit of power = Organization. In Information era, power was = Data. Social Era, unit of power = Connection”

@MeetingBoy – “Boss asked for ‘some impressive-sounding stats to support my presentation.’ Decision first, then check the data. That’s how LEADERS do it.”

@montberte – “With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine.”

Five Whys – Business Plans Don’t Work – via @TimKastelle

Let’s take a look at some of the activities which are not being done:

  • The business is not validating who its customers are, what problems the product is solving, or how well the product is meeting customer needs
  • The business is not finding out which customers will actually buy the product, which distribution channels and pricing strategies work best, or whether the sales model will scale
  • The business is not revisiting the business plan in any way, or making any corrections as it discovers new information about its customers, its suppliers or the operational activity needed to generate revenue
  • The business is not controlling cash burn, or waiting to find out whether the business model actually works before committing itself to a series of execution milestones and sales targets

@JohnnieMoore – Hierarchy, innovation, disruption

I think innovation often eludes big organisations because they’re just too fat-fingered to pick it up.

I wasn’t there and can’t judge the difference all this made but I am struck by how easy it is to reinforce hierarchy in the name of constraining it.

@sjgill – The unexamined leadership program is not worth doing [I also came across a similar post on measuring the effectiveness of a leadership programme, by Paul Kearns]

Evaluation is not an option; it’s an integral part of the learning process. If you want a leadership development program to be more than entertainment and you want it to achieve learning that results in significant performance improvement, than you must evaluate the program and the organizational environment of that program.

@EskoKilpi – in the social workplace, there can never be just one “boss”

Thus, an individual always has many leaders that she follows. You might even claim that from the point of view taken here, it is highly problematic if a person only has one leader. It would mean attention blindness as a default state.

Following is at best a process of active, creative learning through observing and simulating desired practices. Leading is doing one’s work in an open and transparent way. Leading is engaging with people and being openly reflective. Patterns of recognition and patterns of communication are the most predictive activities there are in forecasting viability, agility and also human well-being.

Identity is a pattern in time. The individuals are forming in the social. You can’t add a social layer to what you do, or to your IT-systems – you are social!

Victorian Family socializing at the Beach
On the Shores of Bognor Regis by Alexander M. Rossi

It’s all about networks

by

It’s all about networks. Understanding networks that is. This is the shift our organizations, institutions, and society must make in order to thrive in an always-on, interconnected world.

Changing the mechanistic mindset: Work is changing as we get more connected. The old ways of organizing work are becoming obsolete, as 84% of workers in the US planned to change their jobs in 2011. Workers want out, in spite of a lacklustre economy. We are seeing mass, decentralized and social movements that confront existing hierarchies, politically and in the workplace. The uprisings in North Africa were good attention getters. There is no normal. All our institutions are facing the challenges of always-on connectedness and the need to adapt to Internet time. Social media are just the current tip of the Internet iceberg, making work relationships much more complex. Workers do have to step up, but they also need the tools and authority. Encouraging workplace practices like personal knowledge management is a start.

It’s the network: Thinking like a node in a network and not as a position in a hierarchy is the first mental shift that’s required to move to a collaborative enterprise. Nurturing Creativity is now a management responsibility. The old traits of the industrial/information worker were Intellect, Diligence, and Obedience. The new traits of the collaborative worker are Passion, Creativity, and Initiative. These cannot be commoditized. People cannot be creative on demand. The collaborative enterprise requires looser hierarchies and stronger networks.

Network Thinking: One major challenge in helping organizations improve collaboration and knowledge-sharing is getting people to see themselves as nodes in various networks, with different types of relationships between them.

Network Walking: One way to convince managers of the importance of network thinking is to force them to connect with their networks by getting out of their offices, physically and virtually. It’s not a question of what keeps managers awake at night, it’s what can we do to make sure they are awake to their networks during the day. Go for a walk.

Finally, this RSA Animate video provides an excellent overview of the power of networks and the challenge of mapping an increasingly complex world. It’s well worth watching.

Fostering connections by letting go

by

IBM just published its 2012 Global CEO Study: Leading through Connections.

The IBM study shows that CEOs and the companies they manage must constantly evolve to stay competitive. Partners, suppliers, employees and customers want CEOs to communicate with them on a personal level to build trust and to help align them to the organization’s strategy. There is a lot at stake here. —Mark Fidelman in Forbes

This report confirms what many of us have been observing, writing about, and trying to put into practice for a decade or more. For example, “They [CEO’s] simply expect unpredictability. For them, there is no “new normal.” This is why perpetual Beta is a constant theme here. It is a necessary perspective in dealing with increasing complexity.

“As CEOs ratchet up the level of openness within their organisations, they are developing collaborative environments where employees are encouraged to speak up, exercise personal initiative, connect with fellow collaborators, and innovate.” An essential part of enabling such an open organization is nurturing net work skills — the abilities needed for individual knowledge creators who are simultaneously collaborative workers.

“Across industries and geographies, CEOs consistently highlight four personal characteristics most critical for employees’ future success: being collaborative, communicative, creative and flexible.” Foundational skills that can foster these characteristics can be developed through personal knowledge mastery practices supported by social learning structures and emergent work environments.

“As CEOs, we need new ways of running the organisation – or more accurately, we need novel ways of letting the organisation run. —Shaun Coffey, Industrial Research Ltd.” Dealing with complexity means a focus on emergent practices, not looking back at best practices, which are already out of date. The “novel way” to run organizations is letting go of command and control and embracing change from both sides.

All CEO’s should have this cartoon by Nina Paley on their office walls.
coping strategies

Learning is everywhere

by

There are lots of “learning specialists” in organizations and they work for variously named departments. As learning specialists, I assume they are supporting workplace learning, so let me ask:

  • If I’m sitting at my desk with a work-related problem, can I call the Training Department to quickly get me up to speed?
  • If I want to learn about a new market sector, will the Learning & Development specialist help me?
  • If I need some coaching to prepare me for a meeting with a new client, can I call Human Resources to connect me with the right person who is available?
  • If I’m stuck on trouble-shooting an unfamiliar piece of software, can I get someone from Training to walk me through it?
  • If I’m looking for great examples of collaboration and social learning, do the folks in Training & Development model them?
  • If I want to become a better networked learner, can I call a Training specialist to get me started and coach me?

Learning & working are interconnected in the network era. If learning support is not connected to work, it’s rather useless. Learning is the new black — it’s everywhere, and that’s exactly where learning specialists should be. Net workers need more than advice (training), they need ongoing, real-time, constantly-changing, collaborative, support.

Sharing is good for all of us

by

When I was writing my Master’s thesis on Learning in the New Brunswick Information Technology Workplace (completed in 1998) I based a part of it on a framework developed  in 1991. The SPATIAL model looks at how the physical and non-physical attributes of the work environment influence learning. I had used the book available in the university’s  education library as my source material and then forgot about it. In 2008 I wrote a blog post about SPATIAL as I had found a digital copy of the article. Rodney Fulton, the author, even commented on my post.

This past week, Cindy Jennings asked about educational ergonomics on Twitter. I wasn’t quite sure what she was looking for, but I passed on the link to my 2008 post. Cindy sent me an email later and said, “this model is ideal for our purposes and I am thrilled to learn of it.”

This is the real value of narrating our work in public. If I had not written a blog post on the SPATIAL model, I would not have been able to easily retrieve it. If Cindy had asked the same question, I may have said to myself, “darn, I wrote about that during grad studies”. However, I put it in my outboard brain and I was able to help Cindy. Yes, folks, the network is more powerful than the node – share!

Image by @gapingvoid

PKM Workshop Introduction

by

My next Personal Knowledge Management online workshop is scheduled for 11-22 June 2012. PKM is also one of the topics for our social learning Summer Camp during July/August 2012. Here is a 10 minute video that covers PKM and gives an introduction to the workshop. It should help in deciding if this workshop is for you. Feel free to ask any questions. The last two workshops fostered some good conversations and I look forward to this next one.

 

"I will never stop learning"

by

Here are some of the observations and insights that were shared via Twitter this past week.

@gapingvoid – “Marketing is not mathematics. There are no solutions, only experiments.”

@gapingvoid – “I think Twitter alone is now a bigger cultural force than Hollywood; a fact the old cultural elite isn’t quite ready for.”

@RalphMercer – “the 4 horsemen of technology adoption: trust, curiosity, leadership and culture”

The Automattic (WordPress) company creed starts with “I will never stop learning“- by @photomatt

I will never stop learning. I won’t just work on things that are assigned to me. I know there’s no such thing as a status quo. I will build our business sustainably through passionate and loyal customers. I will never pass up an opportunity to help out a colleague, and I’ll remember the days before I knew everything. I am more motivated by impact than money, and I know that Open Source is one of the most powerful ideas of our generation. I will communicate as much as possible, because it’s the oxygen of a distributed company. I am in a marathon, not a sprint, and no matter how far away the goal is, the only way to get there is by putting one foot in front of another every day. Given time, there is no problem that’s insurmountable.

@johnstepper – “Every single bank I know recognizes that their collaboration solutions are inadequate”

When it comes to sharing information, banks are conflicted. They aim to enforce “need to know” policies and “only use bank devices for work” policies. Yet they also want to break down the silos and discover more cross-selling opportunities.

Which is it? Well, it’s all of the above. Yet, the combination of old tools combined with restrictive policies leads to a set of incoherent, inconsistent, and ineffective controls.

@MarionChapsal – Anyone Can Cook, says Chef Gusto. Can Anyone Present?

I believe, like Pro­fes­sor Max Atkin­son and like Chef Gusto, that any­one can learn to make deli­cious and yummy pre­sen­ta­tions!

Organizational Hierarchy: Adapting Old Structures to New Challenges – by @orgnet

The U.S. government is currently facing a dual problem in the intelligence community:

improve accuracy — WMD in Iraq?
improve agility — stop terror attacks
One of the solutions being discussed is adding a new formal position to the intelligence community. This new box would be an ‘intelligence czar’ to which all other intelligence leaders and their agencies would report. The thinking behind this proposed solution is for there to be one aggregation point for all intelligence. Node 017 in Figure 2 represents this new position.

@tomspiglanin – On using Twitter & URL shorteners

The best practice then seems simple. Paste a link directly into a native Twitter application to share it. If a blog site has a Tweet button that goes directly to Twitter with no additional link shortening/tracking (like the one immediately below), that’s essentially the same. At a minimum, post only a full link using your app or link shortener of choice.

Larry Lessig on Facebook, Apple, and the Future of Code – via @RossDawson

Much worse (and more frustrating) are the easy problems which the government also can’t solve, not because the answer isn’t clear (again, these are the easy problems) but because the incumbents are so effective at blocking the answer that makes more sense so as to preserve the answer that makes them more dollars. Think about the “copyright wars” — practically every sane soul is now focused on a resolution of that war that is almost precisely what the disinterested souls were arguing a dozen years ago (editor’s note: abolishing DRM). Yet the short-termism of the industry wouldn’t allow those answers a dozen years ago, so we have had an completely useless war which has benefited no one (save the lawyers-as-soldiers in that war). We’ve lost a decade of competitive innovation in ways to spur and spread content in ways that would ultimately benefit creators, because the dinosaurs owned the lobbyists.

A new view on lurkers

by

For several years, there has been a rule-of-thumb, called “90-9-1”, that 90% of online participation in groups/communities consists of “lurkers” or more politely, “passive participants”, and only 1% are active creators. Jacob Nielsen’s 2006 post on Participation Inequality provides a good overview of this phenomenon.

All large-scale, multi-user communities and online social networks that rely on users to contribute content or build services share one property: most users don’t participate very much. Often, they simply lurk in the background.

In contrast, a tiny minority of users usually accounts for a disproportionately large amount of the content and other system activity.

A recent BBC survey of 7,500 people shows significantly different results.

Here we see that passive lurkers make up only 23% of participants; active (intense) participants have increased to 17%; and there is now an “Easy” group in the middle who, “ … respond largely to the activity of others. This includes replying, ‘liking’ and rating, all activities where there’s little effort, exposure or risk.”

Perhaps the most interesting finding is that many early adopters, those who used to be active online, are dropping out and are classified as “passive”. I’m not sure if they are actually dropping out or have just moved on to other media and communities.

One conclusion I would make is that in 2012 it is now easier to get people engaged in online participation, whether for work or pleasure. This is the Facebook effect, which I have noticed since the service became mainstream. With a concrete model of what a social network looks like, people can more easily understand online communities. Of course, there comes a saturation point which many of us have faced as we add social networks to our lives. The YASNS effect [“Yet Another Social Networking Service” ~ Clay Shirky] is also becoming ubiquitous.

If nothing else, this report indicates that social media are making people more social online. The medium is the message, or so it seems.