Message-Id: <olHkX80GgE6e0AVI00@mit.edu>
Date: Tue, 19 Mar 1996 14:19:36 -0500 (EST)
From: Bill Cattey <wdc@MIT.EDU>
To: ilead@MIT.EDU
Subject: Ideas from Peter Senge
Content-Length: 16758

Back in January I wrote this up to report on and spread information
from a talk given by Peter Senge over IAP.  My paper hasn't had
wide enough circulation.  I decided to share it with this group.

I hope you find it as interesting and helpful to read as I did to write it.

-wdc

----8<----

		Commentary on the IAP Talk by Peter Senge
			notes by Bill Cattey

Introduction
---------

On Thursday January 18, I attended a talk by Peter Senge. He is a
researcher in organizational dynamics, management theory and, systems
dynamics; a business business consultant and author of the book
_The_Fifth_Discipline_.  He is a Principal Research Associate at MIT's
Organizational Learning Center.

After reading his book I was very excited by his ideas.  I felt his
notion of "the Learning Organization" would have beneficial impact
where I worked. I felt I might be able, myself, to implement some of
them in work that I did and work I managed.

With the idea in mind of learning more, I went to his talk.  I took
many pages of notes.  This document is not so much a transcript of his
talk, nor a transcription of my notes.  It is a re-organized
presentation of what I got from his talk with an eye to providing some
nifty insights to others.

The talk itself began with Senge eliciting questions from the floor.
After he had a critical mass of issues, he began presenting ideas that
addressed the issues that either directly or indirectly underlies the
questions.  I found him a calm speaker -- someone who understood what
he was talking about, and comfortable saying "I don't know".  Most
importantly, he did NOT come off as some sort of charismatic proselyte
for ideas.  He let the ideas speak for themselves, and gave ample
attribution to research and researchers that further explored the
various ideas he presented.

Important New Ideas:

	Systems Dynamics is...
	Process Consulting -- a new paradigm for consultants.
	Motivation -- why would anybody want to change.
	Converging vs Diverging questions
	The Mysterious process of Innovation

Systems Dynamics is...
----------------------

The systems thinking concepts presented in the book
_The_Fifth_Discipline_ are based on the MIT research in System
Dynamics.  Systems Dynamics had been around for forty years.  It was
initially applied in an industrial setting with Jay Forrester's book
_Industrial_Dynamics_.  Digital Equipment corporation's founder, Ken
Olsen, was a student of Forrester's.  The Whirlwind project that got
the Digital folk started was ostensibly an application of Systems
Dynamics principles to produce a computing system for industrial
application.

Perhaps the difficulty that Ken Olsen had at the end of his time guiding
Digital in the marketplace and in communicating his vision of how to
operate the company was because, as Senge himself pointed out,
Systems Dynamics is useful, but not sufficient by itself to identify
strategic directions and motivate people.

Systems Dynamics was used to do strategic policy formation for
corporate policies in the 1960's, public policy in the 1970's (the
defining case being the book _Limits_to_Growth_), and then in the
1980's began to shift back to corporate policy.

There is a traditional introduction to Systems Dynamics: The Beer
Game. In it, the players act as distributors, retailers, or suppliers
of beer.  In the face of changing buyer habits, and time delays in
responding to orders, the players guess how much beer to order or
ship.  This delay causes the players quickly to discover that their
intuition invariably leads them to progressively poorer estimates
of supply and demand to the point where tremendous feasts and famines
result.

Senge pointed out that Systems Dynamics runs counter to most social
science.  The results you get are sometimes profoundly
counter-intuitive.  Systems Dynamics shows how nothing can be
completely understood, that all explanations are arbitrary or
partial or conditional, and that there are no right or wrong answers.
Western analytical thought, in comparison sometimes seems reductionistic
and causing fragmented understanding.  Some commentators on Systems
Dynamics say it pushes in a direction to think more with an artistic
than a scientific culture. Yet, a lot of the Systems Dynamics tools are
coldly mathematical. Senge says there is nothing wrong with hierarchy,
reductionism, management, science, or art unless the focus is too great
on one particular model, discipline or viewpoint.  Systems Dynamics and
the other disciplines that evolved to get people to adopt systems
thinking seems to involve spicing up the various paradigms with other
orthogonal ones.

The essence of appropriately applying systems thinking is:

Does it help people think more clearly?
Does it help people make better decisions?
Does it make the actions taken better?

Senge mentioned _Organizational_Development_(The_Human_
Side_of_Enterprise_)_ by Doug Mc Gregor.  It seems that this
book might provide useful insights as we re-engineer our own
management structure.


Process Consulting
------------------

If Systems Dynamics has been around for so long, how come it doesn't
seem to have caught on?  In the early to mid 1980's the "Learning
Approach" came out of the process of trying to figure out why the
Systems Dynamics ideas weren't catching on.  When Systems Dynamics was
first being brought in to corporations, there was only one kind of
consulting, so it didn't have a name.  Now we call it "Expert
Consulting" -- the expert comes in, figures out what is wrong, and
tells you what to do.  Expert consulting is popular at MIT because
we're a community of experts.  We like experts.  We ARE experts.

People trained in systems thinking are also trained to say "I don't
know".  But in the Expert Consulting model, consultants are not
allowed not to know.  As soon as you say "I don't know" your
credibility is suspect.  This created a disconnect between the expert
and the client.  But really, experts are the sorts who know a lot
about a little.  When an expert consultant comes into your shop, they
cannot possibly know as much about your business as you do.  So the
Expert Consulting model puts client and expert into a bind.  The
client expects the expert to be all-knowing, which is impossible.

When one applies systems thinking one often discovers where basic
intuition was wrong, and where the person himself created the
obstacles to performance.  This sort of thing was a very difficult
sell to managers.  By its nature, it alienates people by telling them
they are wrong.  Even if the CEO did take the message to heart and
make changes, it was a daunting task to progress the changes down
through the company.  At each level in the organization the manager
had to confront people with different paradigms, and get them to
accept something very different from what was comfortable and
intuitive for them.  It was extremely easy for the new idea to get
snuffed out along the way.  Honestly, can a consultant, a boss, or
ANYONE get someone to change how they act?  What about changing how
they think?

Researcher Ed Shein coined the term "Process Consulting".  In this
form of consulting, experts ask questions to elicit new thinking --
process facilitation -- to "tap the understanding that underlies the
undiscussables."  With process facilitation, the expert asks questions
and helps us see for ourselves how the problem is us.  And we end up
being the beneficiary of discovering our own expanded paradigm.

The original Beer Game (mentioned above) had no debriefing.  People
saw their distribution plans go crazy and then went home.  The only
thing people learned was that in a particular situation they were
wrong.  The players didn't really benefit from the experience.  Now we
understand that the most important part of the Beer Game is in helping
people work through the shock, and in developing a new paradigm for
thinking that incorporates the notion of delayed consequences to
actions taken.

So Process Consulting is asking questions, facilitating, and guiding
the client to new thinking rather than dictating actions.  This has
many beneficial outcomes.  Sometimes we learn things we already knew,
but with useful insights that enable us to take different actions.
Sometimes undiscussable issues can into understandings by answering
questions posed by a person trained in asking the right questions.  At
its best it reveals the gaps between how we do operate and how we can
operate.

Senge went further: He said that if the work of a process consultant
confirms what everybody knows it's less useful than if it turns up a
fundamental insight into what was done incorrectly in the past.  The
bigger the gap between past history and current ability, the greater
the potential for learning, and improved performance.

In Process Consulting it is ok for the consultant not to know all the
answers.  As an outsider, the consultant can't really know the
business as well as the people inside. Process Consulting better
reflects that reality.  The consultant brings to bear the external
perspective of an outsider.  This reflects the reality that one can
never understand all aspects of a system while being inside it.  Best
of all, knowledge gained from practicing the process of questioning
and systems thinking was nurtured within the company.  Eventually
the need for the consultant fades as the intervention by the
consultant succeeds.

Systems thinking seems now to be catching on better because of the
additional tools and methods that evolved at the Learning Center.
Three important aspects they had to pay attention to were:

	helping people talk to each other.
	bridging between different people's very different mental models
	recognition that making systemic change is difficult and takes time.

What's an example of systemic change? Shifting from individual to
collaborative modes of learning.  To do it right, you don't just show
up to class, or to the office one day and say "Working by yourself is
out! Working in teams is in".  It requires a vision of the new team
learning, and time for everyone to converge on some mutually agreed
upon ways of collaborating.


Motivation
----------

If change is difficult and time consuming, why would anyone want to go
through the painful process of making change?

People have been observed to change when they care deeply about something.

In his talk, Senge pointed out two primary motivators:

Aspiration  -- Long term view and vision.
Desperation -- Fear, Crisis.

In a desperation mode, people can't consider that there may be an alternative.

The systems thinking perspective is a long term, aspiration based
paradigm.  Senge said that if your people perceive themselves to be
in a crisis, do crisis management, and don't bother with Systems
Dynamics.  But he implied that the best long term results are achieved
when the long term perspective is followed and the Aspiration modes of
motivation are possible.  This is probably why some team leadership
training is in building the skill of getting a vision across to the
team members.

Senge said "Vision is a force in the creative process."

Under desperation, people are bad at inquiry.  Imagination goes away.
Even basic rhythms of breathing go away.  People hold their breath!
Motivating based on vision and aspiration is billed as a way of
getting people into a creative mindset where they will: examine their
experience, reflect on why they're doing what they're doing, be at
their best level of functioning, and be receptive to change.

The courses taught by the Learning Center now also incorporate
exercises in body awareness, for example, taking material from Aikedo,
to get people centered, and OUT of that desperation mode.
_An_Unused_Intelligence_ by Bryner and Markova talks about this issue.


Converging vs Diverging questions
---------------------------------

E.F.Schumaker's book _A_Guide_for_the_Perplexed_ talks about two
classes of problems: Convergent and Divergent.

A Convergent problem is one that people, through thought, and
discussion, and understanding will converge on one answer they agree
is right for the problem.

A Divergent problem is one where people of good will and intelligence
will never converge on one right answer no matter how hard they try.
The best that can be achieved with a Divergent problem is to harmonize
various people's different ideas as best you can.

Senge said Schumaker opined that mental illness comes from treating
divergent problems as if they were convergent ones.

How to educate our children is an example of a divergent problem.
Senge suggested that it would involve thinking better, and
recognition of inherent inconsistencies in what is being taught.  It
would involve more than just curriculum design.  It would involve
attention to the institution that delivers the curriculum.  How is the
school managed and led? What is the role played by the community?  See
_The_Stuff_Americans_Are_Made_OF_ by Hammond (and another author not
in the notes) for more discussion of the diverging problem of
education.

Senge suggested that in an ideal management structure, the managers
would be totally focused on the divergent problems because the
convergent problems would all be handled by the people in the lower
levels of the organization.  Probably the worst management structure
is one in which subordinates utilize the intrinsic divergence of some
issues to sabotage rivals.


The Mysterious process of Innovation
------------------------------------

Senge defines innovation as "New technology that creates a new
industry or fundamentally changes an existing industry" whereas an
invention is just a new technology by itself.  Examples of innovations
are:

	Rayon/Nylon
	The Jet Engine
	The DC-3 Aircraft

So innovations are where inventions, or groups of inventions are
actually put to use.

It is usual for 50 to 90 years to pass between an invention and its
application.

It was not only the inappropriateness of the Expert Consulting
paradigm that was an obstacle to the adoption of Systems Dynamics.  It
was also that the invention of Systems Dynamics lacked the crucial
other inventions which, when bundled together made a critical mass.
In his book _The_Fifth_Discipline_ he describes the disciplines of
"Personal Mastery", "Mental Models", "Shared Vision", and "Team
Learning".  In his talk these four others are sort of smooshed
together into two broad categories:

"tools for talking through different mental models" i.e. ways of
communicating with other people.
"vision/shared vision" i.e. ways of
motivating people.

The important idea he presented was that innovation happens when
multiple, independently developed inventions, come together at the right
time with a critical mass.

Critical Mass:

Both in the lecture and in _The_Fifth_Dicipline_ senge talks about
commercial aviation and how there were five critical inventions that
had to come together before commercial aviation caught on.  Only in
his lecture did he remind people that two years before the DC-3
aircraft embodied the crucial five inventions, Boeing had produced a
plane with four of the five.  The lack of wing flaps meant that an
otherwise viable commercial airliner was not quite stable enough at
takeoff and landing to catch on.

Right Time:


The following two graphs count the number of innovations and the
number of inventions to have been identified over time.

    |
    |
    |   Innovations counted in particular years
    |
    |                               x
    |                              x x
    |                  x           x  x
    |                 x x         x   x
    |         x       x x        x     x
    |   x    x x    xx   xxxxxxxx       xxxx
    |xxx xxxx   xxxx                   
---------------------------------------------------
   1800      1830      1890     1930     1975


    |
    |
    |    Inventions counted in particular years.
    |
    |
    |
    |                            xxxxxxxxxxxxx  
    |                 xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
    |        xxxxxxxxxxx
    |xxxxxxxxxx
-----------------------------------------------------
   1800      1830      1890     1930     1975

These observations came to be accounted for in the "Long Wave Theory
of Innovation".


Although the number of inventions is a simple increasing function, the
number of innovations -- applications of the inventions has peaks and
troughs.  The peak years of innovating correspond to periods of
economic depression.  The deeper the depression, the greater the
number of innovations.

The correlation between economic depression and innovation is a
significant one.  Senge points out that "Growth is tied to creative
destruction".  A fundamental innovation does NOT build on what is
already in place.