Alex Osterwalder from Arvetica has been commenting here at CPH127 before - his work over at Arvetica is highly relevant, not only for Private Banking Professionals, but business in general.
He just published a podcast with John Hagel about how strategy is formulated by most companies, and more interesting, how it should be done when coping with uncertainty and complexity.
Personally I believe that most companies are organized to handle different problems, and thereby also strategy, as is the reality of today. We are shifting away from handling complicated matters to coping with complex problems, and that with a rapidly shift and increase in speed and uncertainty.
I also believe that a shift in mindset is heavily needed. A shift towards a more adaptable mindset, a mindset where each and every individual in the organization sees control as a nice thing, but not needed always, where competencies like intuition and improvisation is highly valued, and where diversity is embraced.
But then again - maybe I’m wrong? What do you think?
I recently bought Gary Hamel’s New Book - The Future of Management. VERY interesting and if I may say “spot on” when it comes to a description of what is necessary for companies to understand. Companies should organize them selfs as social systems, not as mashines.
When reading through the book I experience page by page that I’ve got my self a new friend. I knew that already when reading Gary Hamel’s comment on my post about “beta mindset“.
His book is interesting because it links Enterprise2.0 to Enterprise survival.
“Look around you; what things have demonstrated their adaptability across decades, centuries and eons? What sets the benchmark for adaptability? From my vantage point, life, markets, democracies, faith and cities all seem surprisingly adaptable. Each of these biological and human systems has proven itself to be far more resilient than any large corporation. They must become the role models for 21st century companies.”
and
“Many companies devote 5, 10 or even 20 percent of their revenue to R&D. Why not set aside a small share of discretionary funding for ideas that don’t pop up at the right time, or in the right place, to make it into the formal budgeting process? My guess is that a community of hundreds of mid-level managers spread out across a large company would, in the aggregate, make better investment decisions than a few folks in a corporate new ventures unit.”
I do of course agree, but many managers doesen’t understand the dynamics that web2.0 unfold internally in organisations…..I’ll come to that in another post 
Do you have any takes on how the organization of a company would look like in the future? Which leadership competencies are in play? And what role does design play in the development?
A few months ago I almost stumbled over an article when reading a comment on the Google Transforming Group. Kamille invited me back in September/October and I’ve been on and off in the discussion since then. I an highly recommend the group if you’re interested in the definition of the “new” field of design & innovation.
In October I came across this interesting article by Robert K. Logan and Greg Van Alstyne - Design Ecology: Designing for Emergence and Innovation II
What I find especially interesting is how they:
- define the role of the designer, which not necessary is a designer…
- see innovation and-what-ever-processes as adaptive complex systems - I definitely agree!
- combine theoretical areas like Biology, Technology, Sociology and Ecology into a new decipline…
I don’t know about you, but as I see it they are up to something VERY interesting and important to understand, if coping with the challenges of tomorrow. But maybe I look in the wrong direction?
We’ve been writing a lot about the impact of thinking the design methodology into business process. Now Businessweek has an article, which at it’s best could be called a recap on the importance of diversity in innovation.
The point is of course still valid - important. And of course it’s interesting to look ont how different knowledge domains get’s in play, but the hole discussion lack’s a discussion about the management/leadership implications.
Perspectives?
Richard Dennison has a great post on the BT-case, and how they used Social Software internally.
To quote:
“The power of social software is undeniable in the free, anarchic world of the global internet. But what happens when you bring these tools into the constrained, policy-driven, risk-averse world of the corporate intranet where the user population is small, where expressing oneself as an individual and on a personal level can feel threatening, and where management is watching your every move? Well, that’s just what one of the world’s leading providers of communications solutions, BT, has chosen to do. Richard Dennison, BT’s Internal Programme Manager, tells the story.”
Which organizational dynamics do you think is released by this interesting initiative?
JP Rangaswami has some thoughts on the individuals capacity creating and maintaining relationships. He has a rant on the new Dubar numer in the digital world where social networks setup new premisses for interactions and relationships.
Quite interesting stuff.
I agree with JP, but I also think that the number in the different circles of intimacy will differ a lot. Some relations expects a real-life-meeting, other don’t.
What is the new Dunbar number for you?
The writing here at cph127 has come to an end in the context that most of you know - since early 2005 I’ve been writing about design, innovation and leadership.
I started out with good friends - Jacob & Magnus - and we invited a lot of interesting perspective into the “community” too - Thank you all for your thoughts & energy put into cph127.
For me - at least - the sense-making has been tremendous. When starting out I knew only a few things about design - mainly as a result of my work at DDC. While I created a lot of sense - as I think the community around cph127 did - DDC is still having hard times understanding what design is all about - besides form & function.
This sense-making journey has been a tremendous ride throughout an understanding of a new business imperative. I wasn’t aware about that fact when starting out blogging here at cph127, creating stronger ties to thought leaders and thinkers in the area of Design, Knowledge Management, Chaos Theory and technology development. But while doing that a new understanding of what is needed in todays business emerged. Jacob and I switched the unknowable/intangible to something very real when creating Connecta - now Wemind - back in early 2006. Since then we’ve been busy building a broader understanding on how we create a better platform for todays companies to overcome tomorrows uncertainties in coping with complexity, knowledge economy, globalism and sustainable innovation capability. We’ve created a few insights ourselves already, but trust me, there are no end result or everlasting rules or principles…
This new chapter in the history of cph127 - this new context - is still about making sense of the field of leadership, organization and strategy, but not only for creative business functions, but business in general.
Please feel free and join in…