Different perspectives

One of the cornerstones of a learning organisation is that the members of this organisation has a shared vision on the purpose of the organisation.
But are you sure that everybody understand the purpose in the same way?
The first step is to see the organisation as a dynamic open system, where are elements has to see the systems in different perspectives, in order to see what the real purpose is :be curious what the work of others is, what there mental models are, learn on what you didn't see, be reflective, change the structure and evaluate!
A example in the difference of perspective:

            A

B         W      C

             D      
-What is A,B,C,D seeing?
-What is where for all?

In this example A, B, C ,D are a group and not a system.To have a shared vision on the inner letter, A,B,C,D should be connected together by feedback loops in order to create a dialogue and learn from each other.
Be open-minded: by seeing things differently , you think differently!

Season Greetings

Season's Greetings and a succesful year 2013
Each end of the year,we make the intention to do better next year: more success in our professional life, more relaxation with our family, a better work-life balance, etc. ..
But our society is becoming more complex, with rapid changes and more uncertainties.
Therefore …. look 360 ° around you, see the world from different perspectives in order to discover the opportunities that will make the year 2013 a fantastic year.




 I wish you: a prosperous and happy 2013

Ides

Cooplexity

End of last year, I participated in a workshop on collaboration in complex situations , and how to move from a group of individuals to a self -organized team.

Based on my past experience , here is a story how in a manufacturing plant , a group of people was moving to a well organized team .

"The oil and gas industry , and special the drilling activity is a very complicated  process where uncertainty  is a major factor . Uncertainty goes from not knowing which geological formation the drill bit will encounter, with as result not knowing what the performance of the bit will be  compared to targeted performance .

Nevertheless, everything can be controlled now a day’s, so if anything goes wrong, small pieces of the system can be analyzed, corrected and the whole system will work again.
All best practices are written in policies and procedures. The whole drilling activity is a high tech mechanical process which is complicated , but easily controlled. 

In the Cynefin model  we are in the right segments of the controllable environment.

The main reason is , that it is a mechanical process, where human intervention and decision is minimum.

But the bit can be start to wear very fast ( due to change in drilling parameters, quality of the bit, formation)and stop to drill , before the desired target is met .This is the biggest uncertainty:you don’t know , when this will happen and why it has happen .Their is no time also to first examine the bit and find the cause ….what has to be done is to order asap a new bit and discuss with the design engineers.

That’s where the complexity starts: data has to be send overseas to the manufacturing plant, the design engineers has to be notified , material has to be ordered , bit has to be redesigned , bit has to be manufactured  and shipped back to the rig :the only certainty which exist is : it has to be for yesterday!!!

When you see the situation in the manufacturing plant , the situation is different :

-       First , the orders are coming from different customers, from different locations and are all other bit types.
S   So there is a very large product mix which are demanding different materials, different process times. The manufacturing processes have  also constraints: a limit of resources( labor time), availability of materials( inventory policies), and unexpected events like sickness and equipment maintenance.

At the same time there is no forecast , so there is a big uncertainty when the orders will come in and how much.

-       Also, each order has to be designed or standard models modified,and approval asked to the field for production.
      There is no certainty , that the bit will be approved or the order confirmed ,but engineering resources has to be used to design the bit and manufacturing processes in all cases.

-       The organisation is structured in departments:customer -service departments( 2 people), purchase dept ( 2 people), planning and work preparation (1), manufacturing engineering for making bill of materials  and routers( 2 people), engineering (5 people), manufacturing management ( 2 people).The availability of resources is very variable and only known by the department.

So , as described the environment is very complex by his complex communication-network, variability in order -income, uncertainty of resources and materials, uncertainty of payment , etc .

THE ONLY CERTAINTY IS THAT ALL BITS FOR ALL CUSTOMERS HAS TO BE PRODUCED IN MAX 8 WORKING DAYS!!( that is the customer request)

So, I will tell the story what has happened over the years and how we have evolved from a group of individuals to a team .

-      -  The different departments are sitting in ,an open space , dispersed in different locations. Sharing knowledge on what is happening can only by phone, running around  walking and talking in the corridors. The order is coming from the customer to the customer service department dept.They phone to engineering department, to gather information on the status of drawing, check materials availability with purchase and asked for a delivery date to manufacturing. Taken in consideration all this , a final date is send to the customer .So every department try to optimize as much as possible their needed knowledge, but without knowing what the other was doing , or what the overall issues were.

So it happened often , that delay’s were not communicated and  the system was going into a complete chaos .

-       - Next step was , that management was pushing to learn from each order .So every morning there was a meeting with the department responsible , where the issues of each department were discussed and also the status of the orders. Changes were announced, but there was nothing formal.

- More knowledge was shared by  interdepartmental meetings , visiting the shop, speaking with people and workers: we created a group of knowledge people.

-      -  The learning from each other was also increased by cross functional functions:Customer service, purchase , planning has been cross functional trained, to do if necessary , more than one function . the same with engineering, manufacturing engineering and planning.

-      -  The initial group, decided to formalize the meetings: all order status were put on a Excel spreadsheet, completed with information on material , manufacturing status, resource availability, etc :this has been best practices for a long time, and planning meetings has become more efficient .
-   - With the implementation of SAP, data gathering  was still better, and faster.

But still the objective was still not achieved , because the orders were still pushed trough the workshop , without knowing the issues in the blue collar system.

Therefore by applying leanmanufacturing technical, kaizen events were organized with the workers to better understand the issues.

- The same group of people , now together with  workforce decided to change completely the order system and launching system in the shop. Procedures and rules has been established, where variability could be absorbed easily.All members has been made aware of them, and responsability’s established for management of these rules.

- The result was that the blaming culture disappeared, and that there has been a total visibility of the planning system.The group had become a team , because they were focusing on the result and communication . As such every team member could participate  and organize themselves the planning meetings.

The excel spreadsheet  has been replaced by the SAP data, and a self-organized team managed by purpose , shared vision and rules.

By seeing the organisation as a whole , and not anymore a group of loose elements and functions we achieved a culture of  cooperation and self organizing , in order to achieve our common purpose . 

Excellence and holistic thinking

I have been out for two month's , for different reasons :
- First , preparing my next year business plan and preparing articles, workshops to support it .
- Secondly take a month holiday in one of the most beautiful landscapes in US : Yellowstone Park and the Utah Parks( Bryce, Zion, Canyonsland , ...)


 It has not been easy in 2012. A lot of people tell me , I have to focus more and be more specialized in one discipline.But by my education, and 37 year professional career as a business leader , I am a generalist .
In my previous organisation, I've always managed the whole and seldom focused on individual parts of the system and I have to say , that on the long term it has given sustainable results.
Also in my work related to systems thinking , I've seen that focusing on parts will give you in time unforeseen circumstances, and when not be prepared for it , difficult to handle.
So, am I wrong to be a generalist ?Perhaps , when only thinking to gain money yes, but to provide guidance for company's in order to gain sustainable results NO!
The below summary from a article "Excellence and holistic thinking"from Arthur Dahl has convinced my that I am on the right pad:
Here you have it:

"Our scientific and technological civilization has flourished by encouraging increasing specialization. The universal man (think Leonardo  da Vinci) has not existed since the renaissance.
 With the rapid multiplication of knowledge and the techniques for storing and transmitting it, the human capacity to absorb and use knowledge is rapidly saturated, so we end up by knowing more and more about less and less, compensating our increasing specialization with a division of labour among more and more specialists, with managers ensuring (hopefully) that everything fits together.
This is accompanied by a reductionist approach that assumes that if you know each part, you also know the whole.
While this may be true of machines, more complex systems like computer programmes, ecosystems and people show emergent properties that cannot be predicted simply from a knowledge of the component parts.

Many of the world’s problems today are the result of failures of holistic thinking.
- The economy ignores things that are not bought and sold in the market as externalities.
- New chemicals are discovered and used without consideration of unintended consequences, or even of what happens to them after use.
- The short term wins out over the long term.
-  The financial crisis was caused by an overconfidence in scientific tools of risk assessment for each financial product without considering the overall behaviour of the system.

 Many aspects of our unsustainability are due to failure to consider all the consequences of our economic activities and consumption patterns.
In today’s complex world, we can no longer afford the risks and failures that result from the compartmentalized structure of government, academia, business and most other human activities.
A capacity for holistic or systems thinking should be one of the basic goals of education, in complement to whatever specialization is relevant to the natural talents of each and everyone.
 We may even need to create the specialization of “generalist” able to integrate all the relevant domains of knowledge in a particular management context."

It doesn't mean , that we have to give up our specialisation or lineair thinking , but it should be in function of the whole and in function to create sustainable results.

Our scientific and technological civilization has flourished by encouraging increasing specialization. The universal man (think

Organisations as social systems

When I retired from my company , where I worked 37 years and the last 15 years as  business leader of the European Branch, I received from my employees and workers the most magnificent gift I could dream off: 150 people wrote their opinions about me.
Reading them , the tears were flowing because they were nothing else than congratulations,words of thanks and putting me as an example of their ideal boss: a people manager.

And so it is , managing and leading a company is leading people.....Leading the company as a social system.It's not easily, because still today company's are seen as dynamic organism, but where the dynamic is done by machines , rules, procedures and policies.

Because of internally and externally pressures, corporate leaders became aware of the need to take into account the concerns , interests and objectives of :
- first the people directly part of the system: workers, employees, customers, suppliers, subcontractors
- second the larger systems that contain them:society, legal systems, family's...
- third ,the purposes of the  different systems

For me , all members of the whole system were my customers which I respected by listening to them, sharing my experience , helping them to give solutions , helping by giving the resources for development. The corporate "shareholder", was fast replaced in my mind by the "Stakeholder"


We are living in a complex world, with a overflow of communication, fast changes and globalisation in all aspects. I want to give you some critical points, I've used to manage my organisation. I think there are also the critical skills of each businessleader today:

Olympic Complexity

I want to share this article about the complexity of the olympic games

By Chris Davies
The spectacular spectacular with which Danny Boyle opened the Olympics had many things to recommend it.  But alongside the dazzle, wit and downright eccentricity of the whole thing, there were two aspects of the opening ceremony that led me to reflect on the complexity of social systems.


The first was Boyle’s history lesson.  By selecting the Industrial and Information Revolutions as punctuation for his story, Boyle picked not only two great moments of British creativity (the former more than the latter, of course), but also two key periods in the complexity of human society.
By enabling previously inaccessible stores of chemical energy to be harnessed, the Industrial Revolution made possible an explosion in the diversity of production, which in turn made human society dramatically more complex.  Broadly speaking, what happened was: cheaper energy led to cheaper production, which facilitated greater diversity, which involved greater complexity; and this catalysed a substantial increase in living standards.

The digital transformation currently sweeping the world, stimulated in part by Tim Berners-Lee’s creation of the World Wide Web, will be similarly far-reaching in its effects; indeed it is already creating major policy challenges, as I described in a previous blog.  By reducing to almost nothing a whole swathe of transaction costs, the Information Revolution seems to be giving way to a second great wave of “complexification”.  It will do this by allowing us to combine ever greater numbers of components in complex social systems, probably giving way to increased specialisation, and unleashing greater levels of net wealth.  As I argued in my previous blog, this is likely to be net beneficial but we should be mindful of the pain involved.

Tim Berners-Lee

- The second aspect of the opening ceremony that spoke to complexity was a subtler one.  This was the message that achievement is a collective, systemic phenomenon, not simply the result of one person’s endeavours.  This may seem paradoxical in the context of something like sport, which is surely the very acme of individualism: what on earth does Usain Bolt’s ability to run the 100 metres in 9.58 seconds have to do with the broader social system?

Systems Thinking in Conflict Resolution

By writing an article on projectmanagement and systemsthinking I found a very good article of the Eastern Martial Arts , systemsthinking and conflict solving, which I want to share with you . (Published by Pegasus Communications)

By Judy Ringer
I teach Aikido—on the mat and in organizational training spaces.
On the mat, we take turns giving and receiving physical attacks, falling down and getting up again about a hundred times a night, disarming our partner without harm. We come to the mat for exercise, to study self-defense, and to practice resilience, self-control, and courage under pressure.
In organizations, participants come for similar reasons.
We do kinesthetic Aikido activities to gain insight into how what happens on the mat applies to conflict, communication, and stress in everyday life.
What does Aikido teach us?
Aikido’s first teaching is in the way it frames attack.
 The Aikidoist sees the attack, the conflict, as energy to be utilized—as a gift.
The beauty of this premise is that it changes the locus of power from an external to an internal source. We all encounter unwished-for events, people, and problems every day. To successfully manage these conflicts, we manage ourselves. When I experience conflict as attack, I resist, defend, or avoid. When I frame conflict as a gift, I am willing to engage, explore, and work with it. By changing my view, I change my relationship to the conflict.

Reframing our challenges as energy to be received and redirected into something useful is the first step. But how do we actually make this shift when our emotions are triggered? This is Aikido’s second teaching.
For example, think about a conflict in which you are currently involved. Imagine the situation in detail.
Now pay attention to your body.
What do you notice?
Do you become tense?
 Does your breathing or heart rate quicken?
 What emotions arise?

Complexe problemen hebben geen simpele oplossingen

Rusell Ackoff, een Amerikaanse prof aan de MIT business School in Boston was een guru in het systeemdenken , die zijn visie's en ideeën spiritueel en enthousiast kon overdragen ...soms wat ironisch maar toch "to the point".
Voor zijn dood in 2009 , heeft hij een boek geschreven :

 " Managent f-Laws-how organisations realy work"

Daar heeft hij 81 statements(f-laws)die in organisatie's echt gebeuren vastgelegt.Niet alles is zo reeël , maar toch zijn het triggerpoints om anders naar organisatie's te kijken en in te zien  wat er veranderd moet worden .
Elke f-law is ook gecommentarieerd door Sally Bib, ook een prof ,maar een gans andere tijdsgenoot( Russel was 89jaar, Sally 35), ander continent, andere ervaring en een vrouw.

Ik wil hier een voorbeeld aanhalen :

f-Law n° 80:"Complex problems do not have simple solutions, onlysimple minded managers and their consultants think they do"

De enige problemen die simpele oplossingen hebben zijn simpele problemen.
 Problemen die voorkomen in organisatie's zijn meestal het gevolg ven de interactie's tussen de verschillende delen van de organisatie's en nooit van één enkel deel: het is complexer en de oplossing ook.
Complexiteit is niet eigen aan het probleem , maar hoe je naar het probleem kijkt en wie naar het probleem kijkt .
Het is zo dat problemen van anderen meestal simpel gezien worden en onze eigen problemen meer complex.

Sally's antwoord hierop luidt als volgt , en persoonlijk ben ik het daar zeker mee eens:

De mensen zoeken eenvoud en simpele zaken : het is zo gemakkelijker !
Het is ook daarom dat we hedendaags alles voorgekauwd krijgen in bvb:
- 20 methodes om te vermageren
- 12 wegen om efficient te worden
- 10 factoren om succes te hebben
enz....
Business boeken , blog's, media zijn alle daarop gericht want het verkoopt.

Nochthans , zich buigen over complexe problemen, erover filosoferen , discussieren met collega's kan zo verrijkend zijn . verrijkend om het te begrijpen en zelf met een oplossing te komen.
Spijtig is er zo maar een kleine groep, maar door de sociale media wordt er meer en meer ervaring uitgewisseld.
Het  "quick en easy" antwoord moet meer en meer in vraag gesteld worden ,en bekeken worden in het grotere geheel:systeemdenken leert ons dat!!

Work-Life Balance

Last night , my son in law visited me with his girlfriend and we talked about there last travel , the work and what they were planned for next week .Like also in other discussion with other people , they were so worried about the time flying by, to have no time for pleasure, has too much work, so much to do , ......has to work late at night and difficult to have a family time .
In summary:to have a good life, a good work-life balance should be considered otherwise a burn-out was nearby.
When , there were gone I started to think  that the word "Work-life" is a problem:Looking as such work and life are separately and considered as two different closed systems, working undependable from each other.It implies that "work" isn't part of life!!
Work( your professional activities,) and life( your personal activities,:family, hobby) are elements of your life(your living, well-being).
Seeing your life as a system will help you to understand that the 2 subsystems(Work-Life)are connected and interrelated and that everything that happens in one system will influence and change the behavior in the other system.
Finding synergy will create a emergence property of happiness.
So don't act in boxes: don't try to optimize your efforts in work separately or optimizing your personal life.
Doing so you will create reinforcement loops in each sub-system, with after a certain time , a collapse as result:burn-out!

So how can you do this?

1.Think holistically:
 
Don't plan your career , plan your life.Don't manage your money, manage your life.

2. Don't think separate but integrate!!
Don't think personal and professional;bring them together as part of a system--your life
Think about them working together:the personal helping build the professional and vice versa.

This quote of Georges Bateson is a good demonstration of it .

Gregory Bateson A Sacred Unity Harper 1991 ISBN 0-06-250100-3 

A system, after all, is any unit containing feedback structure and therefore competent to process information. There are ecological systems, social systems, and the individual organism plus the environment with which it interacts is itself a system in this technical sense. The circumstance that the family as a unit came to be thought of as a system must lead back inevitably, I believe, to considering the individual as a system.
It follows that the ways of thinking evolved by psychiatrists in order to understand the family as a system. . . .The polarization of opinion then will not be simply between practitioners of individual therapy and practitioners of family therapy but between those who think in terms of systems and those who think in terms of lineal sequences of cause and effect. . . .
The basic rule of system theory is that, if you want to understand some phenomenon or appearance, you must consider that phenomenon within he context of all completed circuits which are relevant to it.

Strategic Thinking and Systems Thinking

Lately I've read a article from Paul Schoemaker:"The 6 habits of True Strategic Thinkers".I was pleased about the content , because a lot was in agreement with what I had done in my career as leader of a company.I was even more pleased about the similarity of strategic thinking with systems thinking...the only question is what is part of.
It's the story of the chicken and the egg , but who matters..the important is , that the mindset is the same.

Before discussing , these similarity's it's my humble opinion that strategic thinking is important , but also tactical thinking as well linear thinking (analyse ) is as important as systems thinking(syntheses).

Let's compare now the 6 Habits with system thinking elements:

1.Anticipate:

"Look for game changing information at the boundary's of your industry"
"Search beyond the current boundaries of your business"
"Build wide external networks to help you scan the horizon better"
A system thinker see his organization as an open system, composed of subsystems and elements , all in interrelationship which each other .
A system is dynamic.
Everything is influencing everything and the property of the system is more than the sum of the property's of his elements.You have to be aware that a small change in a element of relation, can have a big impact on the whole.
A System , has always a purpose.
Define the periphery of your system large enough ( but manageable)to have enough information to define the purpose and the external factors , which can influenced it .

2.Think Critically:

" Re frame problems to get to the bottom of things"
"Challenge current beliefs and mindsets
"Uncover hypocrisy, manipulation ...."
A systems thinker is able to open his mind  and to question his and others mental models .His communication is by dialogue, asking the right questions and  to have good listening skills.
He goes beyond the events and take the information of all stakeholders in order to the most objective story.

3.Interpret:

" Seek patterns in multiple sources of data and encourage others to do the same"
"Question prevailing assumptions and test multiple hypotheses simultaneously"

A systems thinker is using the data of a team , and is a team player.
He put the data in a Behavior Over Time scheme, which will give him behavior patterns.

4.Decide:

"Carefully frame the decision to get to the crux of the matter."
"Leave perfection to higher powers"
" Take a stand even with incomplete information"
A system thinker is aware of the system and  critical elements that causes the behavior . Because of the interrelationship between the elements , there is NO One cause.
Different leverage points will be tried out and the decision will be taken which one is timely the best , to achieve the purpose of the system :different scenarios will exist , because the system is dynamic.

5.Align:

"Foster open dialogue"
"Build trust and engage key stakeholders"
"Asses risk tolerances"
A systems thinker has a personal mastery to create a shared vision, even when views diverge.By open dialogue and to be part of the system is capable to discuss the different mental models and to define the leverage points for alignment. 


6.Learn:

"Encourage and exemplify honest debriefs to extracts lessons"
"Celebrate both success and failures that provide insight"
A system thinker is aware of time delays and unexpected situations , by taking decisions.
Long term perspective is as such as important as short term results .
A system thinker doesn't look after the guilty person of process, but try to understand which relationship causes the failure.


As you can see , there is a lot of similarity and the good point is , systems thinking can be learned!!








 

NLP and Systems thinking

NLP is a methodology for training, coaching and improving communication. 
It was developed in the 70's at the University of California (Santa Cruz), by founders John Grinder and Richard Bandler.

 They built further on the work of Gregory Bateson, Milton Erickson, Noam Chomsky and others.
 NLP practitioners consider NLP as an eclectic psychology, a partnership between different models and techniques of therapy and communication. 

Over time, more NLP was developed to be used in all personal and organisational disciplines, where communication is important. Robert Dilts, Stephen Gilligan can be named as a few key developers.

In summary:

 - The first generation of NLP is the work of Bandler and Grinder till the early 80's.

Focus was on the individual:cognitive brain skills and techniques at the level of behavior and abilities. 

- In the mid 80's  the second generation of NLP has been developed, with more emphasis between "myself and the other":the somatic brain at the level of values ​​and beliefs.

 - The third generation (around 2000) also deals with themes such as identity, vision and mission.It  is the larger view (system) which is important, with a focus on  inter-relationship of the parts of the system and their interactions

It also involves the larger systems such as families, organizations and cultures in the change.

Here we come now to the definition of systems and systems thinking:

The meaning of the word system is reflected in the Greek Systema, that "organic whole" means. The systemic view see system parts that are interrelated and also takes into account the quality and perception of the observer.

"A system is the whole  components which are connected to each other by a network of relations".

Systems thinking is a method to better deal with the complex relationship that exists between systems, their ecology and their components.People are part of larger social systems,but also the inner human processes and subsystems are systemically interrelated.

 For in the words of Robert Dilts (founder of Systemic NLP) to say: 

"As Systemic NLP Practitioners we are able to change the behavior of systems with minimal interventions, and  working at different levels: identity, values ​​and beliefs, ability, behavior and environment. 

And with "systems" we mean both people, their programs, their beliefs, their skills and the systems in which people move: social systems such as relationship, family and organization's. "

-  With NLP ,you convince people, you communicate better and you will reach your goals faster.

 - With systems thinking you will  create improvements with a strong leverage effect.

 Combine them to make a powerful influence on your company, team and people. 
Learn how systems (organizations, teams, employees) can be influenced and controlled with NLP and systems thinking. 

More influence with NLP:
With NLP you can discover what is going on in people as they communicate and decide, and how you can influence decisions. 
 You become more effective by taking over successful strategies and behavior of others . 
 And you learn how the interactions within an organization or team can be navigated.

More insight with Systems Thinking: 
 With systems thinking you dig deeper in  the dynamics of systems, companies, teams and events.
 Many people look only at behavior or events, a system thinker try to discover trends and to predict  such events.  
With systems thinking you dive deeper, you discover the cause of behavior or events and will understand and manage better the complex problems.

Conclusion:

With Systemic NLP you can:

    * Adjust businesses and organizations in a sustainable way  .
    * Better understand what clients and colleagues really mean.
    * See what intentions they have.
    * Create more support for openness and understanding.
    * Quickly get a grip on what people boaters.
    * Motivate people strongly.

Can ecosystems show how to fix the euro?

 Understanding economic crisis by systemsthinking.

The eurozone, like the rest of the world economy, is a complex networked system. That gives it properties economists rarely consider but which could help us understand the current crisis. New Scientist takes a closer look

What is a complex network?

Complex networks have many interconnected components which influence each other's behaviour. These changes then feed back on each other. A famous example is the numbers of predators and prey in a given environment, which vary in a complex interdependent way. The eurozone – the 17 countries that share a common currency, the euro – is similarly interdependent, with similar feedback mechanisms.

The below article  of New Scientist gives some explanation:

Briefing: Can ecosystems show how to fix the euro? - science-in-society - 10 November 2011 - New Scientist

Books on systemsthinking

A few good books on systemsthinking:(reference Pegasus-Janice Molloy

- Tracing Connections: Voices of Systems Thinkers edited by Joy Richmond, Lees Stuntz, Kathy Richmond, and Joanne Egner (isee systems, inc. and Creative Learning Exchange, 2010) Published as a tribute to systems thinking pioneer Barry Richmond, this book includes essays on the application of these tools in a wide range of settings. The introduction outlines Richmond’s important work on the eight critical systems thinking skills. 
- Business Dynamics: Systems Thinking and Modeling for a Complex World by John Sterman (McGraw-Hill/Irwin, 2000) The core textbook for learning how to apply system dynamics modeling to complex organizational challenges. Even if you aren’t interested in modeling per se, Sterman’s clear, well-written explanations of the core elements of systems thinking make it worth a look.








Systems Thinking, System Dynamics: Understanding Change and Complexity 2/e by Kambiz E. Maani and Robert Y. Cavana (Pearson Education New Zealand, 2007) Another comprehensive, practical introduction to systems thinking/system dynamics tools and concepts. This book includes a series of detailed examples for using systems thinking to diagnose complex problems and design robust interventions.


Limits to Growth: The 30-Year Update by Donella Meadows, Jorgen Randers, and Dennis L. Meadows (Chelsea Green, 2004) The most recent version of the influential system dynamics analysis of the impact of a rapidly growing population in a world of finite resources. Despite the grim prospects outlined through much of the book, the final chapter offers a sense of hope by proving guidelines for setting in motion a sustainability revolution.

NLP en Systeemdenken

Neuro Linguïstisch Programmeren en Systeemdenken

NLP is een methodiek voor training, coaching en verbetering van communicatie.

Het werd ontwikkeld in de jaren 70 aan de Universiteit van Californië( Santa Cruz), met als grondleggers John Grinder en Richard Bandler. Zij bouwden verder  op het werk van Gregory Bateson, Milton Erickson, Noam Chomsky en anderen.

NLP ontleende veel aan verschillende psychologische stromingen en taaltheorieën waaronder de hypnotherapie en gedragstherapie.NLP practitioners beschouwen NLP als een eclectische psychologie, een samenwerkingsverband tussen verschillende modellen en technieken uit therapie en communicatie.

In de loop der tijd , werd NLP meer ontwikkeld , om gebruikt te worden in alle disciplines , waar communicatie belangrijk is . Robert Dilts en Stephen Gilligan kunnen als enkele belangrijke ontwikkelaars vernoemd worden .

Kort samengevat:

-       De eerste generatie NLP is het werk van Bandler en Grinder tot en met het begin van de jaren 80.Concentratie was op één individu-het cognitieve brein-vaardigheden en technieken op het niveau van gedrag en capaciteiten.

-       Halverwege de jaren 80 ontwikkelt zich de tweede generatie NLP, met meer nadruk tussen mijzelf en de ander-het somatische brein-op het niveau van waarden en overtuigingen .

-       De derde generatie (rond 2000) houdt zich ook bezig met thema’s zoals identiteit, visie en  missie.Het gaat het grotere geheel bekijken ( systeem), met een zicht op alle interrelatie’s van de delen van het systeem en hun onderlinge wisselwerking.

Het betrekt ook de grotere systemen zoals, gezinnen , organisatie’s en culturen bij het veranderingsproces

Hierbij komen we nu tot de definitie van systemen en systeemdenken :

De betekenis van het word Systeem is terug te vinden in het Griekse systèma, dat “organisch geheel” betekent. De systemische zienswijze brengt dingen met elkaar in verband en houdt ook rekening met de kwaliteit en perceptie van de observeerder.

“Een systeem is een samenstelling van onderdelen die met elkaar verbonden zijn door een netwerk van relatie’s."

Systeemdenken is een methode om beter om te gaan met de complexe samenhang die bestaat tussen systemen, hun ecologie en hun onderdelen. 

De systeemdenker is in staat om systemische patronen te herkennen én deze te veranderen.

Mensen zijn onderdeel van grotere sociale systemen.

Maar ook de innerlijke menselijke processen en subsystemen staan systemisch met elkaar in verband.

Om in het in de woorden van Robert Dilts ( grondlegger van Systemic NLP)te zeggen:

“ Als Systemic NLP Practitioners  zijn we in staat om met minimale ingrepen het gedrag van systemen te veranderen door te werken op verschillende niveau’s:identiteit, waarden en overtuigingen,vermogen , gedrag en omgeving.

En met “systemen” bedoelen we zowel mensen , hun programma’s, hun overtuigingen, hun vaardigheden alsook de systemen waarin mensen zich bewegen:sociale systemen zoals relatie’s, familie’s en organisatie’s."

Met NLP overtuig je mensen, communiceer je beter en bereik je sneller je doelen.

 Met systeemdenken creëer je verbeteringen met een sterk hefboomeffect.

 Combineer ze om een krachtige invloed uit te oefenen op je bedrijf, team en mensen.

Leer hoe je systemen (organisaties, teams, medewerkers) kan beïnvloeden en sturen met NLP en systeemdenken.

Meer invloed met NLP

Met NLP ontdek je wat in mensen omgaat als ze communiceren en beslissen, en hoe je die beslissingen kan beïnvloeden. Je wordt effectiever door succesvolle strategieën en gedrag van anderen over te nemen. En je leert hoe je de interacties binnen een organisatie of team kan sturen.

Meer inzicht met Systeemdenken

Met systeemdenken doorgrond je de dynamiek van systemen: bedrijven, teams, gebeurtenissen. Veel mensen kijken enkel naar gedrag of gebeurtenissen. Anderen proberen trends te ontdekken en zo gebeurtenissen te voorspellen. Met systeemdenken duik je dieper: je ontdekt de oorzaak van gedrag of gebeurtenissen en kan deze dus gaan sturen.

Met  Systemic NLP kan je:

• bedrijven en organisaties duurzaam bijsturen
• beter begrijpen wat klanten en collega's écht bedoelen
• zien welke intenties ze hebben
• meer draagvlak creëren door openheid en begrip
• sneller grip krijgen op wat in mensen omgaan
• eigen mensen sterker motiveren
•  

Lachen en het systemische ervan

Zaterdag 5 mei , las ik op het briefje van onze scheurkalender dat het Wereldlachdag was.
Het kleine mopje onderaan deed me even glimlachen , maar het resultaat van lachen werd wel goed systemisch uitgelegd.

Eva: Adam, zie je me graag ?
Adam:natuurlijk !Wie anders?


We moeten met zijn allen méér proberen te lachen , want lachen is gezond.
Kinderen lachen gemiddeld 350 keer per dag, volwassenen daarentegen amper 15 maal.
Wie lacht , zet maar 15 gezichtsspieren in beweging.
Maar tegelijkertijd  worden de spieren in de buik ook aangespannen , waardoor de organen zachtjes worden gemasseerd  .Tijdens het lachen ademen we dieper en worden hartritme en bloeddruk op elkaar afgestemd.Het bloed stroomt sneller en transporteert meer zuurstof en voedingsstoffen naar onze hersenen , die op hun beurt meer endorfinen vrijgeven , hormonen die een prettig gevoel geven , pijnstillende eigenschappen bezitten en het teveel aan stresshormonen  doen dalen .

Twintig minuten lachen is even gezond als een joggingsessie van dezelfde duur.
Dus: "Have Fun in Everything you DO"

Waarom hebben we systeemdenken nodig voor duurzaamheid?

Om duurzaamheid beter te kunnen definiëren, begrijpen en beleven hebben we een andere perceptie nodig , die kan verkregen worden door de realiteit te bekijken als een systeem , waar alle delen met elkaar verbonden zijn en relaties met elkaar hebben .
Een systeemaanpak en systemisch denken leert ons de complexiteit beter te begrijpen  ,en zet ons aan te denken in relaties,connectiviteit en kontekst.

- De wereld , onze samenleving en de mensheid worden geconfronteerd met kritische uitdagingen omtrent duurzaamheid en maatschappelijk verantwoord ondernemen en samenleving.

- Duurzaamheid wordt beïnvloed door vele stakeholders en heeft verschillende aanzetpunten en dimensies:atmosfeer, water, land,energie, economie, sociale samenleving , cultuur , waarden ...enz.

- De verschillende pijnpunten , zelfs als die in tijd en plaats ver van elkaar liggen,zijn in verbinding met elkaar en behoren tot een systeem.De conventionele silo-aanpak volstaat niet meer om duurzame oplossingen aan te bieden .

-Interventies om duurzaamheid te bekomen , bestaan uit complexe terugkoppelingslussen , niet lineair oorzaak en gevolg en tijdsvertragingen.Resultaten zijn onvoorspelbaar!

- Zoals Einstein zei:"Nieuwe problemen kunnen niet opgelost worden met vroegere methodes.

- Waar de wereld dynamisch is, maken we steeds nog beslissingen met onze mentale modellen die bekrompen en statisch zijn .

- Door het korte termijn handelen en ge-isoleerde oplossingen aan te brengen , stoten we meermaals op weerstand en onverwachte verwikkelingen.

- We hebben een aanpak nodig , die korte termijn oplossingen integreert met lange termijn systemische interventies

Maar fundamenteel, hebben we een nieuwe wijze van denken nodig en een vernieuwing van onze mentale modellen , om onze oude paradigma's in vraag te stellen.

Personal mastery

"Look at a day when you are supremely satisfied at the end. It’s not a day when you lounge around doing nothing; it’s when you’ve had everything to do, and you’ve done it." –Lord Acton



Personal Mastery is described as the discipline of personal growth, competence and learning.
It's important to be clear , that it is not just skills and competencies, but it includes also spiritual growth and be able to see others mental models , and learn from it.
It means that we continually clarify what is important to us, and are able to see the complex world more clear.
People , with a high degree of mastery share some basic traits:

1. They have a strong personal vision and goal
2. They work with change
3. They feel connected to others
4. They live in a continual learning mode

Personal  mastery cannot be forced, but a climate has to be created to support it.The people has to be feel safe to create their personal visions , without fear.
Also ,learning plans , has to be developed with them and not pushed on them.
There has to be empowerment

Systems thinking will help with this by:

- Combining reason ( the brain) and intuition ( The hart, the spirit)
- Seeing the interconnectedness of events in the world
- Commitment to the whole

If managers live this on a continuous basis, strengthening of personal mastery will be done in 2 way's:

-It will reinforce the notion , that personal growth is valued in the organization
- It will be seen as a on-the -job training.

Meer winst door een holistisch financieel performance management programma

De snelle veranderingen in technologie, toenemende globalisatie, sociale media en “de wereld wordt ons dorp “, maken dat onze huidige sociale en economische samenleving  steeds maar complexer word.

Het is niet meer mogelijk onze organisaties te bekijken als geïsoleerde identiteiten , waarvan we de resultaten louter willen verbeteren door efficiëntie.

Heb je al eens volgende vragen gesteld?

      -      Hoe komt het dat ik niet meer winst maak, ondanks mijn verbeterde efficiëntie?

-       Welk percentage van mijn activiteiten geven geen contributie tot mijn financiële resultaatverbetering?

-       Welke operationele activiteiten geven geen toegevoegde waarde aan mijn financiële resultaten?

-       Welke operationele activiteiten hebben het grootste hefboomeffect?

Om deze vragen te beantwoorden is het nodig de organisatie holistisch  te bekijken als een open systeem en een lerende organisatie,.

1.     Een open systeem , zodanig gestructureerd, dat de interrelatie en feedbacklussen bijdragen tot de ultieme doelstelling van de organisatie of bedrijf, waarbij er rekening moet gehouden worden met alle invloeden ( interne als zowel externe) en alle stakeholders van de organisatie.

2.     Een lerende organisatie waarbij:

-       Iedereen overtuigd is dat alles aan elkaar verbonden is en door elkaar beïnvloed wordt.Effectiviteit staat boven efficiëntie!!

-       Iedereen overtuigd is dat het gehele, groter is dan de som van zijn delen , en dat door teamwerk de doelstelling voor het gehele efficiënter en effectiever zal bereikt worden .Geen isolatie meer!!

-       Iedereen de gedeelde missie en visie van de organisatie begrijpt en naleeft.

-       Iedereen zich ontwikkelt, naar zijn beste vermogen  om continue verbetering voor de ganse organisatie te bewerkstelligen.

-       Iedereen verantwoordelijk is voor zijn bijdrage aan de totale resultaatsverbetering van de organisatie

  Daarbij wordt dan ook systematisch de DMAIC methodiek toegepast met als doelstelling een continue resultaatverbetering te verkrijgen.

Besluit:

Een Financieel Performance Management Programma, gesteund op het DMAIC principe, zal door  het holistisch bekijken van de organisatie , de mogelijkheid geven om effectiever te werken in de operationele activiteiten , die daardoor een hefboomwerking creëren om betere financiële resultaten te verkrijgen .

Het Nieuwe Leren

In een vroeger (engelstalig )Blogartikel , sprak ik over het leren in organisaties en wat daarvoor noodzakelijk is.
Meermaals worden P.Senges "Fifth Disciplines " aangehaald als de 5 noodzakelijke disciplines om leren te leren , en tot heden heb ik nog geen betere richtlijnen gevonden dan deze.

Onlangs sprak ik met leraars uit het onderwijs over die disciplines , en ik was blij verrast dat ze onmiddellijk een nieuwe insteek zagen , hoe ons onderwijs in de toekomst er zou moeten  uitzien .

Tijdens een presentatie op Flanders Creativity , zei de volgende spreker(Dirk De Boe) het volgende  :

Dirk legt  hier duidelijk nadruk op 3 belangrijke veranderingspunten , waaruit ikzelf ( misschien wel niet impliciet) de 5 noodzakelijke disciplines van de lerende organisatie distileer.

- Systeemdenken :
Het onderwijs moet een open systeem vormen , die kan openstaan voor invloeden van buitenuit zoals industrie, samenleving , ander onderwijs , andere gedachten . Het leerpakket is niet meer vast , maar dynamisch en afhankelijk van de nood . 

- Gedeelde Visie:
Leraars moeten bewust worden , dat ook zij deel uitmaken van het systeem en leersysteem.Daar moet een visie zijn dat iedereen van iedereen kan leren , met wederzijds respect en erkenning van de hierarchie in het systeem.

- Mentale modellen :
Het onderwijs zien als een systeem, met een duidelijke doelstelling legt de geest open voor creatief gebruik van tijd , locatie, sfeer , enz..

-Persoonlijke ontwikkeling :
Het leren is ieders verantwoordelijkheid:leraars, leerlingen , ouders, amenleving , overheid.Het gaat niet enkel over aanleren van competentie's , maar ook het leren om mentale modellen te begrijpen en te verruimen .

-Groepswerk
De tijd van de leraar voor de klas is voorbij! De leraar staat tussen de leerlingen en kan een rol spelen als groepsleider en/of groepslid.
Hij heeft nochthans een belangrijke rol in het  bereiken van de doelstelling in de gepaste context.


Een nieuw leren in een nieuw onderwijssysteem is noodzakelijk voor de toekomst van onze kinderen.

Insight in people performances

Each organisation , and as such a team , has to be seen as a open system where the reinforcement and balancing loops between the elements give rise to a emergent property of the system.
This means that not every element has to perform to his maximum in isolation , because as such it can jeopardize the whole property of the system.
 Some people are perform below their individual capability, when operating in a context of a team.
this is not only evident in sport teams , but also in companies.

Let's take the example of a soccerteam ( exp in Uk and Spain):

Exciting games combined with supporter fanaticism result in high attendances, which attracts high media interest, which leads to high revenues for the clubs (and the league association), which allows them to attract the best players for top wages, which eventually leads back to exciting games.

Evaluating Decisions in the longterm perspective

I want you to share this article from  Jim Brumm( july 28th , 2009)

Here are three major considerations that we must keep in mind when we evaluate a decision with a long term perspective.

1.The first is sustainability.

The best plans and ideas, no matter how profitable, or altruistic, or wonderful they may be, are doomed to eventual failure if the processes driving them are not sustainable over time.
Long-term thinking and sustainability inexorably go hand in hand; they are the two sides of the same coin, and it’s the coin we should be using to fund our future. In practice, however, the question of sustainability rarely comes up when making decisions. Governments and elected officials rush into new policies and pass laws that will temporarily please their constituents and earn them some votes, or will give momentary upper hand in some political situation. Often they find that what they put into motion comes back to bite them, as when we trained and armed the Taliban to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan, only to find them years later using their training and weapons on us. We typically only question the sustainability of a situation when we realize—too late—that’s it’s not in fact sustainable.

Because of the worldwide Green Movement, sustainability is a concept that has gotten more attention of late. It’s bandied about in all areas of the social and business spectrum, from corporate marketing to political activism. But what, exactly, does “sustainable” mean? My sister, Susan Brumm, a writer who has covered sustainable farming methods in the wine and food industry, provided the best definition I have heard for the word sustainable. It’s very simple and elegant: Able to continue without lessening. I don’t think we can improve on that. It’s something you may find yourself holding up against decisions in your own life. When the decisions we make and the things we do and take for granted are looked at through the filter of this simple phrase, it can be a real eye-opener. Using that definition, the disconcerting fact that much of what we’re doing in today’s world is not sustainable is obvious to anyone who pauses and asks themselves, can this last? Can we keep this up indefinitely? Usually the answer is a big, fat no.

2.The next consideration we need to have at the forefront when making decisions is this: How will what we’re planning affect everything else?

There is a desperate need for whole-system thinking in our world. Naturalist John Muir pointed out that “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” Thinking beyond the boundaries of the immediate situation is vital. Like good chess players, we must do our best to think many moves ahead when altering any part of our environment, and try to create room for and ways to mitigate the inevitable cascade of collateral change which will occur. Often we behave like the man in the fable who climbs a tree and begins sawing off the limb on which he’s sitting. A passerby calls up, “If you keep sawing that limb you’re going to fall.” The man in the tree ignores this and continues to saw until he cuts through the limb and falls with a crash, thinking to himself, “That guy must have the gift of prophesy.” As you read this we are blithely sawing away at the limbs which support our entire culture and environment, and it doesn’t take a prophet to tell us that if we keep it up, we’re going to come crashing down. Many of our best ideas have turned out to be huge problems in the long run. A little foresight may have helped a lot to offset much of what we face today.

3.A third consideration is to be sure, when we’re problem solving, that we’re actually solving the problem, not just hiding the symptoms.

We often can see the problems and the bad results we’re getting but instead of trying to fix the root causes of the problems, which would often cost more, take longer, or require deeper thinking, we take the easier, short-term route and chase the symptoms instead. This sort of thinking permeates our society. Commercials on television show people suffering from terrible indigestion from eating poorly, then push antacids to relieve the symptoms, never for a moment suggesting that, I don’t know, maybe less pizza is in order? Insects are eating too many of our crops? Don’t promote biological diversity. Douse them with pesticides. Dissatisfied with your life? Don’t try to discover the underlying cause of your dissatisfaction, buy this new car or this new gadget instead. Can’t cope? Take this drug called COPE. It’ll fix the symptom, at least for a while. Nearly all over-the-counter drugs treat symptoms instead of causes. But, as my sister used to say, you don’t have a headache because of a lack of aspirin. When I was a kid there used to be commercials for a type of detergent that was supposed to be great at cleaning men’s shirt collars. These commercials showed distraught housewives upset and ashamed because their husband had “ring around the collar” and they were so happy to have this new detergent that would end their shame. When these commercials came on, my mother would yell at the TV (really), “Hey lady, try telling your husband to wash his neck!” Now that’s getting to the root of the problem.

Even if we honestly couldn’t have predicted the problems some of our decisions would create in the past, we can at least start now to honestly acknowledge that the problems do in fact exist and take measures to correct them. But too often we have in gotten so deep that fixing the problem seems worse than ignoring it; the cure scares us more than the disease. Many of the worst problems we face today are things that are so deeply intertwined in our economy that even the thought of changing them causes panic. We are so afraid of affecting the economy, of losing jobs, of changing the status quo or the balance of power that we will ignore something that is obviously going to blow up in our face down the road in order to continue to benefit in the short run. We pretend it isn’t happening and just pass it on to the next administration or the next generation. In therapy they call this denial.

Denial has become necessary for us to get up in the morning and go about our business as though everything is going to be okay. Because if we were to face reality, we would be forced to see that there are many, many things that demand our attention, things that are going to bite us badly when they reach the point where we can no longer deny them.
When it comes to facing the fact that we are rapidly approaching peak oil and a post-carbon world, that our environment is degrading faster than it can repair itself, that our obsession on growth and profit is unsustainable, for a long time we have been collectively sticking our fingers in our ears and singing, la, la, la…
In his excellent and funny book, Farewell, My Subaru, Doug Fine called this “the societal equivalent of not thinking about dying.” But our way of doing things is dying, and denying it won’t make it go away. The good news is that if we are willing to stand up together and tackle these problems head-on, we can solve them. We have the intelligence, the know-how, and the technology.

We just need to find the desire and the will.

Improved Learning Model

We know that our mental models or models of how we see the world , are formed by our values, convictions, life experiences and that they influence greatly our learning capabilitie's.
Our learning is still driven by our lineair thinking:
We just look at our personal results, like to be teached or trained by experts, don't share our knowledge, want to have control of our own competencie's, think that the sum of competencies of individuals will give the competencie of the team.....
In my career, and listening to others I know that in our complex world we live in today ,and in the future ,it is not the case .

How we have to go to a "new learning style"?


1. Systems thinking:

It start in our minds and we have to  realize that our world is systemic and that there is a causal relationship in all elements of the chosen system . We have to see , that the reality of events are driven by systems that are composed of elements (subsystems) in interdependence of each other and that the whole will give a emergent property that will be different as the sum of property's of his elements.
So will also the new learning system consist of interdependent elements which will form a reinforcement loop:
- Systems thinking skills
- Adapting mental models
- Communication
- Learning from others
- Personal development skills

2. Adapting mental models

All starts in our brains: by selecting elements of the environment we form our mental models.By seeing the whole instead of his elements, we can ask our self reflecting questions where the answers can open or reshape our mental models and seeing the reality more objective.

3.Communication

It's very important to communicate , what we have learned  and share it with others.We have to learn as a team and to give as much possible feedback. What we have received as answer to our communication will again be filterd and change our mental model .

4. Learning inspired by others

It is important to remember that no one solution is unique. Learning from others is asking for taken a step back and free your ego . It give elements to refine your approach in new elements to enrich or change the mental model.

5. Development skills

By this type of learning you will improve your personal mastery, so can start to see the patterns in behavior which will explain the event , situation of problem. those generic patterns are called in systemsthinking  archetypes, that are used to solve mny types of problems, and also interesting to use as a communication tool with others.

If interested to obtain that skill workshops and trainingmodules are published on
http://academy.ubeon.com/systemsthinking

De mindset van een ondernemer

Onlangs las ik een artikel over ondernemersschap( gepubliceerd door Alison Mars)die de belangrijkste denkpatronen van ondernemers beschrijft en hoe we dit innovatief denken kunnen aanleren .
Feitelijk is dit "ondernemend denken" volledig gesteund op de principes van systeemdenken , en graag geef ik hier mijn zienswijze over:

1.Creativiteit

Ondernemers hebben de kwalieit om de wereld anders te zien .Ze richten zich op de ganse markt en gaan na welke gaten in producten en diensten er bestaan , en zullen die gaten trachten op te vullen met de meest creatieve oplossingen .Door "what if" vragen te stellen richten ze zich meer naar de toekomst met nieuwigheden  dan oude oplossingen te gebruiken .Ze kijken meer naar de interactie's en relaties van dingen , dan naar de dingen zelf.

2.Wantrouwen  in data


Ondernemers zijn zich bewust , dat de waarheid niet enkel in data ligt. Zeker in nieuwe markten en met nieuwe producten bestaat er een zodanige interpretatie van data, dat voorspelbaarheid zeer moeilijk is.
Ondernemers beseffen dat het creeren van iets nieuw ,evolutionair is zonder zekerheid van de uitkomst.
Ze werken dan ook in een complexe context waar beslissingen genomen worden in de volgende orde:

Maken-testen-verfijnen !
3. Comfortabel met onzekerheid

Door het wantrouwen in voorspelbaarheid en analyses gesteund op data ( lineair denken ), is de werkcontext een van onzekerheid.Ondernemers voelen zich goed in die atmosfeer , omdat hun werkmethode  er een is van experimenten, revisies en testen .
Door het bekijken van het gehele en de relatie's tussen dingen , kunnen ze door experimenteren de juiste hefbomen bepalen om een optimaal resultaat  te bekomen .
Experimenteren is niet enkel een "trial and error", maar er is een openheid om met de resultaten volledig nieuwe banen te ontdekken .

4. Functionele nederigheid.

Ego's kunnen de beste ideeen vernietigen !Ondernemers begrijpen  hun mentale modellen (persoonlijk meesterschap)en staan open aan de mentale modellen van anderen.Ze begrijpen dat groepswerk de oplossing brengt


Kan iedereen dan een ondernemer worden ? misschien niet ! maar met tijd en oefening kunnen we zeker een shift doen van het lineaire denken naar het systeemdenken , dat ons zeker zal helpen in complexe situatie's waar onzekerheid een zekerheid is .