Rapidinnovation -- A Room with a View

Observing Real Life Systems

To me, observing real life systems is something like this:

“A real life System comprises of a meaningful set of objects, diverse in form, state and function but inter-related through multiple network of interdependencies through mutual feedbacks enclosed by variable space, operating far from its equilibrium conditions not only exchanging energy and matter with its environment but also generating internal entropy to undergo discrete transformation triggered by the Arrow of Time forcing it to behave in a dissipative but self organizing manner to either self destruct itself in a wide variety of ways or create new possibilities in performance and/or behaviour owing to presence of ‘attractors’ and ‘bi-furcations’; thereby making it impossible to predict the future behaviour of the system in the long term or trace the previous states of the system with any high degree of accuracy other than express it in terms of probabilities since only the present state of the system might be observable to a certain extent and only a probabilistic understanding may be formulated as to how it has arrived at its present state and what would keep it going, thus triggering creative human responses to manage, maintain and enhance the system conditions, function and purpose and create superior systems of the future for the benefit of the society at large.”

Such a represenation of an observation looks quite involved. Perhaps it might be stated in a much simpler way. Most real life systems behave in a complex manner creating multitude of problems of performance and failures. But how do we get rid of complexity and uncertainty as exhibited by systems? We may do so by deeply observing the complex behaviour of the system to improve our perception to gain insights about the essence of the system; find out the underlying ‘imperfection’ that causes the apparent complexity and uncertainty and then find ways to improve the existing system or create new system and maintain them in the simplest possible manner. We do this by applying the principles of chaos, reliability and design. Surprisingly, the same process might be used to troubleshoot and solve problems we face on a daily basis. If done, we are no longer dominated or dictated by the ‘special whims’ of the system. 

The crux of the matter is how we observe reality and understand it so as to make meaningful choices as responses to life and living. 

CL - Experiential Learning

Experiential Learning through observation by linking actions to their consequences is simple and probably a natural way to learn anything. We do it all the time.

Conceptually, the idea is simple to understand. A child puts his finger into a candle flame and immediately singes his finger and feels the heat. He learns never to put his finger into an open flame. He learns this because his action and the feedback (unintended consequence of the action -- burning sensation) are very close by - almost instantaneous. However, with age he would also learn how to handle fire for useful purposes too.

If that is so, why people in industries and organizations have hard time learning? The reason appears to be obvious. Actions and feedback of consequences of the actions are separated by time and space challenging cognitive ability of a human being. Since the consequence of a person's actions might appear after a long time and may appear at a different place it then becomes unlikely for a person to connect 'actions' to their 'consequences' to make meaning and learn from his/her actions in a holistic manner.

Can't this simple yet effective method of Observation Based Experiential Learning experiences be designed & applied in industries and organizations?

Surely! The design would involve simulation of the job environment or engage people on an actual job where a skilled facilitator then links the consequences (either unintended or helpful) to the array of actions a learner is free to choose or employ. By linking the two (action and the consequences) learning takes place.

I would call this 'talent development'. Undoubtedly, such talent development within an organization not only helps the person but also helps organizations improve the 3 fundamental Ps -- Productivity, Performance and Profitability.

The video provides a demonstration of a successful Observation Based Experimental Learning experiment we designed for shop floor workers, which we found rather challenging.  The feedback of the consequences was given in their mother tongue (Bengali).

Needless to say that the learners were happy with the experience and so were their top bosses who initiated the program.

However, there seems to be three tricky issues in the design and implementation of such observation based experiential learning.

These are

1. The designer and the facilitator must be comfortable and attentive to handle the uncertainty that comes up in this process of self discovery.

2. The designer and the facilitator must have strong grounding in 'Design Thinking' and 'Systems Thinking'.

3. The facilitator must be well aware of the consequences of each action especially the unintended ones. That is a facilitator must be well versed with the possible 'failure modes' of a system under study and must also know how to provide the proper feedback in a manner understood by learners.

 

CL stands for Creative Leadership

 

 

Complexity, Shall We Dance?

There is an old saying in Bengal, which runs something like this: One person is insignificant; Two together make something creative/worthwhile: Three persons collaborating make things complicated: When four get together things turn chaotic.

Needless to say governments, parties, organizations, teams, communities, online communities are complicated and chaotic. So, what do we do? Naturally, organizations are always wary of chaos and therefore want to bring in order through rules, regulations, regimentation, hierarchies etc. This is the common way.

But even with all that in place, leaders still want to feel the pulse of their people, want to keep a tab on what is going on around them, listen to stories, build culture and many other things. How do they do that? 

They dance with Complexity as a partner. They keenly listen to its music. They follow its steps. They feel the passion and sense its self organizing movement. Then they either copy the steps of complexity. Or they take charge to lead complexity. Or improvize and innovate on the way. But in no case they try to overpower complexity or play rough or be sly about it or ignore it. They dance cheek to cheek with complexity.

Let us see how great and good leaders go about befriending complexity,  

Deep immersion to learn

Here Mr. Bill Gates and his wife are seen in one of the remote villages of Bihar, India. Both of them are now highly involved in philanthropic work in India. However, as expected, they know very little about the country and its culture, which they must learn so as to bring meaning to what they are doing. Hence, they immerse themselves in that learning environment.

In Bill Gates own words, "learning from partners and community members in Patna, Bihar. Incredible start to the day…"

And why in the world is he doing that? Could he not have asked his well paid people to do that for him? They would have loved to send him a detailed report complete with facts and figures supported by photos, videos and what not. Obviously that would not work for him. Human interactions are very complex in nature and that complexity can't be fathomed to any degree of reality without deep observation and learning through direct experience such as this.

Is Mr. Gates alone in such Observation Based Learning through deep immersion?

No, it seems that other great business leaders keep doing this on a regular basis trying to learn within a given context.

Here is another photo that shows Sir Richard Branson practically doing the same thing with his staff located at various offices.

Deep immersion to build culture

The idea is not to straighten out complexity. The idea is not to find order in the complexity or avoid complexity or formulate rules to bring about simplicity. The idea is to befriend complexity to grow and develop by learning from it through direct experience gained through deep immersion and observations.

This brings us to another idea: How do organizations build upon such direct experiences of learning? They can do so through sharing such experiences on a common platform for others to learn and develop on the ideas gained. We call this social learning which uses Enterprise 2.0 platforms to harness the power of complexity and chaos to drive the organization in a self organizing and may I add creative manner.

Best platforms are those which are run on this idea of building on observations, ideas, deep immersions and learning not those who focus narrowly on retaining the heirarchical structure of work as the meaning of work is now undergoing a serious redefinition, the most useful I find is 'observable work'. Such platforms enable Culture Based Design for long term sustainability of an organization.

We now have another name for it. Seth Godin calls it Idea Tourism.

And why would this be so important?

Because money hardly brings in good ideas to sustain but good ideas rake in a lot of money to progress and sustain.

So, we need not be afraid of complexity anymore. Complexity is our partner in our progress not an impediment. So,....

Complexity, Shall We Dance.... since the 21st century belong to the tacit. Or is it?

 

References

1. Culture Based Design

2. Evaluating E2.0 Platforms

3. Management Upside Down

4. Coconut Uncertainty

 

 

Observing from Antumbra space

What is the first step of learning?

Observation.

What is the first step of solving any problem?

Observation.

What is the first step of discovering anything?

Observation.

What is the first step of invention and innovation?

Observation.

What is the first step of designing?

Observation.

What is the first step of training our minds?

Observation.

This tells us why we need to observe. We need it for anything we do in life, if we want to do it well enough.

There seems to be no doubt about the fact that 'Observation' is a basic skill we need to use skillfully in anything we do. It helps us to learn, create, sustain survive, become wiser and enlightened.

But there are two more questions that need to be answered:

1) What do we observe?

2) How do we observe?

The answer to 'What to observe?' is not very intuitive. It is easy and difficult at the same time.

Why?

Nothing exists independently. All phenomena that goes on around us are interdependent on so many other things. 

Such interdependence creates patterns and relationships between different objects that determine the emergent behavior of any system.

What makes things more difficult is the element of uncertainty. We are simply not sure whether a particular relationship would emerge at a particular time under a particular condition. It then becomes a matter of probability. Under certain conditions and time it is highly possible that a pattern might exist or emerge. Hence it is also possible that it does not emerge at all. And it is also possible that the phenomenon might emerge simultaneously at different places (like vibration or wave or light or wear or heat or behavior patterns). This is a simplified understanding of System Emergence, which is a property of any system.

So, what we actually observe is the possibility or probability of various possible but inherent relationships between different elements emerging at different times under a various conditions. Such relationships are seen in form of patterns. Hence observation is the basic skill for pattern recognition.    

We can then express the nature of such relationships in form of equations, laws and principles like scientists, engineers and doctors do. Or express them in poems, stories, art like poets, writers and artists do.

What makes observations very difficult is that such relationships are always invisible. We have to apply our senses (or extend them through instrumentation) and our mind to see such invisible probabilistic relationships.

The other difficult question is 'how to observe?'

It is now somewhat obvious that we must observe in such a manner that we might see the possible relationships in form of emerging patterns clearly. It is also apparent that there must be at least two elements in the system between which a number of possible relationships can develop. So, to observe the relationship, which is our objective, we must not only see the elements simultaneously but also make the invisible relationship between them very evident and obvious.

To explain the technique the metaphor of an eclipse proves to be very useful. (refer: image)

In the umbra region we are too close to one of the elements. It is pitch dark and we can't see anything at all not -- denied of the faintest view. Obviously, this is a mistake to observe anything from this region. Surprisingly, we do commit this mistake too often in real life. We simply creep up too close to the object of our interest or we observe a failure too closely and fail to get any idea of what to do next. We simply don't see anything.

When we move to the penumbra region observation improves slightly but is still not very effective. Though we get to see parts of both elements we clearly don't see the relationship that emerges from the interaction of the two elements. So, we see the elements but not the relationship, which incidentally is the objective of our observation.

Things become quite different when we start observing from the antumbra region. It is here that we not only get to see both the elements of interest but also the relationship that exists at that point of time under certain specific conditions. We understand the phenomenon of an eclipse. We also understand that an eclipse is one of the possible relationships, appearing in various states that exists between the sun, moon and the earth. The pattern varies over time. And it is not happening every day of the year.

So the important conclusions that we may draw from our discussion on observation are the following:

1. Why we observe? -- To learn, understand, gain insights, become wiser, be illuminated and enlightened.

2. What do we observe?  -- We observe probabilistic relationships between different elements that appear in form of varying patterns at different points of time under different conditions.

3. How do we observe? -- We observe in such a way that the elements of a system and their possible relationship at a particular point of time and condition becomes evident. The

Antumbra space provides us the best possible view. 

This discussion also brings up the next important question: What to do after an observation is made?

Ref 1: http://rapidinnovation.org/general-theory-of-emergence-essence-imperfect

Ref 2: http://rapidinnovation.org/creating-operating-maintaining-systems-nature

Ref 3:Image of the eclipse taken from Wikepedia (eclipse)

Acknowledgment:

The use of Antumbra as a metaphor was suggested by Mr. Vlad Kunko during one of our playful discussions in the Design Thinking forum on Linkedin. Grateful.

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