Slow Change

Progress in learning organisations comes in its own time, at its own pace. Some folks might wish to see that pace accelerated.

“Be careful what you wish for, you may receive it”

~ from The Tale of the Monkey’s Paw

I share the belief of the folks in the Slow Movement, that care, concern for others, the building of meaningful connections and relationships – the bedrock of the learning organisation – is best tackled unforced and unhastily.

“The only thing for certain is that everything changes. The rate of change increases. If you want to hang on you better speed up. That is the message of today. It could however be useful to remind everyone that our basic needs never change. The need to be seen and appreciated! It is the need to belong. The need for nearness and care, and for a little love! This is given only through slowness in human relations. In order to master changes, we have to recover slowness, reflection and togetherness. There we will find real renewal.”

~ Professor Guttorm Fløistad

Where does that leave the frantic clamour for change in most organisations today? For the large part, I’d say it leaves it screaming into the wind. Forcing change faster than its natural pace makes no sense to me, bringing as it does a whole host of inevitable dysfunctions, such as stress, disassociation, and disaffection.

Better, I think, to take things as they come, to take careful steps, with maybe a tad of due consideration for progressing in the right direction.

And to take time to see each other as human beings, to encourage a sense of community, of a journey made together, not for the sake of arriving, but for the joy of the journey.

So, when considering the pace of change, would you be willing to fret a little less about seeing things happen faster, and become a little more comfortable with the natural rhythms and pace of events?

- Bob

Learning to Let Go

I’ve just come back from six weeks in Delhi, working there with around eighty people engaged in software development – mainly coding and testing – as members of a number of different product teams located in various other geographies around the world.

This post is by way of thanks to the Delhi folks for their hospitality, generous spirit, and humanity – and for helping me (re)learn a valuable lesson.

The Lesson Relearnt

The lesson in question is: people do not learn from hearing things.

I see my present role – of which my time in Delhi was but one example – as fundamentally about inviting folks’ curiosity and interest. No more, no less. In essence I am asking the question:

“Would you be willing to examine with me – or amongst yourselves – your current views and assumptions regarding the field of software and product development?”

Whether they choose to accede to the request or not matters to me – not because I have any agenda for them, but because my needs include making meaningful connections with people, and helping folks’ life become more wonderful. Given the amount of time folks spend at work, I can think of few better opportunities to pursue my needs. If people choose not to engage with my request, I respect that choice, even though I personally see it as a lost opportunity for all concerned.

Letting Go

So, of what am I “letting go”? I’m letting go of the need to be an expert. Of the need to have answers to their problems (I don’t even know their problems, really). And of the need to tell them all about how highly-effective software and product development works. As someone who has been examining my own views and assumptions of software and product development for the best part of forty years, I’m letting go of the idea that I can help people learn and grow by simply telling them things from my own experiences. Unless they ask. And they may not know that asking me is an option.

“We cannot teach people anything; we can only help them discover it within themselves.”

~ Galileo Galilei

Some years ago, recognising the dysfunctions inherent in telling folks things, I used to withhold information unilaterally – until I thought folks were ‘ready’ to hear it, piece by piece. Having learned from e.g. Argyris, Noonan, Kline and Rosenberg, nowadays I try to make it clear that, to the extent that I have any knowledge or information that might be useful to someone, the timing and manner of its sharing can be something on which we can decide together.

I suspect this notion of self-paced ‘pulling’ of information or knowhow is pretty novel to many people. And so I suspect that many may not connect with the notion straight away. At least, not in a way that they might immediately benefit from.

Summary

In summary then, in attempting to help folks have a more wonderful life at work, I believe that if I have any part to play it’s in simply being there, with them, giving of my full attention:

“The quality of our attention determines the quality of other people’s thinking. Attention, driven by deep respect and genuine interest, and without interruption, is the key to a Thinking Environment.”

~ Nancy Kline, More Time To Think

- Bob

Ambitions

Not in the sense of being ambitious, but in the sense of having some things in mind that I’d like to see come to pass. You might call that an agenda. Or some needs which, upon being met, might make my life more wonderful…

Whatever you choose to call it, here’s my list:

• An implementation of FlowChain. I’ve had this model rattling round inside my brain for years now. I see little prospect of someone else taking the necessary leap of faith and implementing it – although the Reaktor folks seem to have evolved something similar, independently –  so it’s down to me.
• An illustration of just how much like product development is software development. And an illustration of the value – and relevance – of applying decades of well-evolved product development practices to the betterment of software development and a business.
• A systems thinking approach to a) product development and b) (more ambitious) running a business. I refer to this as “Prod•gnosis“.
• Learning how practical all the above ideas really are, in the crucible of real life. And how much – and in what regards – they need modifying when they come into contact with the “enemy’s main strength”.

“No plan of operations extends with certainty beyond the first encounter with the enemy’s main strength.”

~ Helmut von Moltke

This is my agenda.

As I explained recently in my post “Introducing Rightshifting“, I have no desire to foist these things upon people. But (in the context of my new job) I HAVE been asked to bring my experience and insights to bear. And to “innovate”. The above list seems to be a start, at least.

And just in case you’re wondering about my motivation, it’s not all selfish. I’ve made no secret over the years about what drives my work: to see an end to the egregious waste of human potential happening in software organisations everywhere, today. I believe the above ideas, implemented, will contribute significantly to this aim.

If someone asked me what needs of theirs their participation might serve, I’d offer the following list of possibilities:

• The opportunity to learn lots of new things.
• A chance to master the art of software development (esteem).
• Making a difference. Advancing the art, illuminating the possible, and inspiring others.
• The prospect of much fellowship, positive stress, self-actualisation (cf Maslow) and  fun!

Am I an idealist? A dreamer? You may choose to make that judgement. Although such a choice (i.e. to judge) would make me feel sad.

“Observing without evaluating is the highest form of human intelligence.”

~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

So who’d like to join me on this journey? How do you feel about my agenda? What’s your agenda? What needs can we meet, together? What might make your life more wonderful? And how might we help each other?

- Bob

Further Reading

Prod•gnosis in a Nutshell – blog post

Product Development Flow

I’ve been seeing a lot of funny looks and blank faces recently. Although not unusual <wry grin>, in this case it’s been when answering the question “What’s your job title?”. My reply, for the record, has of late been “Head of Product Development Flow”.

I suspect that the terms “Product Development” and “Flow” both are causes for confusion and puzzlement. And I also suspect that the combining of them only compounds the bewilderment.

So, here’s my explanation of each term, and then of the combination, along with some minor digressions and mention of other related ideas, along the way.

Product Development

Some folks, myself included, use the term “Product Development” to describe the myriad of activities involved in taking an idea from e.g. a vague concept to a fully-formed design for a product. In other words, the elaboration (a.k.a. “development”) of an idea for a product into something that, once instantiated, is compelling enough that potential customers will be willing to pay money for it. Wikipedia happens to have an entry for “New Product development” .

Personally, I regard product development as not only the elaboration of ideas for new products, but also the elaboration of new features for, or variants of, existing products.

Aside: In the world of software and software products, the continual release of updates and new features is the norm, and happens much more frequently than the introduction of completely new products.

Whole Products

Few are the organisations that approach Product Development systematically. Fewer again are those that share Toyota’s practice of explicitly ensuring all aspects of a product design are created in a joined-up way. Toyota’s TPDS has the concept of the “Big Room” or Obeya, signifying their emphasis on getting all the various specialists necessary for creating a “whole product” design (in Toyota’s case, a design for a new product line) together in close physical and temporal proximity. This approach is, in part, what allows Toyota to bring complete new car designs to market – cars rolling off the production line and onto the road – in around 18 months, compared to GM’s 36 months (source: BBC News, 2007).

Flow

Flow (n): the movement of a product or service through the process which creates it.

In the context of product development, we might choose to modify this definition slightly:

Flow (n): the movement of the designs for a product or service through the design processes which create them.

And continuous flow:

Continuous Flow (n): The progressive movement of units of design through value-adding steps with a design process such that a product design or service design proceeds from conception into production without stoppages, delays, or back flows.

Operational Value Streams

There are many way of looking at a business, but the mental image I use most often in the context of Product Development is “business as a series of operational values streams” (cf. Allen Ward), where each such operational value stream’s business-as-usual consists of a bunch of people (often assisted by technology and/or machinery) adding value to some raw materials – and delivering units of product or service for consumption by the business’s customers. These operational value stream folks would use the product designs created by the “Product Development” folks to tell them how to manufacture and assemble the product(s), or in the case of a service, how to deliver the service(s).

See also: Value stream mapping

Note that in most businesses, organised around silos (a.k.a. functional departments) as they are, the value streams are notional rather than actually manifest in organisational policy. And their business-as-usual rather, erm, haphazard. The day-to-day (business-as-usual) operational processes (the way the work works) are rarely designed, per se, but rather grow up, like Topsy, over time. With much management tinkering.

Prod•gnosis

I’ll just drop a mention of Prod•gnosis in here. Prod•gnosis refers to my concept of having a “Product Development Value Stream”, responsible for the instantiation of each and every operational value stream within a business.

Typically, when a business first decides to launch a new product line, the product design(s) for the product line will be developed, and then these designs will be sliced-up, and stuffed into the various functional departments of the business, alongside the slices of current products. There will likely also be large gaps in the product design, due to an absence of “whole product” thinking. Various functional departments will have to rally round and (reactively) patch these gaps as they see fit.

For example, a Marketing department may be surprised by the imminent arrival of a new product line, and then feel obliged (to jump) to develop the marketing collateral for that new product line.

With Prod•gnosis, each operational value stream is the “whole product” for that product (line). As an integral part of the “Product Development”, all the operating procedures (processes), support and admin systems, interfaces to common “shared” services – such as billing or CRM systems – etc. are part of the design for the operational value stream in question. By “instantiating” this value stream design – by, for example, adding the people and equipment needed to “run” the operational value stream – the business has the necessary means to sell and support the product line in question. This instantiation can happen once, or maybe even several times in e.g. different geographies.

Aside: You may spot some similarities here to the model often used by franchisers.

Of course, Prod•gnosis is an ideal. But one which I suggest is entirely feasible to use as a model, and to “grow into” progressively, as the product development competence of the organisation grows and matures.

And just in case you’re thinking I’m making a case for a big, up-front deign of a new operational value stream – I’m well aware of the egregious dysfunctions inherent in BDUF. No, rather I’m thinking more in terms of a Lean Startup-like approach – instantiating version 0.1 of the operational value stream as early as possible, conducting experiments with its operation in delivering an MVP (even before making its 1.0 product line available to buying customers), and through e.g. kaizen by either the product development or – the few, early – operational value stream folks (or both in collaboration), incrementally modifying, augmenting and elaborating it until the point of the 1.0 launch, and beyond.

Product Development Flow

Basically, the idea of Flow – a fundamental concept in e.g. Lean Manufacturing, Lean Service, etc. – relates to the continual delivery of something of value to someone who wants it.

In Lean Manufacturing, it’s the continual delivery of product units – such as cars – to customers.

In Lean Service, it’s the continual fulfilment of service requests in response to demands from customers, a.k.a. “service users”.

And in Lean Product development it’s the continual delivery of (whole) product designs into the business, and thence – via e.g. the operational value streams of manufacturing or service delivery – of instances of those designs into the hands of the business’s customers.

So, pulling this all together: I use the term “Product Development Flow” to refer to the flow of new product designs into the business. The operational side of the business can then take these new product designs, slice them up (and patch the gaps) and stuff them into the organisation, to sell and support alongside existing products.

For businesses that embrace the idea of the “whole product”, “Product Development Flow” refers to the flow of new “whole product” designs into the business.

And for businesses that embrace the idea s of Prod•gnosis, “Product Development Flow” refers to the flow of (one or more instances of) complete new operational value streams into the business (in the case of new product lines). In the case of new features for, or variants of, existing products, it refers to the flow of updates to existing operational value streams. We can imagine we might like to do this incrementally and iteratively, in the Agile way.

Measures

We might choose to monitor the flow of each new product, whole product, or operational value stream – in terms of things like:

• Rate or speed of flow (in, say, throughput dollars/day, or function points/month)
• Lead time (time between a customer requesting e.g. a new feature and them beginning to use it)
• Cycle time (time, on average, between starting on the development of a new product or feature and the completion of that new product or feature i.e. ready for sale)

And we might also choose to monitor the flow through the product development process itself (the design of new operational value streams, or updates thereto):

• Rate or speed of flow (in, say, new operational values streams, or updates, per year)
• Lead time (time between the business requesting a new operational value stream or update, and its instantiation, ready to serve customers)
• Cycle time (time, on average, between starting on the development of a new operational value stream or update, and the completion of that new value stream or update)
• Process cycle efficiency (PCE – ratio of value-adding time to lead time)

Big Head

And as for the job title, “Head of Product Development Flow”? For me, it refers to a role with the responsibility for helping folks in the organisation move towards improved flow of new products and updates, new whole products and updates, or new operational value streams and updates, into the business.

To use an analogy, it’s a bit like the role of a master plumber: planning, installing and then overseeing the operation and maintenance of the organisation’s “concept-to-cash” pipeline. Making sure the pipework is fit for purpose, installed competently, continually adapted to changes in circumstance, and kept clear of blockages, scale and corrosion – so that “value” can flow smoothly, reliably and continuously from ideation at one end to satisfied customers at the other.

And what does “improved” mean? Ah, well, that’s a good subject for a future post.

- Bob

Further Reading

Lean Product and Process Development ~ Allen Ward
Product Development for the Lean Enterprise ~ Michael Kennedy
The Principles of Product Development Flow ~ Don Reinertsen
Lean Product Development Flow ~ Bohdan W. Oppenheim (pdf)
Sketching User Experiences ~ Bill Buxton

Introducing Rightshifting

I recently saw a tweet which read:

“Change is about the interaction of competing narratives, whilst change management aims to impose a dominant narrative on others.”

~ @aptviator

When I saw this I thought “Nooooooo”. Not imposition! I hope I don’t do that. Or rather, I hope people don’t perceive my presentations on the subject of Rightshifting and the Marshall Model as an imposition, or an exercise of dominance. Especially after writing much about nonviolence and nonviolent change.

But then I thought about it a bit more. And saw that maybe the tweet in question has some valuable insights to offer.

Looking back, I can certainly recall management consultants and change agent attempting to impose a dominant narrative on others – and in particular on their client and that client’s people. Generally (with complicity by management) in a coercive and violent fashion.

And I can definitely agreed with the first half of the tweet – that change is about the interaction of competing narratives – and moreover the memes and memeplexes underlying those narratives. With the Core Group’s narrative and memeplex generally winning out – however dysfunctional it might be.

I feel uneasy because I need to believe that folks have the freedom to both construct and to follow their own narratives.

“I’m interested in learning that’s motivated by reverence for life, that’s motivated by a desire to learn skills, to learn new things that help us to better contribute to our own well-being and the well-being of others. And what fills me with great sadness is any learning that I see motivated by coercion.”

~ Marshall Rosenberg

I’ve been making quite a few Rightshifting presentations to groups of people recently, and I’d hate to think I’d been inadvertently giving folks the impression that Rightshifting was the new party line. My position of relative authority – at least, as possibly perceived by my audiences – also compounds the risk that some folks may have thought they had and have little option other than to comply or agree.

So, for any of those folks that may be reading this, and as a reminder to myself to make things more conspicuous in future, here’s the kind of introduction that might make my intent clearer:

“Today I’m going to explain Rightshifting, and the Marshall Model. I find these ideas useful to help explain and understand what I see as the root causes of effectiveness – and Ineffectiveness – in today’s knowledge work organisations, both large and small.

“I’d be delighted to hear if anyone here has any alternative explanations – or even partial explanations – for organisational effectiveness. This would meet my need for dialogue, for meaningful personal connections and for learning new things.

“To the extent that the ideas I’m presenting here today meet your needs in explaining these things, please take, use and share as much or as little of these ideas as you see fit.

“I’d be delighted to hear in the future what aspects of these ideas – if any – you have actually found useful and adopted. And which have proven less than useful, or even downright unhelpful, too.

“And I’d also be entirely delighted if you folks would be willing to contribute further to the evolutions of these ideas, and in tailoring them for best fit in this organisation.”

“We should not expect an application to work in environments for which its assumptions are not valid.” #Goldratt #TPS #Lean #tocot

~ @goldrattbooks

- Bob

Further Reading

Beware Eumemics ~ Blog post
Who Really Matters: The Core Group Theory of Power, Privilege and Success ~ Art Kleiner

Business Doctrine

What is Business?

The US Marine Corps’ “Warfighting” Manual defines the Marines’ “doctrine” – what they believe about their “business” and how they approach it . The manual starts out by defining the context for the whole thing, War itself:

WAR DEFINED

“War is a violent clash of interests between or among orga- nized groups characterized by the use of military force. These groups have traditionally been established nation-states, but they may also include any nonstate group—such as an international coalition or a faction within or outside of an existing state—with its own political interests and the ability to gener- ate organized violence on a scale sufficient to have significant political consequences…”

To me, it seems eminently sensible to define what we’re talking about – “War” in this case – before we can productively start to define and discuss what we believe concerning appropriate means to go about e.g. Warfighting.

So too, it seems to me, is it sensible to define what we mean by “Business” before we can productively start to define and discuss what we believe concerning appropriate means to go about e.g. “running a business”.

Of course, war is about many things, and the definition in Warfighting focuses on just a few dimensions, to the exclusion of many others – those which may not suit the narrative of the Marine Corps or its political masters (such as the Myth of Redemptive Violence).

So too is business about many different things, many unspoken, some contradictory. And most organisations have their own shared narrative (aka mindset, memeplex) – often implicit – about the very nature of business.

Few indeed have been the business organisations I have seen where the fundamental topic of “Business Defined” is discussed, let alone debated.

Here’s just some opinions on “Business Defined”, from various sources:

“The purpose of business is to create and keep a customer.”

~ Peter F. Drucker

“The sole purpose of business is service.”

~ Leo Burnett

“Profit is not the legitimate purpose of business. The legitimate purpose of business is to provide a product or service that people need and do it so well that it’s profitable.”

~ James Rouse

“A business is a nexus for a set of contracting relationships among individuals”

~ Jensen and Meckling

And we might also accept various other interpretations of “Business Defined”, including the perspective of Art Kleiner and his Core Group Theory, and the idea that businesses serve a social purpose – to give people some place or “ba” in which to come together and be human.

Aside: Rightshifting takes the view that the purpose of any given business is more or less unique to a time, a place, and the people involved.

Doctrine

What do you believe business is for? How many of your colleagues share your perspective on “Business Defined”?

And how likely is it that – absent a consensus, at least within a given organisation – folks have any chance of meaningful discussions and decisions about the “hows” of the business in question?

How can we come up with a doctrine for our business, if we can’t even agree on why we all turn up for work every day? Are we doomed to all pursuing our various different agendas, milling around like a herd of cats?

- Bob

Further Reading

From Knowledge-Creation to the Perfecting of Action ~ Robert Chia
The Theory of the Firm – Wikipedia entry
The Nature of the Firm ~ R. H. Coase
Theory of the Firm: Managerial Behavior, Agency Costs and Ownership Structure ~ Jensen & Meckling
Concept of the Corporation ~ Peter Drucker

 

Nonviolent Change

Change initiatives, and their generally bigger cousins “change programmes”, almost always involve fear, obligation, guilt and shame. And start from a position of coercive violence.

Here’s a typical posture I’ve seen time and again in the context of organisational change both large and small:

“The company needs to make some changes to become more profitable. We judge you, you and you to be of the right stuff for this assignment. You will work on this change effort. Here’s a list of the changes we want to see. And here’s how we insist you should go about these changes. Do things our way and you’ll be ‘right’. Anything else and you’ll be ‘wrong’. If things go well you can hope for some minor level of gratitude and/or recognition. But woe betide things going badly (veiled threats or implicit allusions to the effect that you could be punished or fired in such circumstances). Actually, however things turn out, we’ll classify you all into various shades of right or wrong. Oh, and we also insist that you feel obliged to look happy and motivated whilst doing this.”

Do you see the violence inherent in this system? Walter Wink would describe this as a “Domination System”. Marshall Rosenberg might call it a “Jackal culture”:

“In Jackal culture, feelings and wants are severely punished. People are expected to be docile, subservient to authority; slave-like in their reactions, and alienated from their feelings and needs.

“In Jackal, we expect other people to prove their loyalty to us by doing what we want.”

~ Marshall Rosenberg

What’s Wrong With this Picture?

This posture inevitably provokes defensiveness, resistance, and counterattack. We often call this a “passive aggressive” response. Although outright aggression is possible, too. This posture impacts the morale and (initial) goodwill of the people chosen. It robs involvement and motivation, and induces a state of fear, insecurity and learned helplessness. Ultimately, it’s a key contributing factor to increasing the poor health of the organisation.

Yet it’s so much the norm that it’s beyond most folks’ imagination to even notice that there could be an alternative. Let’s take a look at just one viable alternative:

The Nonviolent Posture

“I guess you share some of our concerns about the future of the company. We have noticed X and Y and Z as signs that the company needs to make some changes to become more profitable. How do you feel about this? We feel concerned enough that we’d like to see a group come together to work on this. Who shares our view on this need (to become more profitable)? What need (purpose) would best align with your needs? What would you each need (request) to sign up to this group? If things go well we can all hope for things to be mutually more wonderful. If things don’t go so well, we’ll all see what we can do about it, at the appropriate time. Actually, however things turn out, are you willing to share in our choice to believe that everyone was doing their best?”

“How could this possibly work?”

“Isn’t this lunatic optimism run riot?”

These are questions which often follow as a common response to nonviolence in general, yet time and again nonviolent means have wrought unlikely (positive and beneficial) outcomes.

Aside: Note the general NVC framework in this posture: Empathy, observations, feelings, needs, requests.

In such a scenario as here described, a genuine posture of nonviolence offers the opportunity for everyone to have their needs met. And when folks have their needs met, they’re likely to feel engaged, hopeful, confident, excited and inspired, to name but a few of the positive emotions.

Of course, it’s a matter of personal belief as to whether such emotions are appropriate, and beneficial, in e.g. a business setting.

What do you believe? Which posture do you see as have more benefit? As having more chance of success? As more humane?

And under which posture would you flourish more? Which would best meet your needs?

Afterword

I chose to characterise both of the above postures in the context of an Analytic-minded organisation. This was both to make the idea more accessible to folks with that worldview, and to illustrate that even in such organisations, it doesn’t require a wholesale shift in the organisational mindset to begin using Nonviolent Communication in e.g. change initiatives.

Just for the record though, here’s the second posture recast in the context of a Synergistic-minded organisation:

“I guess we all share some concerns about the future of our company. Some folks have mentioned X and Y and Z as signs that we need to make some changes. Changes that might incidentally also help improve e.g. profitability. How do we all feel about this? I feel concerned enough to ask whether we’d like to see a group come together specifically to work on this. Who shares our view on this need (to do something, now)? What need (purpose) would best align with each of our own needs at the moment? What would folks each need (request) to sign up to this group? If things go well we can all hope for things to be mutually more wonderful. If things don’t go so well, we’ll all see what we can do about it, at the appropriate time. Maybe it’s not necessary to remind ourselves that actually, however things turn out, we choose to believe that everyone was doing their best?”

And, in a Chaordic-minded organisation, it’s highly unlikely that this conversation would ever even be necessary, as the need for change, the enrolment of people, and the whole nine yards, would be an integral part of daily business-as-usual.

- Bob

Further Reading

Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life ~ Marshall Rosenberg
Empowerment: The Emperor’s New Clothes ~ Chris Argyris

Nonviolent Employment

Since I’ve begun looking back on past experiences through the lens of Nonviolent Communication, I have come to see this philosophy as permeating many of the policies and decisions with which I’ve been involved over the years.

I’ve written most recently about a needs-based approach to managing projects, and the congruence of that approach with nonviolent precepts.

Only since reflecting on that post have I noted a similar nonviolent thread within the employment policies we had at Familiar.

Voluntary Assignment

“Accept the fact that we have to treat almost anybody as a volunteer.”

~ Peter F. Drucker

Everyone working with Familiar had the freedom to decide which assignments they wanted to work on, and which not. Folks could, at any stage (well, in practice at Sprint boundaries) opt in or out of working on something that was already in progress.

This meant that work had to be in some way attractive, literally. And yes, sometimes this meant we as a company turned away potential business because no one found it attractive enough to commit to working on it.

In NVC terms, if a piece of work did not meet someone’s needs, they were under no obligation to spend time on it.

Status

Everyone had the choice of how they wished to engage with the company. This meant they could consider what they needed – most obviously, in terms of security and continuity of engagement. The options ranged, in practice, from independent subcontractor, through contractor, employee and on to e.g. indentured serf.

And this was flexible, in that someone could change their status as and when they saw fit. In NVC terms, people could make direct, specific, and actionable requests as to the way in which they wanted to engage with the company, at any given time, contingent upon their needs as they saw them.

Compensation

Everyone was free to set their own rate or salary. At the time this was an idea borrowed from i.e. Semco and St Luke’s and rationalised via Transactional Analysis. By which I mean that we wanted a community where everyone could learn how to relate to each other as adults. Who can know what someone’s income / salary / fee needs are better than that person themselves? Indeed, can anyone ever have even an inkling of the personal circumstances of someone else? If not, how could it ever be possible to meet those needs?

Kit

Everyone was free to choose their own equipment, supplied by the company if that’s what they wanted (needed). They were also free to choose their own development tools (editors, repositories, etc), hours of working, and place(s) of work. Whatever best met their individual needs.

Reflections

With the benefit of hindsight, I can see some close parallels between the policies we evolved at Familiar, and the precepts of Nonviolent Communication. I feel sure that these parallels – and in particular the almost accidental focus on folks’ needs, and their subsequent making of requests – contributed much to the wonderful working environment and sense of community at Familiar.

I believe too that the policies described here are the natural evolution of the basic idea that is McGregor’s “Theory Y” (not that we had any managers in Familiar).

- Bob

Further Reading

Open Minds ~ Andy Law
Sociocracy – Wikipedia entry
Holacracy – Website
Holocracy – Definition

Approaching Change

It can seem like there are almost as many options for approaching major organisational change (a.k.a. non-trivial Rightshifting) as there are organisations looking to change.

Indeed, when introducing Rightshifting to people, the second question they most often ask, once having grasped the basic idea, is: “How do we go about rightshifting, then?”. And in particular: “How might we go about effecting a ‘transition’?”.

I’ve listed hereunder some twenty three options presently known to me, either from personal experience, or from relevant case studies documented in the literature.

Deciding on Approach

The most interesting question for me, however, is not which option is best, nor even which option may be best in a given context or situation, but how best to decide which option to focus on, in any given instance. This seems a specific case of the more general issue of Focus, about which I wrote a post some months ago.

In other words, how we choose to go about making our selection (of approach) is at least as important as the approach eventually selected.

Are the options listed here mutually exclusive? Not at all. I can envisage some of them complementing each other nicely. But that does not detract from the aforementioned need for focus, and the benefits of a clear focus on just one (main) approach.

And even before spending time on deciding which approach might suit best, I’d want to understand the purpose of the proposed change effort (along with the purpose of the organisation in question). Something along the lines of OODA.

Agency and Engagement

Aside: I believe organisational change has more chance to go well, and has more chance for sustainability, when folks across the whole organisation have the opportunity to get involved and contribute. This applies as much to the choice of approach as it does to the day-to-day work of change within the chosen approach. See: Sense of Agency.

And let’s not overlook the fact that, for transitions in particular, we’re talking about change involving the wholesale replacement of one memeplex for another – involving the organisation-wide adoption of a host of new and counter-intuitive “truths”.

“It’s hard to teach counter-intuitive truths by explanation.”

~ Taiichi Ohno

You might like to see a short animation of this perspective.

And once we have decided on a specific approach, it might be well to consider how to continue to involve as many folks as possible. A recent blog post “The CI Vaccine” talks about involving folks in a Continuous Integration programme – I’d suggest the same issues apply in the context of more general organisational change, too.

Option 1 – Productive Dialogue first

This option places the development of an organisation-wide capability for productive dialogue at the tip of the spear. This may often require education, training and practice in basic dialogue skills.

Once a basic facility for productive dialogue has emerged, the organisation can then begin to explore what’s important, including perhaps these two questions:

Q1: “What is the purpose of this work, from the paying customers’ (end-users’) point of view?

Q2: “What measures will the workers choose and use to understand and improve their work?”

Option 2 – Get knowledge (with a view to changing the System)

This option presumes that knowledge of what’s really happening in the organisation is crucial to instituting effective change. To get knowledge the change agents might choose to:

• Go to the Gemba, accompanied by the managers
• Study the system (the way the work works)
• Understand the work
• Follow the path of PURPOSE – MEASURES – METHOD

Some more astute readers might recognise this option as, essentially “the Vanguard (UK) approach”.

Option 3 – Kanban

The Kanban option suggests we apply the principles of the Kanban method to organisational change:

• Make things visible
  (NB Consider the side-effects of this new transparency, especially re: salaries, etc.).
• Limit WIP
• Manage flow
• Make policies visible
• Improve collaboratively

Option 4 – Positive Psychology / Solutions Focus

This option places the principles of Positive Psychology at the tip of the spear:

• Asking “What’s going well?”
• Deciding “What should we do more of?”
• Posing “The Miracle Question” c.f. Solutions Focus
• Adopting the position that “People already have all the resources they need to achieve their goals”
• Following the precepts of e.g. P.E.R.M.A.

”If you want well-being, you will not get it if you care only about accomplishment [e.g. profit]. If we want to flourish, we must learn that the positive business and the individuals therein must cultivate meaning, engagement, positive emotion, and positive relations – as well as tending to profit.”

~ Martin Seligman

Option 5 – Coaching and Conversations

This option takes its cue from e.g. Sir John Whitmore’s “Coaching For Performance” (and, by implication, The Inner Game). This is centered around the acronym G.R.O.W:

• Goals (What are we trying to achieve?)
• Reality (Where are we now with respect to our goals?)
• Options (What options do we have?)
• Will (What will we commit to doing?)

Option 6 – Selling the Dream

This option pursues Guy Kawasaki’s advice as detailed in his book “Selling The Dream”. We might sum this up through the following quotation:

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.”

~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery

In the context of organisational change, then, this option suggests engaging folks emotionally in a common “cause”. I’d further suggest that things might go even better should the folks involved get to decide what their common cause might be. (Sense of Agency, again).

Option 7 – Capture the Flag

This is the “JFDI” option. Exercise authority (or build consensus), declare an objective (“take Hill 927″) and just get started on making some changes, and see where that leads. When it looks like it might be time to consider a transition, just make that happen, too. In a nutshell, then, this option argues for action over deliberation, and accepts the role of failure and evolution in learning and moving towards a new (and fuzzy, at the outset) “future state”.

Option 8 – Timeline driven (Context-driven)

This option represents the more traditional – in some ways – PDCA approach. I.E. Understand the current state (A), map a future state (B), and plan a path from A to B (whether iteratively or not being a moot point). In other words:

• Identify the prevailing mindset
• Decide (through leadership or consensus) on the desired rate of rightshift
• Schedule transitions
• Work from that timeline

Option 9 – Emotioneering

This option posits that engaging people (i.e. the workforce) emotionally offers a good chance for effective, sustainable change. If we see the workforce as “the customer” in this context, then this Steve Jobs quote seems apposite:

“You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work back toward the technology – not the other way around.”

~ Steve Jobs

And indeed, we could image an option 9a, where the (end) customer experience is the thing we identify first and foremost, and all other decisions and changes flow from the desire to effect (and then improve) that customer experience.

Option 10 – The Last Mile First aka Servant Leadership

This option encourages (even requires) the workers to come up with their own solutions, using the middle management, specialists, functions etc. as their resources, to “pull” support as needed.

For an example, see: In a Change Effort, Start with the Last Mile ~ Ron Ashkenas in HBR

Option 11 – Consensus

This option begins by exploring the possibility of building a consensus about what matters, and how to proceed:

• Is purpose important?
• What about consensus?
• And Dialogue?
• Which of the principles mentioned herein (see: at end) do we think count?
• And in what order (of e.g. significance, impact), if any?

We might choose to use something life World Cafe or Open Spaces to help approach the building of such a consensus.

Option 12 – Reference Projection / Interactive Planning (Ackoff)

See: Interactive Planning

“The best place to begin an intellectual journey is at its end.”

~ Russell Ackoff

Option 13 – Theory of Constraints

This option, perhaps the most developed, documented and widely-practived of all the options listed here, follows the path laid down by Goldratt in his Theory of Constraints work. In essence, this approach is predicated on the three focussing questions:

• What to change?
• What to change to?
• How to effect the change?

Theory of Constraints has a well-developed toolkit to help address each of these questions.

Option 14 – Scenario Modelling (Kahane)

See: “Solving Tough Problems” ~ Kahane, and Scenario Analysis.

Option 15 – Identify Needs, Quantify Objectives, Prioritise by Impact

This option is based on the approach of Tom Gilb as described e.g. in his books “Principles of Software Engineering Management” and “Competitive Engineering“. At its core is the idea of getting everyone on the same page with respect to what we’re trying to accomplish, through the use of quantification (expressing objectives in numerical or quasi-numerical terms).

Once most folks are on the same page with respect to the objectives, impact mapping can rank the sequence of necessary actions to achieve said objectives.

Option 16 – Kotter

This option uses John Kotter’s Eight Step change model, which he introduced in his 1995 book, “Leading Change”:

• Step 1: Create Urgency
• Step 2: Form a Powerful Coalition
• Step 3: Create a Vision for Change
• Step 4: Communicate the Vision
• Step 5: Remove Obstacles
• Step 6: Create Short-term Wins
• Step 7: Build on the Change
• Step 8: Anchor the Changes in Corporate Culture

Option 17 – Tribes

This option leverages folks innate tribal tendencies to turn them away from internecine strife and towards bonding together to compete with external competitors. This is explained in detail e.g Ray Immelman’s book “Great Boss, Dead Boss”.

Option 18 – Skunkworks

This option concedes that changing any non-trivial organisation in-situ may prove more disruptive, and more disconcerting to the status quo, than the organisation is prepared (sic) to tolerate or accept. Under this option, significant changes are limited to a small section of the organisation (either an existing or a new unit). This selected unit is kept at arms length from the core organisation, so that changes in the given unit (the skunkworks) do not affect (“contaminate”, disrupt) the status quo of the main organisation.

Option 19 – Pouring aka Phoenix

This option, like option 18, concedes that an in-situ change may prove more disruptive and more disconcerting to the status quo than the organisation is prepared to tolerate or accept. However, certain parties may be keen to see the existing organisation and its status quo die out over time, to be replace with a new organisation fulfilling all the function of the old, albeit in dramatically different ways. To this end, this option posits the creation of a new, empty “vessel” into which selected (suitable) elements of the old organisation are selectively “poured. This transfer of people, plant, market segments, etc, continues, at a pace dictated e.g. by events, until the rump of the old organisation can be disposed-of.

Option 20 – Organisational Health

This option places the health of the organisation at the tip of the spear. Patrick Lencioni in his most recent book “The Advantage” suggests that:

“The single greatest advantage any company can achieve is organizational health. Yet it is ignored by most leaders even though it is simple, free, and available to anyone who wants it.”

~ Patrick Lencioni, The Advantage

In his several other books, Lencioni has argued for placing trust and the development of (vulnerability-based) trust at the heart of any approach to change. Cf. The Lencioni pyramid from “Five Dysfunctions of a Team”.

Option 21 – The Enlightened Organisation

An option related to option 20, but focussed on enlightenment rather than mental health per se. You can read more about this in a post of mine titled “Zen and the Art of Organisational Enlightenment”.

Option 22 – Frame and Reframe

This option draws on experience and practice in both cognitive therapy (where it’s often called Cognitive Restructuring) and life more generally. This approach makes the phenomenon of frames and framing visible and explicit, and then builds on this new knowledge to identify the current frame(s) in which the organisation is operating/thinking. Then potential new frames are discussed, with the existing situation recast in those new frames (reframed).

Option 23 – Nonviolence

“Make things more wonderful for everyone, mutually.”

This option applies the principles of Nonviolent Communication, as laid out by Marshall Rosenberg in his book of the same name:

• Empathy
• Observations
• Feelings
• Needs
• Requests

Practically, in this approach we ask people how they feel (about their role in the organisation, the present, the future), and what they need from the organisation. From their needs we build (and evolve) a coherent collection of specific, positive, actionable requests, which together constitute a practicable, actionable agenda for our approach to change.

These agenda items can play the role of stories in e.g. a change backlog and maybe we can use e.g. Kanban to work through them systematically.

In this way we progressively evolve an organisation which meets the needs of all its stakeholders (cf Covalence).

Note: We might regard this option as a particular instance of a Therapy-based approach – and in particular a Client-centered Therapy approach.

Note: I’ve written more about this particular option in a more recent post.

Some Principles

Most if not all of the above options have some core principles in common:

• Obliquity
• Equanimity
• Donella Meadows’ 12 Points of Leverage
• Sense of Agency

How to Choose

Ah, well. That is the 64,000 dollar question.

I’m not going to pretend that I have a general, universal approach to the question of how to go about choosing one of the above options, in any given situation. You’ll probably not be surprised when I say “It depends (on context)”.

But I would say that choosing is as much of a challenge as, subsequently, effecting that so-chosen option.

Personally, I prefer to build a consensus, involving as many folks as possible in the choosing process. That way, by the time a particular option is selected, and the change journey itself begins, folks have already bought into the option – and the need for change. And embraced the chosen option as – at least, partially – their own. In fact, any one, or combination of, the above options are as relevant in the choosing as in the subsequent change journey itself.

What if things go less-than-well? What if the option we chose turns out to be not such a good choice after all? What if, in the light of experience, we find we might like to change horses mid-stream? I see this as feasible, and even probable. And made much less of a challenge if folks generally have had a meaningful part to play in the initial choice – and in the subsequent questions of “should we now change?” and “what to change to?”, too. You may even see – as I do – some parallels with the Lean Startup ideas, and in particular the idea of “pivots”.

Loose Ends

One thorny question is: What to do about new hires, folks who join the organisation after the initial consensus-buliding, dialogues, or whatever, has happened?

Another concerns the unintended consequences that naturally and almost inevitably follow when we try to intervene in complex, non-linear systems.

“Be careful of what you wish for.”

- Bob

Who Watches the Watchmen?

“Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?”

~ Juvenal (Satires)

No, this ain’t about governance, corruption, Leveson, or our drift as a society towards a police state (maybe another time).

Nor about the Agile community, and the question of who might hold all the pontificating bastards like me to account (deffo one for another day).

It’s about the comic series (and book, film) “Watchmen“.

“Series writer Alan Moore created the main characters to present six “radically opposing ways” to perceive the world, and to give readers of the story the privilege of determining which one was most morally comprehensible.”

~ Wikipedia

Ways to Perceive the World

There’s probably more than Moore’s six ways to perceive the world, and in the Marshall Model I’ve chosen to show only four.

Which of the six main Watchmen characters map to which four organisational mindsets? Not that there’s an obvious or direct mapping, but here’s my take on the question:

The Comedian

“He believes that humans are savage in nature, and that civilization can never be more than an idea.”

This reminds me of the Adhoc mindset, where there’s often a belief that organisation and discipline can never be more than an idea.

Doctor Manhattan

Harder to find a correspondent for Dr Manhattan. Given his affinity with technology and science and his tendency to “grow away from human habits and humanity in general” I might choose the Analytic mindset. But his superhuman powers, especially near-total clairvoyance, make the mapping less than satisfactory. And I’m saving the Analytic mindset for…

Ozymandias

A “child prodigy” – as so many Analytic-minded organisations are in their “youth”, he “learned the art of lying” in childhood. Like Alexander the Great, Ozymandias seeks to control the world by any and all means at his disposal. Sounds like a sociopath of the first order, to me.

“One of the worst of his sins is kind of looking down on the rest of humanity, scorning the rest of humanity.”

~ Dave Gibbons

Rorschach

“Rorschach sees existence as random and…this viewpoint leaves the character ‘free to ‘scrawl his own design’ on a ‘morally blank world’”.

Rorschach consistently refuses all compromise. It’s also interesting to note that Wikipedia suggests “he loses all faith in humanity”, whereas I see a different interpretation.

In any case, of the six main Watchmen characters, I see Rorschach as closest to the Chaordic mindset. Even his ever-changing black-and-white mask seems appropriate.

Night Owl II and Silk Spectre II

 Both of these characters are the “good guys” of the plot, with Night Owl II interested in technology and Silk Spectre II (at the outset) girlfriend to Dr Manhattan. Later she becomes the catalyst for Dr Manhattan to rediscover his conscience regarding humanity, albeit briefly.

They both have “difficult childhoods”. And both have more compassion and humanity than the other characters.

Accordingly, I’d say these two are closest of the six to the “Synergistic” mindset. Although they don’t seem to do much systems thinking.

Summary

How do you see these mappings working out? And at least as interestingly, perhaps, which character, which way to perceive the world, resonates best with you? And which way to perceive the world is most in line with your current workplace?

- Bob