The Flow Guide? is Live

Definition of The Flow System?

The Flow System? enables business growth by eliminating non-value-added activities by fostering an environment for innovation and the rapid delivery of value and shortening the time to market.

The Flow System? is a holistic FLOW based approach to delivering Customer 1st Value. It is built on a foundation of The Toyota Production System, also known as TPS and LEAN, plus a new triple helix structure known as the DNA of Organizations?.

The Flow System? provides an understanding of different methods, patterns, practices, and techniques that enable organizations or institutions to achieve their desired outcomes.

Introduction

After many late nights and weekends, and endless research and counsel from numerous luminaries and notable scientists, we are releasing version one of The Flow Guide?.

It is important to note that Lean practices such as the Toyota production System (TPS) are still valid, just as Agile approaches such as Scrum are still valid. However, context is everything. Flow does not usurp any practice, it brings them together with complexity thinking in a way that contextualizes them together with new leadership models.

Together with my co-authors and co-creators Professor John Turner and Brian 'Ponch' Rivera, we are pleased to present the this free body of work that we hope will enable organizations, and those that support and lead organizations, to serve their customers more effectively and protect the futures of those that work in those organizations.

The Flow Guide Official Website

The website is live, but bear with us while the developers iron out final mobile device issues in the CSS style sheets. There'll be a few silent updates as we find any unknown defects. Call this a good MVP.

Applying The Flow System?

The Flow System? is not, nor should it be, viewed as a prescriptive model or framework. The essential realization in The Flow System? is that the three helixes must be interconnected into one holistic unit at every level of an organization before reaching a state of flow. How one gets to this state of flow, however, will be different for each organization, large and small.

The methods, techniques, and tools presented in each of the three helixes are only provided as options for organizations/institutions to try to utilize. While some of these methods may work well for one type or size of an organization/institution, others may work better for different organizations/institutions.

The methods, techniques, and tools presented in each of the three helixes are contextual and primarily aimed at addressing complex problems and environments. These are different than current methods, techniques, and tools used today that mainly deal with simple and complicated problems.

Each organization/institution deals with different types of problems at various levels of complexity. The mechanisms they use to manage complex environments will most likely be different than those used by other organizations. The Flow System? presents several tools for organizations/institutions to experiment with for them to find out which ones work best for their contextual setting.

The key is for organizations/institutions to experiment with the various mechanisms in each of the three helixes until they find which methods, techniques, or tools work best for them. The result is for each organization/institution to be able to utilize a few of the methods, techniques, or tools presented from each of the three helixes for them to achieve flow.

The act of experimentation is essential for organizations/institutions to survive in complex environments. The Flow System? acts as a guide for organizations/institutions to focus on during these experimentations.

Opinons

There will be detractors, of that you can be assured, but to those we say ours is just an opinion, but one we think is valid. Time will indeed tell if we have interpreted our world sufficiently well to enable improvements to be made.

“Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.”

“Great spirits have always encountered opposition from mediocre minds. The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding the man who refuses to bow blindly to conventional prejudices and chooses instead to express his opinions courageously and honestly.”

Albert Einstein

What Next?

The guide is offered free to anyone who finds it useful. We are working with many people on training classes to cover the fundamentals of flow, as well as all the elements described in the guide. We have developed training modules and courses to teach the various aspects of The Flow System?and those will soon be available. We will also be producing learning resources online, and a YouTube channel is in the works as one of our options.

The University of North Texas (UNT) is also working on a new BA and MSc program based on this approach, and my co-author Professor Turner is leading this effort.

The self titled book of The Flow System?will be published in Q1 2020, and will be a deep dive into each aspect of The Flow System?. The manuscript is finished, so just the publishing hurdles to now navigate. I am proud to say many eminent people have offered forwards and endorsements already.

The The Flow Guide? will continue to evolve as The Flow System?itself evolves. Just as any complex adaptive system evolves so will this. As we test and validate more aspects of this approach, so will we evolve the thinking. Flow is fluid, and The Flow System? is a theoretical model designed to influence practice. It is not a one size fits all framework. There are plenty of them already in existence to choose from, and alas the description of them is wrong.

I hope that the effort we put into this work proves valuable, and that it is embraced and used where it is effective.

Acknowledgments

None of this would have been possible with the years of research by our co-author Professor John Turner. He is a deep expert in complexity thinking and team science, and leads team science at UNT.

I also want to express my deep admiration for my other co-author Brian 'Ponch' Rivera whose years of service in the US Navy as an aviator, and subsequent research and support of his country has contributed immensely to this work.

I have been fortunate to have known many huge minds over the years, and to have been given many opportunities to learn and grown. Many of those minds are still helping. Without those minds my contribution would have been less. To all of those people I say 'thank you'.

I also recognize the greatest learning of my career. TOYOTA!

Finally to those who believed, and continue to believe, you all rock!