Good that you raise the topic of culture organisations because over the decades many have tried to 'change culture' and mostly failed. The reason why, using systems thinking as a basis, is the recognition that culture is an outcome. Changing an outcome obviously means that the cause has to be identified and acted upon.
What is the cause of culture in an organisation? From those that study and research this, culture is primarily derived from the mindset of senior leaders. This can be identified when one leader is replaced with another, the result is often a shift in culture. And in many organisations, the mindset of leaders is predominantly based on Taylorism - scientific management. Understanding the organisation like a machine, with staff the cogs in the machine and managers adjusting those cogs from measures.
I have always insisted that machine metaphors are not helpful for making sense of organisations.
My own practice aims to use analogies from the complexity sciences to make sense of it.
I have moved from thinking in strict systems terms (‘Complex Adaptive Systems, or CAS) to the notion of making sense of the process of organising in terms of what the late Ralph Stacey called “complex responsive processes of relating”. “Culture” in that sense would be an emerging property of those complex processes.
Thanks for detailing your approach. In systems thinking the processes of organising have their roots in deeper aspects of their iceberg model - the mindset and world-views. And it is those roots that I go to. It works very well for me, and I do not have experience of your approach. I do know that Ralph Stacey was not using systems thinking, but more of complexity science, and a bit of systems dynamics. His approach to complexity itself is one that I partially share, except that I go deeper into the mindset/ paradigms nd wider into intervention theory. And I do not restrict myself to complexity itself, but look at how systems thinking deals with complexity.
My approach is also more to do with Argyris and Schon in terms of single and double loop learning.
I studied Complexity Science applied to “the social” specifically after I had been introduced to Systems Thinking in the early 2000s. I got involved with that community in the US and met some of the key thinkers there... tempus fugit!
I am interested in exploring how different ways of thinking can inform us about human interaction and what may (or may not) emerge out of that.
During the HiveConnect week, I will share some thinking on Organisational change based on Stacey’s thinking and my own practice using this model.
Good that you raise the topic of culture organisations because over the decades many have tried to 'change culture' and mostly failed. The reason why, using systems thinking as a basis, is the recognition that culture is an outcome. Changing an outcome obviously means that the cause has to be identified and acted upon.
What is the cause of culture in an organisation? From those that study and research this, culture is primarily derived from the mindset of senior leaders. This can be identified when one leader is replaced with another, the result is often a shift in culture. And in many organisations, the mindset of leaders is predominantly based on Taylorism - scientific management. Understanding the organisation like a machine, with staff the cogs in the machine and managers adjusting those cogs from measures.
I have always insisted that machine metaphors are not helpful for making sense of organisations.
My own practice aims to use analogies from the complexity sciences to make sense of it.
I have moved from thinking in strict systems terms (‘Complex Adaptive Systems, or CAS) to the notion of making sense of the process of organising in terms of what the late Ralph Stacey called “complex responsive processes of relating”. “Culture” in that sense would be an emerging property of those complex processes.
Does that make sense to you?
Thanks for detailing your approach. In systems thinking the processes of organising have their roots in deeper aspects of their iceberg model - the mindset and world-views. And it is those roots that I go to. It works very well for me, and I do not have experience of your approach. I do know that Ralph Stacey was not using systems thinking, but more of complexity science, and a bit of systems dynamics. His approach to complexity itself is one that I partially share, except that I go deeper into the mindset/ paradigms nd wider into intervention theory. And I do not restrict myself to complexity itself, but look at how systems thinking deals with complexity.
My approach is also more to do with Argyris and Schon in terms of single and double loop learning.
I studied Complexity Science applied to “the social” specifically after I had been introduced to Systems Thinking in the early 2000s. I got involved with that community in the US and met some of the key thinkers there... tempus fugit!
I am interested in exploring how different ways of thinking can inform us about human interaction and what may (or may not) emerge out of that.
During the HiveConnect week, I will share some thinking on Organisational change based on Stacey’s thinking and my own practice using this model.
If you are interested... 😉