The nature of organisational life forms

This article summarises recent learnings on organisational life forms, bringing together elements of chaos, evolution and innovation theory. It gets into some deep waters and is intended to be a reference to fuel future general articles.

Note: references denoted thus [REF]

Executive summary

Individuals, teams, organisations and organisational systems (including technological, biological) can be described as organisational life forms (OLFs).

Macroscopically, OLFs are best understood as a person making their way in a hostile world, wayfinding, sense making, updating their mental maps and models interacting with others

Microscopicaly, OLFs are best understood as a community of such people.

Spiritually/Psychologically, OLFs are best understood as people arranged one inside the other like Russian dolls (i.e. fractals), all chattering and exchanging information.

These three states are engaged in a beautiful maypole dance--or manipulative glass bead game depending on the circumstance--as they adapt to internal and external forces.

We must strive for viability of these OLFs at all levels while recognising that evolution and decay are natural. Ensure individual members are in multiple OLFs to strengthen the weave round the maypole. Intermingling encouraged.

Harold Jarche summarises the network era we now inhabit and how this changes leadership to something we all need to do:

And Richard Schutte adds the sense-making context, emphasising differences between our models produced as actors and a more distant undefinable objective reality :

Also some great points made here:

Note: while this is not a Covid article, it appears that self-isolation, home working etc. deconstructs pecking-order and hierarchies enough to usher in the flat network leadership model that Jarche describes.

Formal explanation

Organisational forms:

• Consist of individual members who are in zero or more organisational forms according the laws of Organisational Physics [OP] and can be described as organisational forms themselves
• are characterised as tribes, institutions, markets and networks [TIMN] aligned to the colour principle of reinventing organizations [RO]
• Exchange information i) internally and ii) externally including with other organisational forms and the environment
• are Negentropic [NEG], creating order rather than chaos ... and therefore living systems [LS]
• are both Homophilic-- birds of a feather flock together-- and also Heterophilic--opposites attract [HOMHET]. This relates to an extension of Mel Conway's law [CON] affecting (dis)information exchange
• evolve according to principles of Fray Out [FO] and the Diffusion of Innovations [DI]
• are a Chaordic [34] scale-linked Panarchy [45].in chains of different scales and durations
• are Subject to the laws of Requisite Variety [RV]
• evolve in an Algedonic manner [ALG]--pleasure and pain--at the growing edge [GE] creating Dissipative Structures [DS]
• Subject to the laws of social power measured by social distance and alignment [SP]
• ... which can be hacked/deconstructed/reconstructed with Social Engineering/social techniques [SE],[ST]
• Iterating minimum viable product [MVP] models of themselves and their surroundings according to laws of observability including Johari window, ego state, requisite variety etc.
• Prone to prolonging their existence after replacements have already arrived, possibly due to {power differentials, HU units J.Brian Hennessy, the need to get to an adoption majority}
• Best categorised as a duality of musical waves and interacting fractal people [FOM], a type of musical dance round the maypole

Visualisation of mental model

Let's use the universal language of Mario:

<Diagram 1>

<Diagram 2a> the telescope--similar to cybernetics, fray out and Prigogine models with some Wardley mapping thrown in

<Digram 2b> telescope iterative diffusion of innovations - basically it never stops (red line) but people by necessity require time to catch up with new trends and indeed these need to mature and descend the value chain to e.g. commodity.

This can be visualised as a series of conveyor belts like those encountered at the airport--with a twist: series of conveyor belts, faster towards the middle representing rate of adaptation:

<Diagram 2c> - the conveyor belt

<Diagram 3> Dissipative structures in sustainable urban development

<Diagram 4> this as a model for organisational form interaction

<Diagram 5> a Sierpinski triangle of organisational forms

<Diagram 6>

Vulnerabilities

• Social engineering [SE]
• Power games [48Laws]
• Morality diminishing with (social, temporal, physical, ontological) distance
• Hacking of dopamine loop [DL]
• Network contagion [NC]
• Recuperation of Share of Voice (e.g. arms race around Google ad words)

Implications

Implications for organisational forms are that we should strive for: viability and adaptation

1. society-centred design, indeed becoming more social animals [SOC]
2. Optimisation of shared stakeholder success measures cf. Enterprise DevOps, Stakeholder Capitalism [STA]
3. Flat models of interaction cf. Guildcraft
4. Noise and variety and even "weirdos" [WEIRD] to allow exploration of the problem space
5. Leadership as making the network smarter (Jarche)
6. A progression from linear through circular to regenerative business model [REG]

Network contagion Valdez tips

• create distance
• remove steps
• create holes, remove optimal nodes

References:

[OP]

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[TIMN]

David Ronfeldt

[RO]

.

[NEG] Negentropic I.e. negative entropy

Example of the goodies on offer from google image search on this word:

[LS]

[DI]

Everett Rogers

[ST] Social techniques

Strategic doing:

Guildcraft:

[DS] Ilya Prigogine, dissipative structures and inflection points

and these images (search for dissipative structures), noting synergies with Tao and OODA loop orient step:

And:

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Inspiration for the telescope diagram:

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[HOMHET]

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COMMUNICATION AND ADOPTION 3(3+0)

Lesson 46 : Channels of Communication for Homestead Technology

Homophily- Heterophilly

A fundamental principle of human communication is that the transfer of ideas occurs most frequently between individuals who are alike, or homophilous. Homophily is the degree to which pairs of individuals who interact are similar in certain attributes, such as beliefs, education, social status, and the like. Social relations are much closer between individuals who resemble each other in occupation and education.

Homophily occurs so frequently because communication is more effective when source and receiver are homophilous. Such effective communication is rewarding to those involved in it. When two individuals share common meanings, beliefs, and a mutual language, communication between them is more likely to be effective. Most individuals enjoy the comfort of interacting with others who are quite similar. Talking with those who are quite different from ourselves requires more effort to make communication effective. Heterophilous communication may cause cognitive dissonance because an individual is exposed to messages that are inconsistent with existing beliefs, causing an uncomfortable psychological state. Homophily and effective communication breed each other. The more communication there is between members of a dyad, the more likely they are to become homophilous the more homophilous they are, the more likely it is that their communication will be effective. Individuals who break the homophily boundary and attempt to communicate with others who are different from themselves face the frustration of ineffective communication. Differences in technical competence, social status, and beliefs all contribute to heterophily in language and meaning, there by leading to messages that go unheeded.

But heterophilous communication has a special informational potential, even though it may be realized only rarely. As we shall explain in a later section, heterophilous network links often connect two cliques, spanning two sets of socially dissimilar individuals. These interpersonal links are especially important in carrying information about innovations, as is implied in Granovetter’s (1973) theory of “ the-strength-of-weak-ties,” so homophilous communication may be frequent and easy but may not be so crucial as the less frequent heterophilous communication in diffusing innovations.

https://ecoursesonline.iasri.res.in/mod/page/view.php?id=115746

Homophily -Beth Levin

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Panarchy

Daniel Wahl -whole-systems health

[7] Requisite variety:

[8] Growing edge (thanks to Curtis Ogden for the intro)

All around us worlds are dying and new worlds are being born; all around us life is dying and life is being born. The fruit ripens on the tree, the roots are silently at work in the darkness of the earth against a time when there shall be new lives, fresh blossoms, green fruit. Such is the growing edge! It is the extra breath from the exhausted lung, the one more thing to try when all else has failed, the upward reach of life when weariness closes in upon all endeavor. This is the basis of hope in moments of despair, the incentive to carry on when times are out of joint and men have lost their reason, the source of confidence when worlds crash and dreams whiten into ash. The birth of a child — life’s most dramatic answer to death — this is the growing edge incarnate. Look well to the growing edge!

—Howard Thurman

[FOM] fractal organisational models

A number of models out there include:

• Semco method by Ricardo Semler
• Buurtzorg of Jos de Blok
• Betacodex cell design of Niels Pflaeging and others

• Microsolidarity group of Richard D. Bartlett

• Terrorist, hacktivist and elite forces models

[SP] Social Power

[aLG]

This note from Harald Krecher:

Fatal attraction

This share by Beth Levin:

Is this a case of homophily?

Sociocracy and the human organisational map

[SOC]

Society-centered design

https://societycentered.design

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[Network leadership]

[REG]

Regenerative

[WIERD]

Introducing noise and variety (cf. requisite variety)

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Laloux racers

[STA]

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[SE]

[NC] Network contagion -good and bad

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