Have you ever had the unenviable task of creating a procedure for something? Maybe a high level set of policies or a hands on ‘How-To’ guide. Great – now picture the end result in your mind. Got it pictured? Okay, where is it now?
Continue readingI have been able to call upon friends and colleagues to help me craft articles:
In all of these cases, the contributors provided me with excellent advice and the resulting articles were much better as a result. This article is no exception: SharePoint as a Documentation Tool; Life Beyond the “Big Honkin’ Binder”.
Of course no good deed ever goes unpunished and to that end, the following are the folks who have helped me with the friendly-peer-review. Hopefully I can return the favor in the future. Also, if you are on the list and are logging this as professional development, feel free to refer to this post and notice below.
|
Person |
Organization |
| Chad B. | Government of Alberta |
| Eric S. | Government of Alberta |
| Howard T. | Government of Alberta |
| Mavin K. | Government of Alberta |
| Mona E. | Self Employed |
| Paul B. | Government of Alberta |
| Terry E. | Retired |
| Uday D. | United Nations |
To whom it may concern, the above individuals were asked to perform a friendly-peer review of an article (2017 – Life Beyond the “Big Honkin’ Binder” ) published in the Financial Management Institute of Canada January, 2017, FMI*IGF eJournal. The estimated time to perform this review was between 2 to 3 hours completed in early September, 2016. All of the above individuals demonstrated a firm grasp of the subject matter and helped to create-net-new original thought and critique through this peer-review which will be reflected in the final article.
Giulia Enders has written a delightful book on our Guts. If the title was not sufficient the sub-title describes it all: Gut: The Inside Story of Our Bodys Most Underrated Organ.
Gut is a good read for anyone who digests food (which pretty much covers everyone living) and is a potential lesson for organizations that there is more complexity in a system then we can ever imagine.
Gut is a pretty easy read. Enders presents the physiology of the Gut in a very accessible manner and explains the key functions of the major organs (e.g. stomach, small/large intestines, liver, etc.). Originally published in German, the English translation has great cheek and humour. In fact, Gut would make an excellent text-book for junior or senior high school biology given its easy accessibility.
As a microbiologist, Enders delves into the other organ of our body, the microbiota of the gut. Based on current research, Enders makes the case that the dividing line between where our cells start and bacteria and other germs end is not as clear cut as we may think. For example:
Ender has not only written a very accessible book that discusses such delicate matters as what our poop should look like, she has reminded us that perceptions of systems are based on best available information at a point in time. For the gut, bacteria are necessary to not only break down food but to also stress the immune system so it does not over or under react. Structures such as appendices may appear useless but turn out to be vital to our long term health.
The gut can be used as an analog for organizations. Poop jokes aside, a healthy organization is more complex and mysterious then it first appears. While we may be inclined to oversimplify them, organizations have interactions and systems that may not be immediately apparent.
Here is one small example: riding elevators. In my building a new system has replaced the traditional ‘up’ button with destination buttons. Rather then jumping on the first elevator going up, you select your floor and proceed to that lift going exactly to that floor plus perhaps a few floors above and below yours.
This system has dramatically improved the speed by which people are carried to their floors – and it has cut the accidental and random interactions of people. Previously who you got on with was chance. As a result, there was an opportunity to interact with a variety of people who you may only see intermittently. Now the elevator ride is much more homogenous – you ride with people from one floor above or below.
More efficient, yes – beneficial to the organization – not necessarily. In as much as good bacteria trains our immune system and a diverse flora is better for us, random interactions and non-sterile organizational mixing is also of value. Good organizations need slight agitation, a diverse culture and some randomness to be effective and healthy – just like a good gut. In addition, organizations should recognize that individuals who may not seem to be part of a main structures may in fact have a disproportionate impact on the health of the culture. Introducing the occasional disruptive employees/contractors, the mail room clerk who is a clearing house of information across many floors or a cafeteria that promotes chance encounters vertically and horizontally across the organization.
The gut is more complex than we ever imagined and has a stronger influence well beyond converting food to energy and nutrition. In the same way, organizations are more complex then we can imagine and elements we may think of being without use can turn out to be instrumental to its health. Enjoy Enders’ gut and good luck with your biotas – both the micro and organizational varieties.
On September 21, 2016, the Edmonton FMI Chapter hosted the following session (detailed description found below in the ‘blog-annex’: Fostering Innovation in the Public Service When Money is Tight. Part of the conference was a game entitled ‘Innovation Bingo’. The objectives of the game were as follows:
The following conclusions were drawn from the results of the game:
Fostering Innovation in the Public Service When Money is Tight.
Public servants are expected to be innovative while working in a risk averse environment. This inherent conundrum is compounded during times of fiscal restraint when ideas are solicited but resources to execute few. This session will investigate innovation in the public services from a number of facets.
What is innovation, how do you get it, how do you keep it and when should you ignore it? Next, how to propose, implement and sustain an innovative idea or culture in an environment that is less than ideal. Finally, thoughts and strategies of making the case for innovation during times of fiscal restraint; after all, never let a good crisis go to waste.
Proofs of Concept (PoC) are great. They allow one to test a small component and then apply success (or failure) to future endeavours. Certainly the all time champion of the PoC are the Myth busters. Adam and Jamie would start each myth with a small-scale test before going big (and with the obligatory BIG explosion).
PoCs come in many sizes. At one end is the developer who experiments and comes up with a workaround or a more elegant way to achieve a result (aka a good ‘hack’). On the other end is an organization that incrementally works toward a final objective. For example sending a series of Apollo missions into space with each one adding on to the knowledge and experience of its successor. This blog considers more than a midnight pizza fueled hack-a-thon but much less than sending humans into the unknown.
Buzz Aldrin Apollo 11 – the beneficiary of a series of Proof of Concepts.
One of human’s greatest achievements was the development of the Scientific Method which involves (courtesy of dictionary.com):
noun; 1. a method of research in which a problem is identified, relevant data are gathered, a hypothesis is formulated from these data, and the hypothesis is empirically tested.
The following Six PoC Questions for Success is loosely based on the above method. The intent is to help an organization understand why a PoC is a good idea and the result. At the same time, this is ‘just-enough’ formalization. After all, it is important to let the brilliant folks develop ‘elegant-hacks‘ without too much paper work.
Why was a PoC identified? Generally this is to address a specific business problem. Pure research is okay as an objective for a PoC. That is developing technologies or techniques with no immediate application but future potential value for an organization.
The answer to this question is that it is often not solved, done through intuition or completed via a manual/semi-automated process. This question helps the organization understand what to do the with the results of a PoC. If the manual process is only slightly more costly then a fully automated variety, why bother with the complexities of automation?
In effect this is the hypothesis portion of the scientific method. Ideally this question should be a simple Yes/No. If the nature of the question changes through the PoC process, that is okay – but the evolution of the question should be included as part of the final report. Thus we may have started asking question X but we ended up answering question Y. The reason is that X was too big/small/wrong and Y was answerable.
Defining the question is important so your PoC team does lose its way and they have a touchstone to come back to. A bit of formalization around how they can change, extend, shrink or otherwise amend the question is important.
This question should have two parts, a) and b). Part a) is the predicted result. By including a prediction, the PoC can stay focused on the intended result. This is not to discount secondary benefits or chance discoveries but it does help to ensure that a PoC does not become its own self-sustaining cottage industry. Consider keeping part a) secret from the PoC team if you want the benefits of the double blind effect.
Part b) is what happened, what were the results? This should support the response to the question answered above. Ideally the result is Yes or No but it might be Maybe. Of course everyone wants a momentous discovery every time. However failure should be seen as a positive result – such a result may have saved an organizations considerable time, talent and treasure.
This should be a very practical listing of how to use these results. Examples of next steps may include refining a subsequent PoC, engaging in a larger scale test or moving the resulting solution to production.
Question five focuses on the practical and immediate application of the PoC results. Question six let’s the team blue sky a bit and extrapolate findings to larger contexts. This is part of the fun and value of the PoC – the larger application of something new.
Sorry, unlike the Mythbusters, there is no end of blog explosion. Instead, these questions are a handy reminder of the things to consider when a PoC is being suggested. Let me know your thoughts on the six questions. Would you add a question or take away one or more of them?
What exactly makes up an organization and how is work done within them? This is a subject of a handy mental model I use when I am trying to understand an organization; an organization in four part harmony.
1. Harmony 1, Infrastructure: the furniture, furnaces, machinery and head offices of the organization. Note that in many organizations infrastructure is often a non-tangible. For example a computerized airline reservation system or perhaps a finance system.
Steamfitter, by Lewis Hine (American, 1874–1940) . Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Accession Number: 54.549.56
2. Harmony 2, Operations: these are the day-in-day-out processes, tasks and procedures which we typically hire people to do. Accounts payable clerks, widgets assembler or process engineers are hired because payables need to be clerked, widgets assembled and processes engineered.
3. Harmony 3, Ad hoc activities: if you have a reserved parking spot close to the head office of an organization, I bet this is what you do all day. Sure, you were hired to do operations (Chief Executive/Finance/Information Officer) and sometimes operational work sneaks in when you are not looking. More than likely though, you have crossed into the grey and smudgy no-man’s land that separates operations from the world of the ad hoc.
4. Harmony 4, Strategic thinking/planning: Periodically, the leaders of an organization will set aside their many ad hoc and fewer operational activities to complete strategic plans. Strategic plans hopefully answer questions like, do we have the right infrastructure, efficient operations and why are there so many ad hoc activities.
If you dig out your old college text books, organizations are described as functioning something like this. Wise executives poke their heads up from the fray and gain strategic knowledge. In turn, this knowledge is used to tweak infrastructure and adjust operations. Ad hoc opportunities are few and nearly always involve entering into new markets, maximizing shareholder wealth or stakeholder well-being.
In a Dilbert’esque world, the four harmonies work in isolation. Most of the management focus is on performing ad hoc work that usually involves fixing or infrastructure or operations. This is because infrastructure suffers from a lack of investment while operations are conducted by poorly trained leading the newly hired. The only time either of these harmonies get any attention is when they fail and then they are hastily repaired, usually in an ad hoc manner.
Most organizations fall in between these two extremes. Ideally infrastructure is like a well-run furnace on a cold winter’s day – well-functioning, appreciated and invisible. Time invested in operations saves management effort solving future ad hoc problems (an ounce of prevention is worth of pound of cure). Ad hoc efforts need to be the exception and not the standard modus operandi of an organization. Unfortunately management through heroics and drive by management can make it difficult to operationalize a corporate culture used to the adrenalin rush of the last moment.
Finally strategic planning should be an ongoing rather than intermittent activity, ad hoc activity. Ideally, an orchestra-conductor makes small corrections to the harmony rather than having to stop the tune and start again from the top.
Organizations are much too complex to fit into four neat buckets, but it is surprising how this simple model has help me channel my thinking about complex and abstract structures, such as organizations. So, how well does your organization manage the four harmonies and what are your thoughts on the mental model? As always drop me your thoughts, ideally via a singing telegram in four part harmony.
Organizational Biology 