Tag Archives: thinking

The beauty of learning – nothing is wasted

August 7, 2013 Simon Black 5 Comments

The term ‘learning organisation’ first gained popularity in the 1990s and is, unusually in the faddish world of ‘management-speak’, one which seems to have endured. What is a ‘learning organisation’ and why try to become one?

An organisation that learns is best able to adapt. It finds out what works and what doesn’t and, most importantly, does something with that knowledge.

However, a learning organisation doesn’t just accrue information. Some organisations appear to be addicted to data – searching for the ‘facts’ before decisions can be made. This is NOT a characteristic of a learning organisation since it will cause one of two problems (or both): either the organisation will boil itself to death in trivia and noise and not pick up the important signals; or statically churn data without adapting – paralysis by analysis. This is not learning.

A definitive feature about learning is that it involves proactively seeking out knowledge; to make good judgements based on insight. If we want people in our team, department or organisation to start learning, then we should steer them towards good judgements based on insights from analysis. The statement ‘costs are out of control’ is an opinion. However, if we define costs and out of control, we can then test that hypothesis and progress in our understanding (Scholtes 1998). This requires new disciplines of thought. For Deming, part of this transformation is about getting managers to see themselves as experimenters who lead learning.

The Learning Cycle (adapted from Scholtes 1998)

A good way to represent this type of approach is the Deming Wheel (or Shewhart Cycle, as Deming labelled it) Plan-Do-Study-Act; the never-ending cycle of learning (Scholtes 1998). Deming called for a change from ‘opinions’ to hypotheses which we can test, understand and then apply to our work activities.

Scholtes explains the phases of learning. ‘Plan’ and ‘Act’ are the stages of developing and reviewing theories and hypotheses. ‘Do’ and ‘Study’ are about application – work and the examination of work and outcomes. The phases of thinking and doing are intrinsically linked.

“There is nothing as practical as a good theory”
Kurt Lewin

Once again – the impact of incremental change

July 8, 2013 Simon Black Leave a comment

In the light of previous sporting posts it would seem improper not to refer to Andy Murray’s historic men’s singles tennis victory at Wimbledon – the first by a Briton in 77 years. Can we link his achievements with ‘change and improvement’?

One key element worth reflecting upon is Murray’s level of improvement in the last 12 months since working with new coach Ivan Lendl. This period has seen Murray win Olympic gold and also achieve a first grand slam title at the US Open; an ascencion in the sport which culminated in Sunday’s epic Wimbledon final. Ahead of these breakthrough achievements, Murray’s quote following the 2012 French Open is notable:

“There’s not been one radical change. A lot of it is minor details. But if you pick 10 small things to work on and change, that can turn into a big difference.” Andy Murray

This reminds me of a previous post; British cycling coach Dave Brailsford applies the same philosophy in bringing his team to world-conquering levels of performance. They key is that these cases hold a common belief in learning and continuous improvement – they see significant change as a set of small, relevant (and often testable) improvements – working on the system to improve capability.

Change which is focused on these aspects enables you to influence your success; work on what you CAN influence in the reasonable hope that improvements will overcome the factors over which you have no control (like the weather or how well the other person is playing). More effective thinking like this may help our teams, our services, our performance, our generation of knowledge to become even better.

Covey, S. (1989) 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Simon & Shuster, New York, NY.

Deming, W.E. (1993) The New Economics, MIT CAES, Cambridge MA.

Juran, J. (1989) Juran on Leadership For Quality, The Free Press, NY

Change Principles, Myths

Metamorphosis: significant change requires energy

June 24, 2013 Simon Black Leave a comment

My son and I have been monitoring the frogspawn in our garden pond since April. It has been fascinating to see the tadpoles hatch, then grow into monstrous alien-looking aquatic denizens. Suddenly in the last couple of weeks they have started sprouting limbs, then their feet and toes have lengthened becoming mobile. Body shapes change, the tails shorten and a new form develops.

This is interesting stuff, but the biggest talking point in our family has been the observation that the reasonably big, fat tadpoles end up turning into relatively-speaking quite tiny froglets. Why is this?

Clearly the metamorphosis takes energy; the gut system changes the body shape of the animal, but all of the excess (most obviously the tail) has to be reabsorbed to fuel the transformation. The result is a smaller animal – but one which is much more adaptable, capable and resilient – and which, as it moves out of the pond, hunting and feeding, soon outgrows its original tadpole form.

The moral of the tale is, hopefully, obvious – with change, you don’t get something for nothing. If we want change to happen we need to expect an investment – to put something into the change.

Remarkably, however, investment in change does not primarily mean money and resources. Initially, the resources are within us.

What change certainly requires, as in the frog, is an investment by us – a renewal in our thinking
– and that takes EFFORT.

The effort is expressed in establishing new thinking, in questioning ourselves, in being open to new ideas (which stretch our minds or challenge our emotions), and in getting into new habits through practice.

Of course it is always easier to do nothing and sit on the proverbial sofa…

…watching the same problems occur again and again.

Still no ‘instant pudding’

June 3, 2013 Simon Black Leave a comment

In my first blog 18 months ago I mentioned that when we consider change “we should see things as a human system: people, the work that we do, the interactions we have with each other, the physical environment that we create and use. These are the routes to change.”

Don't go for the "quick mix-quick fix" — Don’t hope for the “quick mix – quick fix”

This is great because as humans we have the privilege of choice; we can be proactive and make things happen.

The down side is that this situation is by its nature complex – other people might not feel the same as us and may put up barriers or counter-proposals.

As a consequence, to make things change, we need to encourage people to change – or at least the people who have an impact on outcomes (note: trying to change people who cannot affect change is a sure-fire route to getting unpopular AND will fail to have impact in any event – so don’t make people the problem).

To encourage people to change we need to change their thinking, how they value people, how they understand why results occur, how systems work (or don’t work), how to distinguish between ups and downs, between real improvements and one-off blips in performance.

People may have an epiphany and see new ways to operate, other people may more gradually understand the need for a new perspective. Either way new thinking has to be embedded in our habits and ways of working and this usually takes practice.

This is consistent with Herrero’s (2006) suggestion that new behaviours are needed FIRST to support proposed changes in processes and systems.

Quoting his mentor Deming, Donald Wheeler tells us that “The [new] way of thinking – has to be cultivated. This will take both time and practice. There is no instant pudding. There is no shortcut.”

To effect change is to do it… and to keep doing it. To be the change … and sticking to it.

As Wheeler says “There’s nothing to it but to do it.”

Tell me – what’s your purpose?

May 2, 2013 Simon Black 3 Comments

To be clear about our work – namely, who we are serving, how to do the work, how to change, what improvement looks like- we need to be clear about one thing:

WHAT IS OUR PURPOSE?

Peter Scholtes was one of the clearest writers on this concept; for him, like Deming before, everything starts with purpose; “Without a purpose there is no system”.

Until we have clarity of purpose, all we are doing is completing sets of tasks. ‘Purpose’ should be embedded in our thinking about work, people and organisations.

Scholtes offers a very clear analogy to illustrate the importance of purpose:

“Cleaning a table cannot be a system until the purpose of the clean table is made clear. A table clean enough to eat on requires one system of cleaning. Clean enough to dance on requires another. Clean enough to perform surgery on requires yet another. Everything starts with purpose.

“What is your purpose?” is the most useful question one can be asked.

When thinking this way, work is transformed from being seen as tasks to carry out, to become a reason to do something which adds real value; a framework for making decisions and seeking ways to improve.

Deming, W. E. (1993) The New Economics for Industry, Government, Education, second edition. MIT CAES, Cambridge MA.

Scholtes, P. R. (1998) The Leader’s Handbook: A guide to inspiring your people and managing the daily workflow, New York: McGraw-Hill

Scholtes P.R. (1999) The New Competencies of Leadership, Total Quality Management, 10: 4&5, S704-S710.

Change Principles, Effective Meetings, Updates

Meetings – How can we reduce the “supertax” of work?

November 5, 2012 cdv 2 Comments

By Cindy Vallance @cdvallance

I closely follow the writing of Nilofer Merchant who is a thinker, independent author, and regular contributor to Harvard Business Review (HBR) on the topics of culture, innovation, and strategy and who was also recognised as one of the “Most Influential Voice on Twitter” last year by The Independent (UK). One of her recent posts has stayed with me. In it, she states:

“Inside our organisations, we ought to re-imagine meetings, because they truly are the supertax of work. If our goal is to create shifts, the role of meetings then should be about the dialogue around an idea so we can understand and learn together. Meetings should not be about regurgitating information that people could read at their own pace. They should allow space for us to hear one another and then to hear the distinctions of the ideas so we can discuss and ultimately learn what criteria matters to everyone — so a clarity of direction can become clear.”

My calendar, like many others across the University, is chock full of meetings. When I experienced a Blackberry synching problem recently, I somehow managed to lose the records of nearly all of my upcoming meetings. While I was momentarily tempted to use this as an opportunity to simply restart my work life with an empty diary, I knew the solution wasn’t that simple. I painstakingly (and with some help) manually recreated all of my calendar entries. So far, I have only missed one meeting and I just have to hope that I have caught the rest.

Last year, shortly after returning from the Change Academy residential programme, I wrote a blog series about the key principles that support a productive thinking environment and which form the basis for productive engagement in the work place including effective practices in meetings. The reality is that re-imagining meetings takes a commitment to positive values and behaviours as well as adherence to rigour in practice. However, while my previous blog series was about creating the right cultural climate for meetings, I didn’t focus in detail on meeting practicalities. Given how important meetings tend to be in our working life, sharing practical meeting considerations will be my goal for my next few posts.

What kinds of meetings work best for you? What tips do you have to share? Feel free to add your ideas and comments.

Change Principles, Excellence, Integrity, Leadership

Consistent thinking and values – the key to integrity

July 5, 2012 Simon Black 3 Comments

People may differ in look, make-up and role, but can still share a few, common, underlying values that last.

There is a growing discussion in our institution about the ‘values’ and the principles which we should use to run the organisation, make decisions and design the future. Few people would argue that ‘values’ are irrelevant – even politicians dare to refer to them when there is a moral outrage or a disclosure of unethical behaviour.

However as Edgar Schein (the man credited with inventing the term ‘corporate culture’) noted back in the 1980s, what an organisation says are its values are not necessarily the same as its ACTUAL values. This makes sense because in reality, organisations don’t have values – it is the people within them that carry and interpret values, on an individual or collective basis (probably both).

Actual values are represented in rules, policies, conversations and behaviours (including our decisions to ignore or break rules); these are the things which are followed by people on a day-to-day basis. Values may be stated or unstated, but because they guide the way people think and work, it is the actual, enacted values which most accurately describe the culture of the organisation (rather than the common wish-lists included on posters or corporate websites).

One challenge is to understand what those actual values are and then to decide if any need changing. The consistency and integrity of stated and actual values is not just a conversation topic; it has impact on performance and results. If we say we value innovation, then that must be reflected in the innovative way we work, the innovative services or products we offer and the innovative skills and mindsets of people that are recruited, retained, developed and promoted.

However, if an organisation claims to be innovative (or ‘encourages innovation’), yet has rules, sets budgets or makes decisions which are constructed such that they prevent or discourage people from innovating, it is clear that:

i) innovation is not a meaningful value at all.

ii) staff will be demotivated; a lack of integrity in ‘values’ creates cynicism and undermines trust.

iii) mismatches between ‘what we say’ and ‘what we do’ de-stabilises people, decisions and work.

To make matters worse, it is likely that points i, ii and iii combine, discouraging otherwise innovative staff even further, thereby making the organisation even LESS innovative than might have been the case had ‘innovation’ never been promoted in the first place.

This is why it can be so damaging if values and vision are addressed, discussed and promoted by an organisation without the full and consuming understanding and commitment of the leaders who wish to see them implemented. It can never be a paper exercise, because the negative the consequences are real.

So if we are going to talk values in our organisation, we need to do this with integrity and care – based on very clear thinking. If our thinking is muddled, our message will appear confused. Confusion runs the risk that our value system will be considered either unauthentic or ill thought-out; either of which reduces the credibility of what we say.

This presents several challenges. How do we make sure that the values we espouse are internally consistent (with each other) and how are the same values externally validated through our own behaviour (and shown to be authentic)? This might seem to be a significant challenge, but there is a silver lining:

If we see inconsistencies in values and behaviour that others see, by changing our behaviour and creating helpful, meaningful consistency, we will show that we are serious and this will influence other people, accelerating the change.

By working hard to fall behind clear values, and re-set the rules, policies, conversations and behaviours in the institution, leaders can have a big impact on culture. Some organisations have been transformed this way in relatively short periods of time.

Leaders need to develop a good ‘cultural radar’ and be aware of how people’s behaviours match (or do not match) the desired values of the organisation – and be ready to challenge where necessary.

With the correct thinking it is possible for Leaders to develop conversations with everyone about shared values. These conversations can occur in any meeting, or at set-piece events such as a ‘management forum’, a strategic presentation, a new-employee induction event, or at an all-employee ‘town hall’ gathering). Conversations should enable constructive challenge concerning how things work now and what might be an agenda for change. The change agenda should be set at a practical level, addressing aspects of service delivery, budget setting, recruitment and promotion, for example.

Everybody should be expected to maintain integrity in the way that they operate against the communicated values. This includes being courageous enough to challenge inconsistencies when they become apparent and having a healthy and supportive debate when new or unexpected issues arise to challenge our previous assumptions.

Integrity starts with ourselves, then flows out to others with whom we work; it builds trust.

Change and work: more misplaced assumptions

December 13, 2011 Simon Black 5 Comments

Conventional wisdom has tended towards considering change in the context of ‘programmes and projects’. However this approach does not easily lend itself to embedding change into day-to-day work. For example a common misconception is to use ‘training’ as a method to secure change, when other influences need to be addressed first. A second commonly ineffective method is to use ‘communication’ (telling people about the change), but this will have little impact in terms of real change. Leandro Herrero (2006) recognises this misconception and suggests that the most important focus should be on behaviours. Seddon (2005) emphasises that work behaviour driven is by a change in thinking; how we see what we do and why we do it.

The change of perspective is subtle but important; for example there is the misconception that “New processes and systems will create the new necessary behaviours.” Herrero (2006) suggests that instead it is new behaviours that are needed FIRST to support new processes and systems. If you change a system first, people will adapt their behaviour BUT it may not be the behaviour that you want – it will depend on a variety of other factors. If you s=get the thinking right first then the design of improved systems will follow.

This brings us to challenge a third misconception, “People are rational and will react to logical and rational requests for change”; often we are individually and collectively much more complicated. Instead, people’s behavioural changes only happen if they are reinforced; leaders need to walk the talk and be consistent in the way they prioritise, make decisions and use resources in line with the change they expect to see (Seddon 2005).

Part of this is to embed continuous improvement and a culture where change is expected – a normal part of work. This is change with purpose, seeking improvement (rather than change for change’s sake). This contradicts a further misplaced assumption that “After change you need a period of stability and consolidation” – on the contrary, we need a culture of continuous improvement, involving an on-going dialogue about what works and what doesn’t work and a mentality that makes things happen. Establishing these new behaviours as a routine means that momentum can be maintained.

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