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“Embrace the present and invent the future,”

Karl Lagerfeld Chanel

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“We all use the future to escape the present.”

John Green

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It never fails that any time I am asked to speak about the future of work or even the present of work I am asked to discuss how the pandemic has affected both. I find it a little tiresome because it suggests the pandemic created something rather than simply affected what existed. And, yet, speak about it I must. So, this is my obligatory mention of the pandemic within the larger, more important, context of creating a better business model – pandemic or not.

I wish we would speak less about the pandemic as an event and more about how it applies to patterns. The lifeblood of any business is pattern recognition. Chasing events or momentary anomalies are simply fool’s errands. The pandemic was a change in gravity, nothing more and nothing less. The heavier became slower, those who could fly gained newer heights and joints which couldn’t bear the additional burden bent beyond use if not broke. Those are all structural things and important things to the survival of many businesses. Maybe more importantly the pandemic gravity affected all existing patterns THAT ALREADY EXISTED. I bold that to highlight its importance. True resilience in business is in minds, imaginations, creativity, thinking and applied intelligence – applied against pattern recognition. So, while we may worry incessantly over the structural issues, we may, instead, worry more about the intelligence of our businesses.

I am firmly of the belief AI is here and will improve overall intelligence of business {1}, people (and Life in general as a “lubricant” for bettering thinking and things). That said. We are creating a generation of people who are just more dependent upon numbers spit out by black boxes. That generation is compounded by an older generation who cares only about hollow ROI (therefore THEY only care about what numbers they can count). What this means is while judgement and qualitative thinking may be more needed than ever that type of thinking is valued less in today’s businesses and, maybe more importantly, taught less.

AI will only exacerbate/amplify the problem. To me this is an existential crisis of true thinking applied to business. We cannot be solely dependent upon numbers, or AI, to tell us what to do and, yet, we are not really investing a shitload of energy fostering qualitative thinking/judgement.

Which lead me to Waves (or Ages)

Waves, ages, even generational shifts, are simply patterns which have evolved to an extent they actually have an effect. I begin there because pattern recognition is usually the key to identifying what is important and what is not (or less so). And this is where I bring up Mike Walsh, author of Futuretainment{2}. He surprised me one day by saying “I’m sad to say I’ve not actually ever read Toffler”. I found it interesting because in Futuretainment he spends a number of pages on “To win the Game is to Change” where he discusses three main waves; technology, behaviour & business. Regardless. Today if you opened my copy of Futuretainment you would see a number of notes in the margins on those pages (258-263 if you want to read) mostly referring to Alvin Toffler thinking. Alvin Toffler wrote a book called “The Third Wave” in 1980 (and introduced the idea of facing a sea of change in his seminal magazine piece in 1965: The Future as a Way of Life) discussing exactly the same ‘waves’ (and more). Yeah, see the pattern? Anyway. I do believe change comes in waves. I have always chafed on the simplistic labels associated with ‘revolutions’ (agriculture, industrial, technology) as too tidy for, well, people.

“Questions are what matters. Questions, and discovering the right ones, are the key to staying on course. The wave of information threatens to obscure strategy, to drown out details and numbers, calculation and analysis, reaction and tactics. To have strong tactics we must have strong strategy on one side and accurate calculation on the other. Both require seeing onto the future.”

Gary Kasparov

From a business perspective the waves, or tsunami, of information combined with the waves of change create an environment to conduct business that is always in flux, i.e., purposefully showcasing agility and adaptability. This means intelligence, or learning, becomes the lifeblood of existence. Well. For a business focused on efficiency (or standardization) this creates significant challenges let alone is often a precursor to death as the world moves beyond their seeming stability. As Mike Walsh points out (p. 258, Futuretainment):

“one of the hardest things to do for anyone who runs a company is to ensure they are positioned for the next big wave which carries the latest trend. As we’ll as the possibility of not being adequately prepared, it is easy to do much too soon, when it is simply too early to be trying to change the market.”

This is the exact situation we are in today. The pandemic gravity shift not only increased the strength of the current waves, but threw in all the other things a storm includes: chaos, inconsistency, darkness/fog, uncertainty. In order to navigate your quest this is the context in which we need to discuss the future of business.

Which leads me to the forced change of an Event

Business has been changing, or trying to change, for some time. Whether it be technology (digital transformation), organization design, systems thinking (scenario planning), dealing with uncertainty, gamification, democratization/autonomy, even the slightly misguided ‘purpose over profit’, or whatever, the business world has been limping along the path of change on a variety of dimensions and aspects. What the pandemic has done hasn’t changed anything, but rather amplified things – strengths, weakness, flaws and fragility. What the pandemic has done has sped up existing transformation (all aspects not just ‘digital’). What the pandemic has done has made the business world reflect upon business contextually which, inevitably, will lead the more insightful business people to reflect on business models and how that business, and its way of doing business, is interconnected with society, people and environment.

But at its core, the pandemic has amplified some larger foundational business narratives.

• Will some existing industries find new energy?
• Will viable businesses which had just enough fragile aspects to make it unsustainable be destroyed?
• Will new viable businesses, less reliant on existing ways of doing business, be created?

Regardless of the questions, I would argue that all answers reside in institutional intelligence well applied and not in ‘fixing’ things because of a crisis/event.

** note: I believe everyone needs to reflect upon the fact that this pandemic has ‘forced’ (or compelled) some transformation which may inspire some misguided objective making (based on flawed problem analysis). Forced transformation, even if it simply amplifies existing initiatives/thinking, tends to create poorly thought out vectors of behavior. The truth is that more business people will see what they want to see and will inevitably take the lazy linear decision-making path.

Which leads me to ‘zero sum game or not’ (“all for one, one for all” or ‘one or all’).

Control, or a recognition that much of our own success is out of our control, is now obvious – glaringly obvious. This will most likely create, attitudinally, a bifurcated mindset – those who recognize the future is collective and those who see the future is ‘every person for themselves’.

The latter is a zero sum game (attributed to the mathematician John von Newman). The profit of one side comes at the expense of the other, i.e., there is a complete conflict of interest between people/parties/business enterprises. This means it is impossible to achieve a state of equilibrium. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that this same competitiveness gets applied to individual intelligence where “thinking” becomes a competition in the game of business. In Carse phraseology all of this is the ultimate Finite Game. On the other hand, maximizing, or optimizing, potential – of people and business – is not zero sum, but rather found in the equilibrium where not always winning does not equate to loss and most of conditions are more complex and dynamic, i.e., a cat’s cradle of connectivity rather than linear cause & effect (John Nash and the “Nash equilibrium”). This, in my mind, is using collective intelligence to create structural lift to the overall value of the business and its offerings – constantly. In Carse phraseology this is the Infinite Game.

This discussion becomes important as we discuss the intersection of humans and technology in business. If a ‘survival of the fittest’ human attitude is amplified by technology it actually creates the possibility, if not probability, for catastrophic consequences. I say that to remind everyone AI simply amplifies what exists. Needless to say, that is not good nor should it be the objective of technology in business.

This all is relevant to discussing where the business world today is because a business could survive the pandemic and, yet, still be embracing an old way of doing business. My belief is that if they embrace that thought 100%, they will eventually die. If they embrace portions of that thought and some new business model aspects, they could quite possibly be quite successful. And those who completely embrace a new model, and a new way of thinking, are not guaranteed success – now. The path forward is complex, not for the faint of heart and answers will be more likely emergent rather than formulaic. And it is quite possible within that last thought that the core of the Corporation of the Future business model resides: embracing emergence.

Which leads me to the idea of technology and humans working together to the benefit of a business is not a new idea. Drucker, Toffler and McLuhan, in the 1980’s and 90’s, all had thoughts about how technology and people could work together in a way, or ways, that would demand a different business model. Unfortunately, since that time “technology & people” has mostly consisted of putting computers on everyone’s desk or in their hands and asked them to do the same jobs just with a computer in hand. We treated technology as a tool, a capital investment, rather than an opportunity to actually rethink how business should be done. As time has passed the human side of the issue has increasingly become obvious, less engagement, more stress, less meaning, more efficiency, where the Taylorism of business was enhanced by this technology. People did not benefit and business got stripped of important value creation aspects – critical thinking, imagination, enlightened debate/collaboration. I would argue:

It’s time to flip the equation.

It’s time to look at a new business model in which people are at the center and technology augments them.

It’s time to look at a business model in which people’s potential is maximized, not their time.

It’s time to look at a business model in which results are an outcome, not an objective, of people engaged.

Which leads me to:

• the arc of systems bends toward efficiency
• the arc of people bends toward doing what is right

Therein lies the conflict in most business models.

To get business from where it is to where it should be will demand a new business model with a combination of a new attitude on how to approach business, a new business model where technology augments people and a way of doing business in which the skill sought is to think conceptually (use intelligence well), a new business model in which people closest to the decisions have the power, and the information, to make the decisions, and the job positions are not specialties, but part of connective energy that powers organizational effectiveness and productivity.

This future organization, structurally, is grounded upon technology which augments its people. Structurally it has layered technology components to augment people:

• People own their data and plug it into an organization
• The organization has a technology platform using AI/algorithms, to maximize individuals by tapping into their surface skill sets (the obvious ones) as well as the potential skill sets (hobbies, ‘half skills’, untapped skills, emergent skills, etc.)
• The organization has a data ‘pool’ of organizational knowledge to tap into
• The organization can tap into the cloud to augment, supplement, complement the combined organizational/individual knowledge.

** Note: I envision individual privacy is protected by the organization when interacting with the cloud. I envision that accumulated skills & knowledge BY the individual increases the owned personal data which can get unplugged if the individual leaves (it becomes their own institutional knowledge)

This organization, strategically, is grounded in a deterministic strategy augmented by emergent strategy. This strategic understanding is important because it separates unfettered chaos from a strategically smart quest.

The deterministic strategy is the plan to bring resources to bear to impose the will, and vision, of the institution against the industry. This is the backbone which ensures focus and the consistency necessary for efficiency and coherence necessary for increasing continuous emergent activity.

The emergent strategy demands situational awareness – how the industry & actors within it have matured (attitude, perception, products) over time in order to assess unfolding opportunities in relationship to the movement of the industry itself. Categories are not stagnant and consumer perceptions of competitors shift, emergent strategy is dependent upon probabilities assessment and probabilities cannot be effectively assessed without awareness of past and present features of the opportunities.

I believe the future of work will thrive with an effective organizational infrastructure where people will continuously reskill, teach, & apply skills, i.e., people will use the model (thrive within it) versus the current transformation mindset in which an organization has a vision “how do I transform my organizational infrastructure, including digital, to maximize people within the organization (augment & expand their potential to deliver the vision).” The latter is about extracting productivity and the former is about having potential emerge and create productivity. The latter is about building an organization to efficiently meet a specific market need and the former is about constructing an organization capable of effectively meeting opportunistic market needs. The efficient versus effective is important.

** Note: some people may want to apply “agile” to this idea, I avoid it when possible. I apply ‘emergent’ instead as I believe agile implies reactive while I believe emergent is a quasi-proactive idea in meeting opportunities. Emergent demands agility but being agile is reactive.

In the end.

The basis of my business model thinking revolves around some key thoughts:

• We know optimizing emergent and deliberative strategy thinking increases organizational efficacy
• We know optimizing standardization and de-standardization maximizes organizational efficacy
• We know complexity is inherently expansive (expandable) and complication is inherently reductive (restrictive)
• We know any hope of optimizing complexity demands conceptual thinking skills over causal/linear thinking
• We know everyone is capable of conceptual thinking (or grasping concepts) as well as capable of some polymath characteristics (not suggesting everyone be a polymath just that everyone is capable of being some degree of generalist and business tends to discourage that)
• We know that utilizing all resources (people, capital, $, supplies) maximizes investment in resources (know inherently that a closed loop system – nothing wasted/all waste is a resource to be reused – optimizes organization)
• We know the importance of the Lean principle “optimize the whole” is not a Lean principle, but rather the true objective of a business
• We know that business is of, and within, society (but have ignored that connection in the pursuit of ‘business is business’)

In the end, because this is my obligatory nod to the pandemic, the pandemic did nothing to disprove anything I have suggested to create a better business nor the fact that where we are today in the business world is in the wrong place.

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{1} note on AI. I use AI to discuss algorithms and machine learning, not automation or robotics. the truth of the pandemic and automation, not discussed enough in my mind, is that it has shown businesses where humans are either replaceable by automation or reflect possibly fragile aspects in the overall business. Business, as business does, will react in their own best interest and will, in my predictions, over-automate and de-human their businesses. Lots of jobs will be lost and lots of people negatively affected (and no “re-skilling” will solve that). Inevitably, in my predictions, business will recognize they went overboard on automation, that humans actually provide ongoing structural value creation, and will head out and rehire people. That is most likely going to happen in a future where you and I will not benefit.

{2} note on Futuretainment by Mike Walsh. First. It is a beautifully designed book holding some wonderful thinking. Second. The thinking has held up quite well for a book published in 2009 discussing the Future. It is within that thought I’d like to make a point about change. For all the talk about the ‘massive change’ we are encountering I find we continue discussing the same things for quite some time before they actually change. It is true not all change is created equal, but the future is usually quite consistent in that it forewarns us of most of its features for years in advance – if we pay attention.

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“It is my thesis that machines can and do transcend some of the limitations of the designs and in doing so they may be both effective and dangerous.”

Norbert Wiener, 1960

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“As machines learn they may develop unforeseen strategies at rates that baffle their programmers.”

Norbert Wiener, 1960

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It’s not very insightful to note that algorithms inherently increase efficiency. Similarly, it doesn’t seem that insightful to note Life, people and business, are inherently inefficient <despite all their efforts to be efficient>. I think the insight resides in the fact this creates a recipe for disaster. Disaster in that what is easy, or even useful, is not necessarily good for us.

Anyone who has even researched AI slightly would see that even if AI systems learn from accurate, representative data, there will still be issues if the data reflects underlying biases and inequalities of the system.

Oh. And it does.

Oh. And, yes, I am going to suggest efficiency is a bias and an inequality driver.

Look. We idolize efficiency and we increasingly have tools which offer some sense of efficiency, yet, the attempted ‘flattening’ of natural inefficiency, generally speaking, only creates, well, dysfunction <and, generally speaking, persona dissatisfaction>.

How the hell does that happen? Simplistically an algorithm offers a binary choice – A or B. Yeah. To do so it evaluates a variety of inputs but, inevitably, it has to choose a 0 or a 1, this or that. Not weighted, a choice. And sometimes that choice is a guess. Yeah. A guess. My favorite line in Brian Christian’s fabulous book, The Alignment Problem, is “the computer is alarmingly confident when it guesses.” When you simplify everything down to a black & white ‘this or that’ you can sometimes simply flip a coin. Now. say you are a algorithm and you not only flip a coin, but you flip a coin 6 straight times. Yeah. You can see the possible problem there. Circling back, let’s assume each of those 6 coin flips are driven by efficiency. Yeah. You can see the possible problem there. Let me stretch the efficiency issue out a bit more. Efficiency demands a division of labor, resources and energy. So, if the algorithm is driving all those things toward the ‘most efficient’, well, there are always consequences to a choice.

As a counterpoint, effectiveness, or efficacy, is found in things that are often fairly inefficient <at least in the short term or present>. Effectiveness is the natural enemy to the incrementalization of standardization.

Range:

Development is not linear, and diversions that set you back in the short term frequently become powerful tools in the long term.

More importantly, effectiveness is the natural enemy of efficiency. How? Well. Efficiency arcs toward improvement of structural character, not improvement of market dynamics. Effectiveness is grounded in the external inputs, efficiency from internal outputs. Basically, efficiency strips away systems dynamics and flattens organizational principles.

Risk is quantifiable, uncertainty is not. It’s one thing to say there is a 50-50 chance on something going wrong. It’s another to not know the chances at all.

How does it do that? Algorithms grounded in efficiency minimize the optimal organization ability to expand and contract. the tendency of everyone in business is to contract (under the guise of ‘focus’). The contracting oversimplifies, but makes it mentally manageable and certainly drives an efficiency objective. Yet. Navigating complexity <which is the standard business> demands one actually expand their situational awareness of the moment.

I imagine I am also discussing the human aspect of algorithms. What I mean by that is algorithms are meant to be a tool for people, not a means to absolve responsibility.

And what do I mean by that?

A collection of people can be stupider than an individual (often even stupider), and, an individual can be stupider than a collection of people. The trick is to always to find when one is smarter than the other.

This gets compounded by the fact technology, well crafted, actually makes people stupider. How? It actually lessens our critical thinking by offering easier solutions (knowledge gifted is not the same as knowledge earned). We need to be sure to break the stupid loop. Because the smarter technology gets (algorithms actually iterate based off of interactions), the less smart people get (we do the hard work of thinking less), so we need to actively use technology to make people smarter. We need to amalgamate company wisdom and institutional learning into critical masses it cannot be ignored and demands some interaction. It seems counterintuitive because we are activating algorithms to do the hard work of ‘thinking’ <assessing an overwhelming amount of data> and, yet, we should actually be thinking harder ourselves <people>.

Look. Algorithms can be used for the forces of human behavior team bad (default, easy answers, let tech decide) or forces of human behavior team good (curiosity, expand upon imagination, innovate).

All I know is algorithms are going to play a big role in navigating business efficacy and shaping business.

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“The future of companies, regardless of size, will be shaped by algorithms.”

Mike Walsh

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The key word is “shaped.” Ultimately it will be humans who use the shapes.

Anyway. Here is my wish.

I hope we will be “directed to act” by algorithms, but not managed by. The latter demands acceptance of algorithm as qualified to make us to do something behaviorally, the former demands we accept algorithms as something that ‘informs’ our doing. Somewhere in between is the decision of how much we, people, are accountable for thinking. Algorithms inherently encourage us to believe business is not best when it is random. Yet. The best businesses resist the urge to suppress randomness.

Which leads me to temporal convergence and temporal divergence.

Temporal convergence is progressive and affirming. By contrast, “temporal divergence,“ is where we cannot see a path from where we are “now” to achieve the goal-state. Temporal divergence may result from insufficient capability/ capacity to navigate with any confidence toward any goal. Also, one may not know if one is in a state of temporal divergence. The difference between these two things is the difference between survival and death in a business. I bring this up because algorithms, driven by efficiency, are temporal, but you cannot actually see whether they are converging or diverging. Well. At least until it’s too late.

All businesses will exist, in some form or fashion, grounded in algorithms. I am fairly sure that’s a given. What is not given is what role efficiency will play in the future of business. Now, I am not naive, efficiency focus will not go away overnight, but efficiency, relentlessly pursued, is simply a path to commoditization. The challenge will be to not get consumed by efficiency driven algorithms and to realize algorithms do not give answers, but outline options. To realize algorithms don’t define redundancies, but rather define the outlines of systems. And, in the end, realize efficiency is the lazy way out and understand algorithms can make us even lazier so the double hit from the dull axe of efficiency will bludgeon us, individuals and business, into a bloody pulp even as the dashboards scream success. Ponder.

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“I have no way of knowing whether the events that I am about to narrate are effects or causes.”

Jorge Luis Borges

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I have been talking about complexity, and building emergent agility, into business for quite some time. Yeah. Maybe I didn’t use exactly the same words as all the complexity folk today, but there were a bunch of us talking about it. The original seed was Toffler’s 1985 The Adaptative Corporation. I believe he recognized the shift occurring in business from standardization, mass everything (manufacturing, strategy, communications, etc) and drew a line in the sand between simple/replicable & complexity/dynamic. Yeah. It was a fuzzy line to me, but it felt right. Goldratt’s Theory of Constraints, taken literally, was about production and work flow. Taken figuratively, as many of us did, was about agility in a dynamic environment. It’s true they weren’t speaking of Complexity Theory, but they were clearly talking about how to conduct business in a constantly changing dynamic marketplace. Mintzberg dumped his book, Rise and Fall of Strategic Planning, in our laps in mid-1990’s drawing some clearer lines on emergent strategy in meeting the needs of a dynamic marketplace <i.e., thinking in a complex environment>. Once again. he didn’t invest a lot of energy on the idea of complexity <even though that’s what it is about>.  Toffler cranked out three more books which if you didn’t have your head up your ass clearly showcased a complex world where the way business traditionally being conducted was going to be screwed. Some of us paid attention and started tweaking from within businesses. Then around 2000. Cluetrain Manifesto (meta view) explained complexity in a way we all could understand. The New Marketing Manifesto (marketing view), while about marketing explained complexity in a way we would understand. Carse’s Finite and Infinite Games (complexity humanized into behavior). Peter’s Thriving in Chaos (management view – albeit the only time he mentions complexity it is to encourage keeping things simple) explained complexity in a way any business could understand. And a little bit later, Rozenweig’s The Halo Effect, sealed the deal for us complexity embracers as well as The Culture Code by Rapaille nailed down some heuristic narrative making concepts to unlock understandable <Rapaille was a bit of a nutjob but his heuristic ‘codes’ are a fabulous narrative concept>. To us, complexity just was, not a theory, and while cause & effect <or linear relationships> did exist, we understood the consequences of those linear relationships were vectored.

** note: the distinction between linear activity <a specific action creating a specific outcome> and linear consequences <which is a probability causal calculation> is an incredibly important one I believe complexity theorists overlook when dealing with business which is in the business of doing business, not theory>. linear activity exists, even in complexity, linear consequences are rare.

If you were paying attention, and felt like the existing business construct and way of working felt flawed, all these books and ideas were planting seeds in your mind.

Eventually we navigated complexity embracing a number of principles:

• • • Situational awareness: a SWOT established a benchmark but once completed most of us made it a rolling roadmap reflecting present status. It was straddling past, present & future while assessing resources available. This was the easiest part because a SWOT made even the most ‘stick with the 5-year plan’ people feel at least slightly comfortable with diverging from the plan.

    • Coherence over consistency: you encouraged some freer thinking, some continuous improvement <using
      

      

      …. Value Creation of Possibilities: Emergence over Predictive ….

      Goldratt always eased C-level concerns> and got people believing that sometimes better outcomes could be achieved with some adapting or agility. This one was more difficult because, even with Goldratt in our hip pockets, consistency is business’s heroin.

    • Context was everything: the only way to kill a best practice/formula response or activity was to deconstruct the context in which it would be successful – and point out the current context wasn’t applicable. This one was time consuming, energy sapping and unless you had some scenario planning skills was fraught with peril.

    • Probabilistic thinking: once you have even taken a half step into believing in complexity you know predicting anything is absurd. This is where you need a C-suite support system (or in the case of edge employees, managers) because in the good ole days not promising specific results against specific objectives was like committing Hari Kari. You needed someone else in the room to absorb some of the risk.

These were principles of which our successes resided on a wide continuum because the world we were working in, for the most part, wasn’t exactly in sync with what we were thinking. That didn’t mean we didn’t have some wins, just that to a ‘purist’ complexity person it may not look that way. We learned some hard lessons along the way.

• • You need generalists.

  • You need people who can think spatially (or conceptually).

  • You need creative thinkers (and they could be found in any department).

  • You need a CFO who ran a flexible balance sheet (you didn’t really need other budget-owner buy-in because in those days any budget owner always had money stored away in some rainy-day bucket if you had a good idea).

  • You need at least one C-suite person who liked pursuing emergent opportunities (& could understand emergent strategies in a timely fashion).

  • You need both emergent and predictable/replicable (the %’s can vary depending on organizational palate).

  • You need some restless people (adventurers or people in a ‘state of perpetual dissatisfaction’).

** note: I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out none of the books I listed nor all the lessons learned gave clarity on complexity immediately. Each, and all, were disparate puzzle pieces we slowly accumulated in our heads until at some point the puzzle itself became clear. The books, in particular, didn’t always make sense at the time, but they all resonated in a way that made us think “there is sense in this.”

In the good old days when you got this right you not only created a business constantly adapting, but you were surrounded by groups of curious, restless, thinking, people. I will suggest in those days that was the satisfaction because most likely, as you introduced complexity-like things into business in a business environment focused on replicable, simple & uncomplicated, you got things fed back to you like a co-worker said to me when I was at JWT – “you have your own way of doing things” <kind of a backhanded way to say they thought it was an unusual way to create positive results>. That said. When you got it right you not only created some good business stuff, but the people you worked with tended to take aspects of business complexity thinking wherever they went – and found success.

Anyway. I have watched people as they have come around to the Complexity side of the world watching as they toss aside the simplistic view of Occam’s’ Razor and Steve Jobs ‘simple mantra’. Heck. I went through the Complexity Rabbit Hole myself.

….. The Complexity Rabbit Hole ….

Business loves certainty and evenness and has embedded that type of thinking into everyone so the initial grasp of complexity is one of excitement and, well, some uncertainty. The crux of complexity is found in lack of predictability (oh my). This rubs up against a feeling of lack of control or a constant state of liminalness (oh my). The natural reaction to that is to find ways to control or find concrete solid things to create some construct<within complexity>. So, in the good ole days it was milestones and clear short-term objectives which then turned into sprints, scrum and Agile Manifesto tools. We would be naive to think that these weren’t methods we sought to control aspects of complexity. This journey all leads to a place in which you embrace complexity and emergence and realize that navigating complexity resides not in any framework or methodology or even some really good everyday management tools – it is in humans and how they think. Conducting business, strategy & tactics, against Emergence is an art and skill which I call ‘conceptual thinking’ <which is most likely a derivative of sensemaking and meaning making or critical thinking>. Conceptual thinking embraces complexity, acknowledges aspects of complexity theory (the ones that pertain most to the business of doing business) and suggests continuous learning. Going back to an earlier point, this is all valuable for the future success of a business in a dynamic marketplace, but much of it becomes moot if the business model itself doesn’t change from a traditional hierarchy or command/control-ish construct.

This is to suggest embracing complexity is an unfolding process which we all go through. I’d suggest it is finding a comfort level between infinite and finite or maybe risk and certainty. The depths of the complexity rabbit hole can almost make you feel like nothing you do can mean anything and, from a human perspective that not only seems meaningless in some ways, but also chafes against a natural desire of productivity (proof). Therein lies the rub. Complexity Theory doesn’t have to worry about ‘meaning’, business does.

Look.

I have written about complexity in business for over a decade (maybe two). And while, today, I talk about complexity, complexity theory and, specifically, business, I am not associated with the Santa Fe Institute (but have invested time reading their thoughts on complexity theory), not part of the Cynefin community (but have read about and follow several on twitter), nor am I a complexity expert. But I do understand business and I do understand complexity in a dynamic business environment. Some of my thoughts may not align with some traditional thinking, and parts may, but I will remind everyone, when discussing business and complexity, it is about doing the business of doing business within complexity wherein the business is the priority, not some Complexity Theory. In addition. I also remind everyone “perhaps because the field has attracted researchers from a wide diversity of home disciplines, there is no consensus as to how to define, measure, describe or interpret “complexity.” <Steve Maguire, The Interaction of Complexity and Management> Read on. Think. Disagree if you wish. But everything I will offer is grounded in the pragmatism that within complexity <world, industry, company, humans> business needs to do business in a way that optimizes the dynamics of complexity and minimizes confusion complexity discussions sometimes seem to create.

• • I believe complexity just is. Period. It is the system in which all businesses work within. All dynamics are simply the dynamics of systems – institutions, people, process, automation, technology, society, culture (inside & out of a business), community (inside & out of a business), global, etc. – interacting with each other.

  • I believe complexity is expansive in nature, not reductive. Therefore the objective of navigating complexity is always to unlock its potential, not ‘reduce complexity.’

  • I believe there are linear aspects within complexity and there are causal relationships. In fact, I have argued insights are often found within these ‘fractal’ connections , i.e., solving the fractal releases complexity potential.

  • I believe complications exist within complexity and not all complications are created equal. In fact, complications exist as the normal, either human created or natural creations of dynamics, consequence of complex system.

  • I believe being able to discern what is a human-made complication and what is a natural-system-made complication is often one of the most critical things in deciding what a business wants to do with a complication.

  • I believe there is a difference between complicated and complication. A process can be complicated and, yet, effective and even efficient. I believe a complication occurs when the ‘complicated’ becomes an issue to the effectiveness, or efficacy, of a system.

  • I believe not all complications need to be resolved.

  • I believe many systems work, in totality, quite effectively with complicated parts and even some complications.

  • I believe Chaos does not occur in 99.9% (I made up that % to make a point) of businesses and I do not believe it is helpful to suggest chaos as a feature, or a bug, of business.

  • I believe many successful businesses can edge close to chaos, I actually call it ‘the bedlam stage’, but it is simply patterns yet to be identified, but patterns nonetheless.

  • I believe, to quote The Santa Fe Institute “we are not ants nor are we bees”, to quote Dave Snowden (22:50 in this fabulous talk ) “industrialization at scale is a real problem in leadership and management”, to quote Alvin Toffler “the future belongs to the company who can de-standardize” and to quote me “the natural arc of business leadership bends toward evenness, predictability and replication.” I imagine I state this because I believe frameworks, quadrants, formula-thinking formats, will only be counterproductive to the natural dynamics of complexity (which are not nice & neat) because business, invariably, will take a framework and make it a process.

  • I believe complexity shouldn’t be discussed as a theory, but as a reality.

  • I believe complexity in business cannot be discussed without discussing business models.

** note: conceptual thinking, or sensemaking/meaning making, needs a malleable organizational structure or business model in order to maximize its effectiveness and, I would argue, make adoption of that thinking pervasive in an organization. I worked with P&G as Design Thinking was implemented and I watched as a business model, and institutional debt, constrained the possibilities.

That said.

Let me share my biggest issue with where I believe complexity discussions in business tends to struggle – infinite. Complexity becomes, well, complex when in theory. When everything is connected with everything, and, conceptually, nothing is causal (which, in practicality, is untrue in the doing of doing business), and consequences are found in probabilities not predictions, the whole seems infinite and infinite seems overwhelming (sometimes hopeless). The main consequence of this overwhelming and hopelessness is that simplistic models that define well enough to help make, not inform, a decision win (even if they do not explain truth). The next, almost as important consequence, is complexity increases the sense of pressure (to not only make a decision but that each decision carries a larger burden of consequences) so in order to appear (be) decisive most people will justify ‘right choice’ by selectively using data from dashboards. Going back to where I began, complexity just is. Its like living within a universe with some different gravities here and there, but, the important things remain the important things no matter where you go in the universe. Complexity shouldn’t increase stress, but rather offer freedom. And this is where I believe complexity folk need to get a grip. In a business world, to most business decisionmakers, possibilities are not infinite. In fact, they are clearly finite. Time, resources, information and people within any given situation represent a finite set of possibilities. Not infinite, finite. And within that finite sphere someone has to assess, most likely through some probabilistic thinking, what to do in that particular finite sphere. Within the business of doing business, pragmatically, people need to be doing shit not noodling some infinite set of complex dynamics.

I am at my core a pragmatic business person. I love theory because it stimulates thinking, but in the end, business is about taking action and doing things (hopefully productive things enhanced by the theory thinking). Complexity, complexity theory, complexity discussions, are really important discussions because accepting business is complex is the first step toward navigating complexity (rather than building simplistic  solutions and aiming for the wrong things). But discussing complexity always runs the risk of becoming a rabbit hole discussion in which it becomes impossible to make choices (because it is difficult to wrap your head around making sense of things). What I mean by that is if, within complexity, everything is connected with everything, and nothing is causal, consequences are found in probabilities not predictions, the whole not only becomes nebulous, but actually infinite. And while business people love talking about infinite possibilities, pragmatically (once again), infinite thinking does absolutely zero good to everyday business and decision-making. It is overwhelming and can often make decision-making seem like a hopeless effort therefore the default becomes ‘just check the task off the list’.

Once again, the truth is that in any given situation while the outlines may be vague, the choices are actually finite, not infinite.

I bludgeon all of you with all that repetitive thinking because the truth is that discussing complexity does not occur in a void, but rather needs to be discussed within a framework within which business, all people in the organization, can envision as a way of doing business – not just of how they are now doing business.

In other words, I believe most businesses recognize that decision-making needs to be dispersed within organizations more so than it currently is (this ‘dispersed’ is relative to its current status of distributed decision making). So, any discussion of complexity theory, in a practical sense, needs to keep an eye on the fact everything will be shifting out toward the edges of a business and many people who have never been expected to think conceptually, make many of these types of decisions or even ‘see’ the kinds of cues an emergent opportunity offers someone. I am certainly not suggesting things need to be ‘dumbed down’, but I am suggesting any theory needs a good dose of pragmatism.

Here is one thing I know for sure. Business has a nasty habit of turning the positive complex into the negative complicated. That is just what business does and if anything needs to be ‘transformed’, it would be that. I would suggest business will not be transformed by understanding complexity just as it is not really transformed by technology. Business will be, as it has been forever, transformed by people – people thinking clearly, conceptually and critically within situations they are placed. This isn’t to suggest part of developing a learning organization shouldn’t be learning some skills and beliefs which can enhance their success in navigating a dynamic business world, it is simply to suggest, in the end, success will be found in people working with people and people talking with people and people innovating with people.

Personally, I think we need to get this entire Complexity discussion right. Why? People spend about 1/3 of their lives working (or in a workplace). Businesses, generally speaking, spend 100% of their business either integrating with the world (gathering resources) or with people (exchanging the resources they have used). In other words, quoting Drucker, business, and its people, are in and of society. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out society, or humankind, is actually a complex dynamic marketplace of its own. I would also be remiss if I didn’t point out most of Humankind does not have the structure/boundaries a business has. That last point is relevant because most people, in society, are also struggling to navigate complexity (most of whom had been taught in school some fairly causal things). I imagine my larger point is humankind benefits if the business word has its shit together on complexity learning. Probabilities, emergent strategies, complications versus complicated, agility, situational awareness, all are invaluable learnings for successfully navigating life – self, community, country & world. It’s quite possible I am being too dramatic in my view of the scope, but it’s possible I am not. So, for all the complexity people out there, what are the probabilities if we get this right? No predictions, just is the probability of positive effect on Humankind worth getting this right.

Maybe I say this because I bang on Cynefin, & I shouldn’t. They are simply a part of the puzzle we all need to solve. The truth is I am a ‘mutt thinker.’ When I speak of complexity in business, I don’t really have a single framework and I pluck out the aspects of Learning Organizations (which I tend to believe is the larger vision), Senge, Pflaeging/Hermann OpenSpace, Lisa Gill’s thinking on flat organizations, Leloux, Drucker, Goldratt, Stacy, Ackoff, Deming, Mary Parker Follett of course (my business guiding light), the military (who most likely embraced individual conceptual thinking earlier than most of us – simply out of survival), Jason Fox, Mintzberg, John Grant, even The Santa Fe Institute <their collection of essays, “Worlds Hidden in Plain Sight” is fabulous learning fodder>, and finally the two sources who sealed my meta view on this whole complexity thing – Cluetrain Manifesto and the person who planted the seed of complexity thought – Alvin Toffler.

Complexity is, well, complex. The one thing I believe all Complexity people can agree on is the importance of words and narratives. From Toffler to the present the constant theme has been stories, storytelling, metaphors, codes and the use of words. At some point, at least in the business sphere, I believe it would be helpful if there could be some common agreement on definitions, narratives and words. Why? Well. To go back to maybe my most important thought – business is in, and of, society. It behooves us to get that right because, in the end, while I am in the business of doing business, to think we can help the greater humankind think just a bit better every day, and maybe that helps society progress a little bit better every day, is a way I think we make a dent in the universe.

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Postscript: I, personally, believe the future of business – embracing complexity – is a future business model within which technology augments people in a way that facilitates constant learning and conceptual thinking  . i even have the draft of a book on this idea – combining complexity, people and technology. I, personally, believe any existing business could adopt a 100% emergent strategic outlook – people, left to their own emergent opportunities, will naturally build in the predictable/replicable parts out of some efficiency recognition.

That said. I could never have written The Adaptable Corporation, Cluetrain Manifesto, New Marketing Manifesto, Finite and Infinite Games as well as a slew of other books which have all fed my ‘mutt thinking.’ I highly recommend you read all of these books, as well as the newer book Agility (Tilman/Jacoby) which captures a lot of how I think, as well as any others I included in this piece. I would argue 99% of us will never have the answer, but 99% of us can find some answers in someone else’s thinking.

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“Technology is not nature, but humanity. It is not about tools; it is about how people work. It is equally about how they live and how they think.”

Peter Drucker, the essential Drucker (from analysis to perception)

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“When you improve the performance of a part of a system taken separately, you can destroy the system.”

Russell Ackoff

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“… in the basement of your organization is a diesel-powered database that has a geological strata of decades old data.”

Jarred McGinnis

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This is about the effect automation will have on jobs, employment and, specifically, on 50something employment.

With all the talk about how automation will replace jobs I’d like to take a moment and say that dwelling somewhere within the basement of your organization is a nuclear-powered database with the half-life of decades old data, it is called institutional knowledge and it resides in 50somethings (or people with significant industry and business knowledge & experience). And its about them I speak of today. Business is being transformed, but not by technology or automation. These things are simply liberators of time and mind of, well, people.

So. While this is about the role of 50somethings in the future of work I will begin with the effect automation will have on the future of work. Yes. They are related.

Increased automation

In 1999 The Cluetrain Manifesto laid out the automation issue for us albeit they did so in speaking about the Web (or technology):

Because the Internet is so technically efficient, it has also been adopted by companies seeking to become more productive. They too are hungry for knowledge, for the intellectual capital that has become more valuable than bricks and mortar or any tangible asset. What they didn’t count on were the other effects of Web technology. Hypertext is inherently nonhierarchical and antibureaucratic. It does not reinforce loyalty and obedience; it encourages idle speculation and loose talk. It encourages stories.

Of course, a percentage of jobs will, be replaced by automation. It would be absurd to not acknowledge that factories, and some businesses, will go running to automation in their attempt to efficiently, consistently, produce things 24/7. Entire industries will stare at balance sheets trying to assess what is the automation efficacy bottom line for manufacturing and doing business. A select few of idiots in the service industry will also do the same. I will not put a number on that and regardless of the number the people affected are harmed financially. But I believe the larger number effected will actually be within the 4 walls of businesses themselves. It was Mike Walsh who first made me think of it this way, but let’s assume 80% of a large segment of workers will have automation assume 20% of their current responsibilities. Now. Of course, business will immediately seek to consolidate employees, based on ‘hours worked’ to attempt to lower people costs and efficiently get an ROI from a traditional 40-hour week. Far too many will do this and while in the short term (maybe even a generation) they will do fine because once again they squeezed out costs and squeezed output from ‘less.’ It is a race to the efficacy bottom and simply squeezes out whatever paste is left in the tube rather than seeing if they can redesign the tube to hold more paste.

** note: this is reductionism at its worst. I will state the obvious; the danger of reductionism is it rarely tells us about construction. And businesses, while they may not word it this way, view automation as a way to ‘reduce’ – people, unevenness, human error, costs. The future of business will not be found in reductionism, but rather construction.

“I don’t think our goal should be to create conscious intelligent machines. Everything that makes a machine useful are generally the things that are not human, why do we need to create an emotional, unpredictable, volatile, machine and put it in charge of something mission critical. The whole point of machines is to do they can do the things we don’t trust humans to do consistently.”

Mike Walsh

Which leads me to construction.

The active energy in any business is not technology, its people. Technology can activate energy, or amplify, energy, but generally speaking, at best it is passive energy if not just sustaining energy (when designed well). But my point with automation is that there is an opportunity for it to activate energy (freeing up people) and amplifying energy (maximizing the people energy being generated from automation).

Which leads me to freedom.

Freedom (extra time to do things)

While I believe it would be helpful for business to think about how automation will free up people to use their energy to think conceptually and envision ideas, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out we may actually be circling back to a way of doing business.

Me, being me, tend to think of business issues cyclically and that the tools we develop and design simply solve one problem only to have us circle back only to find that the problem we solved only created maybe an even worse problem (so we go back to original work style). This has to do with machines beginning to do what people don’t need to do so they CAN do what they should do. In the way back business machine we had administrative staff. What they did was the stuff so that the thinkers/guiders/knowledge people could be ahead of the business and seeking out emergent possibilities (and problems/complications to solve). Then technology came along with tools which suggested anyone could do all the administrative things. All of a sudden, those ‘guides’ were being asked to build power points, craft correspondence, type correspondence, schedule meetings, etc. Business, seeking efficiency, actually de-optimized effectiveness. But with automation arising it would appear we would be going back to the old model where knowledge worker ‘guides’ could do what they were supposed to do (create and expand value offered by the business) while technology/machines created the infrastructure to permit them to do so. It seems like business is circling back to a better way of doing things simply by adopting new technology. That was a simplistic overview and I am also relatively confident business will want its cake and eat it too (take the automation AND still demand knowledge workers to do their own doing).

Just to provide some clarification on my thoughts:

As a generalization I have split the work force into three groups: guides, makers, support.

• Guides were the senior-ish people who could think conceptually, perceptually envision emergent opportunities as well as situational problems/challenges. The bulk of their time was in thinking and their doing was more as a facilitator rather than in making.
• Makers were the ones who made the things happen. They analyzed, built, facilitated and, in general, made projects happen on time, on budget and on strategy/mission.
• Support were mainly administrative people. They mainly handled the logistics of business and made sure the right materials were done right, put into the right hands at the right time (and made sure the guides & makers didn’t look stupid).

How those groups have evolved in the business environment.

• Pre-technology

One of the few positive things of the old hierarchy was the really good ‘guides’ had a boatload of people reporting to them. They didn’t really do ‘command & control’ they were actually more like a “queen bee” where everyone in their hive stopped by on occasion to get some guidance, check in on what they may be missing and get some good guidance to avoid obstacles, stem problems and gain some new insights (transferal of learning also occurred). This happened because makers made and support supported and guides guided. It wasn’t a flawless system, but the good guides were invaluable. They thought conceptually, saw systems where connections made things complex, but navigable, and tended to balance progress versus specific goals well. This may have seemed like a bloated system, but in general it optimized thinking & doing and pragmatism & possibilities.

• Technology

We often think of technology in terms of software, but we should also discuss it in terms of tools. Powerpoint, email, Microsoft office forever changed how business was conducted. But more importantly business itself, ever in pursuit of cutting costs and efficiency and profits, saw them as ways to become ‘leaner.’ These tools reshaped how business was conducted and how organizations started believing business should be conducted. In a way that the current ‘push decisions to the edges’ advocates now discuss, business started encouraging ‘support work’ be pushed out to the edges to those actually involved.

Some of the tools business embraced suggested some administrative tasks could become not only ubiquitous, but also be more efficient. I mean, who better to build a presentation than the one actually giving it? Who better to scheduled a meeting than the one who know s who should be in it and the topic? Who better to craft the correspondence than the one who is actually writing it? There was a sense that quality would improve (hiding the real desire for efficiency) if the person responsible did it all. This also bled out into meetings. All of a sudden, the presenter of the ideas was responsible for the set up & crafting of the presentation itself. The unintended consequences are obvious. All of a sudden, the ones who you truly desired to be thinking were actually having to not only learn how to do, but become masters of doing. Philosophically there was nothing wrong with this, but practically speaking business was trying to commoditize everyone on the wrong features.

My point is guides were no longer guides, but also makers and supporters. Makers lost invaluable experience interacting with guides and, well, business just lost support (who offered an important safety net).

I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that technology can never replace people, just compliment or supplement – business forgot that. Business emphasized pragmatism over possibilities.

• Automation/technology

Automation, while we often speak of it in efficiency terms, will also offer a business what is called “effective stationarity”. This is the importance of slowness (Jessica Flack, Santa Fe institute). We often talk about movement and adaptability, but every business and organization have some components of effective stationarity. Automation, in many of its forms, will offer a business some structural stationarity.

Now. That said. The opportunity for automation in busines is regaining what I believe was lost, in other words, something that ‘effective stationarity’ offers a business – time to think.

Reflecting on what I just said about original technology eliminating administrative level and responsibilities/doing shifting up versus handing some ‘making things’ off to other people, the consequence was “think time space” was lost. In the future I wonder if machines will simply fill up empty time (encouraged by business leaders who see time as money) or rather because of machines maybe it gives us back some of the reflective time we lost. If I am honest, my business correspondence improved by handing a draft to someone, doing something else, and then reviewing before it went out. My presentations were better when I handed them to someone, did something else, then reviewed it again. You get my point.

To conclude this thought.

All that said, the future resides in the businesses who maximize the new freedom and figure out how to maximize, specifically, the freed up 20%. Which permits me to circle back to Cluetrain Manifesto again. Business is never defined by technology; it is always, defined, and even redesigned, by people. Automation actually helps people navigate around existing obstacles. The obstacles do not get removed, just now mappable and navigated. People, unencumbered by these old obstacles, gain new freedom to craft news ways of doing things and even seeing things – conceptually and perceptually. In my opinion, the future of work, automation or not, will demand both conceptual and perceptual thinking, and ideas, and the environments in which those ideas can thrive (I call this the Conceptual Age Organization).

Which leads me to the fact we have some of these people sitting around right now – 50somethings+.

The experienced conceptual thinkers – the 50somethings+

Ok. 50somethings. Many of these experienced business people were extremely successful in a hierarchy, albeit chafing within the system, but have deconstructed their faith in hierarchy system without losing their faith in the business of doing business. If that sounds religious it is. I stole that idea from Ann Helen Peterson’s newsletter about “the anti-church of Glennon Doyle.” The point is that you can believe in capitalism, have faith in its potential goodness, and yet still have learned that the system itself is constructed on the wrong things to optimize your faith. These 50somethings may have lived within that system, but all the while, maybe in some small ways and some big ways, were attempting to deconstruct the system to show everyone a new way to live their faith. Automation is releasing many of the binds on the existing system and it is these experienced people who can guide people with their new freedom so that the business itself remains productive and doesn’t fall in on itself finding a new way of doing things.

This is not to suggest business shouldn’t be wary of 50somethings because not all 50somethings are created equal and new systems create new ways to access power (kind of like the televangelist version in business).

** note: I could write an entire book on why I think the business world is breeding crappier managers. In today’s business world when becoming a manager your only management thinking, or how to manage people protocol, is to encourage output, direct others to create output and crap on those who don’t generate output. All I can say is ‘garbage in, garbage out.’

To be clear. There is a relatively small percentage of 50somethings who have the ability to straddle generations <attitudinally> and have the ability to insert themselves into the younger generation’s minds and desires to strengthen the engine of progress rather than stall the engine.

“Everyone takes the limits of his own vision for the limits of the world.”

Arthur Schopenhauer

 

Not all 50somethings+ are created equal. Yeah. I am not suggesting all 50+ people are the same. And this generalization may be translatable to other age groups, but let me suggest there are three groups:

• Over 50 and all they know and believe in is what they were taught when they were in their 20’s.
• Over 50 and they have all the knowledge they need to be on their own and like being on their own (I call these builders)
• Over 50 and have accumulated iterative learning over the years and have a unique combination of old and new (and like renovating)

** note: Builders versus Renovators 

The first group is lost in the past. They will struggle because their thinking and ideas and even their vocabulary can be out of date. They will suck at transformation or renovation. Their hope is finding someone who needs to work on their internal construct of how to get shit done. But mostly these are the people when we were young, we thought were ‘out-of-touch’ from the real world (or chuckled to ourselves because they would throw out up to date buzzwords acting like they knew what was going on).

The second group has accumulated enough knowledge and expertise and confidence where mentally they have flipped from ‘working for someone’ to ‘working for myself.’ They have recognized their ability to build. And they like building (which is different than transforming). They would suck at transforming because they want to run the place and not simply be an enabler for the organization to shift. They could possibly be out of touch or they could be leading edge entrepreneurs. But it doesn’t matter because they are now going forward as their own boss.

The third group are the renovators. Companies should be fighting over these people. They are old but not old. They are experienced but still learning. They have a solid thinking construct but flexible in application. They may have their quirks (because I believe all of us older people start feeling more comfortable in our own skin and therefore are a little less worried about ‘fitting in’) but also tend to be more interested in the result than worrying about step by step how they get there. They can actually make the current buzzword understandable by using past functional learnings to explain them.

** note: When I say “fighting for these people” I don’t mean to suggest that companies should be stockpiling these people at the expense of young energetic fresh thinkers and doers. I am simply suggesting that companies need a good tier of these types to transform themselves when, frankly, a lot of companies need to be ‘transforming’ into a conceptual thinking learning organization. I am also not suggesting there should be a direct correlation between % of 50somethings in population and % of 50somethings in the makeup of business organizations. That would seem kind of silly to me.  But the numbers are pretty compelling that organizations should seek that third group of over 50ers. In 2009 The PEW Center had a study outlining the current generation gap is the largest in the almost 50 year history of the study. In that study an astounding 79% of Americans believe that there is a generation gap in the ways young and old think and believe. Truly the only way to bridge that gap within an organization and eliminate generational divisiveness is to have older experienced people who can effectively communicate with all age groups AND think conceptually.

50somethings can be the biggest enhancer of progress. Experienced business people do have some idea of what’s going to happen and this, in turn, affects what they do in the present. This is imperfect foresight, but foresight nonetheless which leads to probability management rather than predictability management (which is critical to conceptual thinking and systems thinking management). A polymath-like experience offers a quasi-rationality to form useful models the organization can work within effectively and efficiently. These experienced guides create the vague outlines within the abstract and make them concrete enough to enable progress.

** note: I am not suggesting these 50somethings have to be as good as the young at technology or whatever new innovative techniques out there yet to be discovered, in fact, it may benefit them to not be or even try. Their value is in their heads and experience and the nudging of ‘what can be’ using selected knowledge from ‘what was’ grounded in principled thinking. In fact. Let’s call it ‘selective principles learnings’ that can be effectively articulated.

“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.”

L.P. Hartley

Which leads to me how effective guides guide.

Manage and navigate, not command and control.

While I will begin by pointing out this small cadre of experienced 50somethings have deconstructed the command and control and have embraced managing freedom and navigating emergent concepts & thinking and have a unique ability to manage and navigate, a guide (regardless of age) will have an ability to lead messes.  Paradoxically, automation, intended to help better put pieces of the business together better, actually makes things messier. That’s the unintended consequence of automation just as technology or the Web did originally to business. let me explain (this is a derivative of an idea the Cluetrain Manifesto offered us in 1999). Automation is simply an extension of the deconstruction of hierarchy and command & control technology began. This may come as a surprise to the business leaders grasping for straws to hold together that thing they love called ‘control’. Automation will actually further deconstruct control which is actually a good thing because the future of business resides in lack of control, asymmetry and messiness. Automation further bulldozes the organization charts and exponentially enhances the potentiality of conversations, thinking, ideas and conceptual problem solving & opportunistic adaptation. Despite the automation, the business will have little symmetry, just some pockets of traction & consistency, and plans based on the automation are basically a fool’s errand or simply an acceptance of some basic acceptable mediocrity. True future of work automation businesses will be, well, messy. And they will demand a tier of experienced mess managers. Maybe they become ‘freedom navigators and guides.’

** note:  I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that, freedom given does not mean that it is freedom well used (I imagine a number of democratized organization or decentralized organizational theory advocates would agree with me). After residing within a command & control industrial system since birth (school sealed that deal) people need to be taught how to optimize their new freedom.

Why? The business who gives the freedom without some guidance (effective Guides) will begin looking at that freedom as ‘bad ROI’ or some failed experiment or some short-termerism viewed poor decision.

In conclusion.

The future of automation depends on the future of people in business. Social behavior and human imagination are inescapable. You either ignore the importance of human connectivity or optimize the interactions people do have. And while business is only becoming more complex and dynamic, I would argue this is where simplicity plays a role because human interactions are actually the simplest relationship within complex systems. Yes. It is a causal, linear, issue in business (and linear moments are gold mines for a business).

The future of business is found within a contradiction – automated and asymmetrical conceptual and perceptual. Pragmatism and possibilities. It will be, simultaneously, the maximization of automation and the unautomated human curiosity to explore. This continuous learning and curiosity is important because complexity, and complex dynamic systems, always have an inherent degree of randomness tied to those who use or interact with the systems (everything is connected with everything and, people, in general, create randomness). Automation, in the end, is about freedom and the future of work will not be defined by those who optimize automation but rather by those who optimize freedom the people in the organization have gained (assuming the business doesn’t use automation as an excuse to “downsize”, i.e., embrace reductionism).

Ponder.

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“Technology may have changed the hardware of your business, but culture is your true operating system.”

Mike Walsh

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I believe we typically discuss digital transformation in an inherently flawed way. We speak of it as a business objective and a business infrastructure. I know. I know. That sounds inherently reasonable.

But. Yeah. This is a mistake.

Most often this business objective is all about maximizing what the business sees as ways to optimize specific business strategies, sometimes a mission. In doing so they then build a system and demand everyone to work the system and optimize the system. Once again, sounds reasonable especially if a mission has already been defined and the people have bought into it.

But. Yeah. This is a mistake.

It’s a mistake because nowhere in what I just stated is “optimizing people.”

I’ll get back to that point, but let me finish up on how basic digital transformation discussions are flawed.

Rarely does anyone point out if every business approaches digital transformation as it is typically discussed, it becomes a race to “optimization commoditization” where the value can only be found in one of two places:

• Working the system better (kind of like training so you gain an extra .001 second in the 100 meter dash)
• The edges (continue to overdeliver against customers – which is a losing race because the bar, and costs, continue to rise squeezing profitability more & more – or continue to squeeze production ‘inputs’ like suppliers, supply, etc)

Both of these minimize business potential to the narrowest in possibilities and possible results. In other words, approaching digital transformation in a flawed way makes the ‘differential potential’ minimal – progress & growth but restrained from full potential.

I do not mean to suggest there is no business value in digital transformation just that we approach it incorrectly. I believe the minimalist way, but an important way, to view digital transformation as offering structural value creation opportunity. It has the ability to lift the foundation of the business house so the people within it can “move on up” (to steal a Jefferson’s phrase).

Where I believe most digital transformation experts miss an opportunity (beyond overselling a mis-defined structural value creation potential) is in how one should view digital transformation from a transactional value creation aspect. If you think through the transactional value opportunities, well, maximizing potential value has little to do with technology and the value creation potential resides more in people.

The reality is people represent the highest potential for business and highest differential (both of which optimize & maximize value potential).

Which leads me to –

People (the key to the transactional digital transformation value creation)

Technology should mold to the people, and their skills and potential and quirks, and not the reverse.

The pushback I get is “how can we do that, people come and go and I want to build the business for the future?”

First, I point out technology, or a digital infrastructure, is simply a means to an end. People are the future of any business, not technology.

Second. This question permits me to ask: “have you read Antifragile?” (my second favorite Taleb book after ‘Fooled by Randomness’). Your objective of a business digital infrastructure creates a fragile system. I should note this is similar to Goldratt’s principles that you should develop an infrastructure system flexible enough to adapt to changing context and dynamics in the marketplace.

A digital infrastructure should be flexible enough to adapt to changing people and the dynamics of individuals skills & potential. It should not be a ‘best practice system’ of which most of your people will use in a ‘less than best’ way.

Which leads me to –

Sensemaking and choice making

I can almost guarantee you that no one brings up sense making and choice making when discussing digital transformation which begs the question who will make sense of what digital offers and how will choices & decisions be made?

Far too often digital transformation experts will toss out “culture” and “skilling people” as a head nod to the role people play in the organizational success (and digital transformation), all the while suggesting the system is a ‘plug ‘n play’ construct where people just plug into the system as if people are technology & technology is people. That sounds nuts to me.

What is really nuts is how no one seems to talk about how digital infrastructure can be used to increase better sense making and choice making. Basically, they talk about how people will learn to use the digital infrastructure instead of the infrastructure augmenting people. That seems ass backwards to me.

Maximizing business productivity, progress & profit resides in better sensemaking (ability to make sense of situation) and choice making (effective decisions within good sensemaking).

I mean, how do you use the benefits of a digital infrastructure if you cannot identify the right problem/opportunity (sensemaking)?

Oh. Digital infrastructure/transformation is going to do the sensemaking? (insert me laughing so hard my sides hurt).

If one cannot make sense of what is, or is not, happening then choice making is useless.

Oh. “Data” provided by the digital infrastructure will make the choices obvious? (insert me laughing so hard my sides hurt).

Data only informs, it doesn’t decide. Yeah. Some of those digital transformation people may say that, but it is most often said under their breath after showing a bunch of fancy dashboards showcasing how data can make the choice paths obvious.

It seems crazy to me to have to say this, but, digital infrastructure informs decision-making/choice making, data informs decision-making/choice making, AI informs decision-making/choice making and all simply inform context needed to make sense of what is happening (sensemaking). None make decisions. All offer possibilities with probabilities associated (assuming someone can assess the possibilities and apply some probabilistic thinking).

Most importantly, in the end all will inform people. People will make sense of what they are informed by and inevitably make the most consequential decisions and choices. It seems like digital transformation people should be thinking about how people think. Maybe help them become digital/data/sensemaking literate (not experts, just literate).

But. That’s me. I think how digital transformation is discussed is inherently flawed.