Complexity

Complexity

the random organization

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“Post-industrial work is learning. Work is figuring out how to define and solve a particular problem and then scaling up the solution in a reflective and iterative way – with technology and alongside other people.”
“The future of work has to be based on willing participation by all parties, and the ability of all parties to protect their interests by contractual means.” —Esko Kilpi

This week I had the privilege of co-presenting a session on the future of work and the role of learning to the EMBA students at the Berlin School of Creative Leadership. Esko Kilpi told a story of visiting an Amazon warehouse and how tubes of toothpaste would arrive in a large crate and then individual tubes would be placed randomly throughout the warehouse, wherever there was room. Using RFID, the computer system knew where each tube was located. This random network of objects, instead of all similar types being grouped together, reduced order fulfilment time by about 70%. Esko explained that random networks are actually more effective at making connections. This reminded me of Dave Weinberger’s book, Everything is Miscellaneous.

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learning to create the future of work

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I recently wrote that when we look at the future of work, the loss of current jobs, and the effects of automation we should use a compass to guide us, not a list of what the jobs of the future may look like. These kinds of maps get dated too quickly. In preparing for this new world of work, policy makers and organizational leaders should look at how they can enhance self-determination for everyone: by fostering autonomy, competence, and relatedness. We are moving into an age of augmented work where much of the value we create is intangible, the knowledge we require to work is implicit, and most of this will be learned informally, outside the classroom.

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culture is complex

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I am in a rural village in France enjoying my last day here before heading home. This week was spent mostly in Paris, running a workshop and meeting with a few people. One of the frequent topics was AI: artificial intelligence, not actionable insights. I admit that I know very little about AI, but luckily I know other people who know a lot. My network helps to keep me informed.

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collaborating with the enemy

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Collaborating with the Enemy by Adam Kahane gives a framework of how to work with people you don’t agree with, like, or trust. Kahane developed it through his years of conducting collaboration workshops such as the Mont Fleur sessions to prepare for a post-apartheid South Africa. I read his first book in 2005, Solving Tough Problems, and his latest is similar in that it is short, to the point, and provides practical advice. It is based on some of the failures in his work and professional relationships from which he developed a guiding principle to always “look for disconfirming evidence”.

His framework is relatively simple to understand.

When two or more parties get together to address a problematic situation, they ask themselves a series of questions to understand their options. First they determine if they can change the situation. If so, can they effect change unilaterally, in which case they can force their solution. This happens frequently when governments ‘consult’ people who have no power to effect change.

If they cannot change the situation, then they have two unilateral decisions possible: adapt to what has been forced on them, or exit the situation if possible.

If they can change the situation but cannot effect change unilaterally, then it is possible that conventional collaboration can work, but only if the change can be controlled. This is the basis of a lot of collaboration interventions based on an assumption of control, which is often wrong. This is what Kahane learned through his failures. Even if the engaging parties agree to collaborate, other factors and external parties may subvert their actions.

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it’s not complicated – review

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“In times of change learners inherit the earth; while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists” —Eric Hoffer

A major focus of my work is getting people to think in terms of complexity and understand the difference between complicated and complex systems. I use the Cynefin framework as the main point of reference. In It’s Not Complicated, by Rick Nason, the Cynefin framework is never mentioned but it covers similar territory, namely that much of business is complex and we have, unsuccessfully, been using mostly complicated models and tools to understand business for the past century. As Nason states at the beginning of the book: “Engineers, scientists, and ecologists have been thinking in terms of complexity for fifty years, and it is time that the business community considered some of the valuable and interesting lessons the field has to offer.”

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self-managing for complexity

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“What processes will be effective in helping people to unlearn the disposition or stance that made them successful in the ordered domains of Cynefin?
How can they most effectively learn the skills required in the complex domain?
How do leaders start creating environments that support this transition – if we simply focus on training people, but the environment remains the same, nothing will change.
Many current ‘obvious’ environments are very compliance driven with rigid constraints.
In this transitionary phase, how do we create enabling spaces within these constrained environments?”
—Sonja Blignaut

Let me paraphrase what Sonja has asked. How can we prepare people to work in complex, and not highly ordered, work environments in which most problems are exceptions from which some emergent solutions can be continuously developed, learned, and shared? In a world of organizational compliance training, where following orders is the best practice, how can we get people to come up with their own creative ways of doing work?

This is pretty well what many executives are saying, if you read between the lines. They want creative and critical thinkers, but saddle them with compulsory compliance training. They want people who take the initiative, then create so many rules that there is little room left to even change what time people are at their desk. Even in work environments where workers have some flexibility many are still constrained with a job description, meaning that someone in marketing cannot decide to collaborate with another person in human resources, without getting special permission through a circuitous chain of command. I wrote about this the last time I had a JOB: a four-letter word.

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look for disconfirming data

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Adam Kahane hosted a webcast this week to discuss his new book, Collaborating with the Enemy. I thought his first book, Solving Tough Problems, was an excellent read so I attended. What follows are from my notes. The quotes are as I wrote them down and may not be Kahane’s exact words.

Kahane opened the session with an observation from his research that “collaboration is often difficult and painful and doesn’t work”. He described collaboration as the fourth option, usually after these three are discarded: adapt, exit, and force. It is often when forcing our position is not possible that we realize we must collaborate. Kahane cited the case of our relationship with the United States, in that Canada has no choice but to collaborate with the USA. Canada cannot exit North America, adapt its borders, or force its way with our larger neighbour.

Kahane stated that the conventional model of collaboration implicitly means control, it is constricted, and cannot succeed in complex situations when both parties do not want to collaborate. The book describes a process Kahane calls ‘stretch collaboration’. It is an open process and often makes participants feel uncomfortable as they lack control over what will transpire. Stretch collaboration is based on three fundamental assumptions:

  1. We are not one team or whole, and we have a multiplicity of interests. We have to embrace conflict as well as connection.
  2. We are probably not going to agree on either the problem or the solution, so the only way to find out is to try one step at a time, and to experiment.
  3. The only thing you can change is yourself.

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attractive prisons

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Today we hear a lot about models like holacracy and teal organizations that are focused on changing how we work together in organizations.

Teal organization: A new kind of organization designed to enable “whole” individuals (not narrow professional selves) to self-organize and self-manage to achieve an organic organizational purpose (determined not through hierarchical planning but incrementally, responsively, and from the bottom up).

Holacracy: The most widely adopted system of self-management, developed in 2007 by Brian Robertson. Authority and decision making are distributed among fluid “circles” (defined below) throughout the organization, and governance is spelled out in a complex constitution.

Podularity: A system of self-management in which each basic unit, or “pod,” is treated as a microcosm of the whole business and acts on its behalf. Podularity has its roots in agile (defined below).

Agile: A theory of management originating in software development. In an agile system of work, cross-functional, self-managed teams solve complex problems iteratively and adaptively—when possible, face-to-face—with rapid and flexible responses to changing customer needs. —Harvard Business Review 2016-07

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networked knowledge triad

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There are three structures that exist in all organizations, with three different sources of power, and three types of leadership required for each structure. This is the thesis that Niels Pflaeging puts forth in Organizational Physics.

  1. Formal Structure – Hierarchy – Compliance Leadership
  2. Informal Structure – Influence – Social Leadership
  3. Value Creation Structure – Reputation – Value Creation Leadership

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the arts in perpetual beta

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Next month I will be facilitating a workshop at The Arts in a Digital World Summit, hosted in Montreal by the Canada Council for the Arts.

Among other things, the summit will be a chance to share knowledge, mobilize – and possibly even incubate projects. We’ll consider our digital reality as an opportunity to:

  • develop innovative approaches
  • re-imagine how artists and arts organizations engage with citizens
  • seed collaborations within the arts community, and with other sectors.

It will bring together over 250 artistic and administrative leaders, digital experts, and strategic thinkers selected by the Canada Council to represent the vast diversity of the sector and to contribute to the testing and understanding of its new Fund for the arts in a digital world. The event will be by-invitation however many parts of it will also be accessible online.

My workshop is entitled The Arts in Perpetual Beta. This is how I describe the 90 minute session: We live in a networked world. Automation and connectivity are changing how we work and learn. How does the digital surround affect how human knowledge and creativity are shared? Join this workshop to discuss some key trends, understand knowledge networks, and critically examine the technologies we use.

I intend to focus on network thinking, machine augmentation, and the tetradic effects of technology. I’ll also talk about learning like an artist.

I would be interested in the perspectives of anyone working in or with the arts. I am especially curious how their work has changed in the past decade or so as a result of automation or connectivity.

  • Has the internet been a positive force for your art?
  • What do you see as major challenges to do your art or to get it known?
  • Do you have a generally positive or negative outlook on the future of your art?

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