by Robert Axelrod, and Michael D. Cohen / Hardcover / Free Press, The / April 2000. Format: Hardcover, 605pp. ISBN:
this is page https://denmanni.tripod.com/ProbRes.lhtm, and FILENAME C:\Problem Resolution in Organizations.doc;
(A short and incomplete working paper in progress. Begun 12-Jan-2001; last rev. 23/01/01.)
By Dennis R. Mannisto, Technical Writer. Compuware Corporation, Professional Staff.
Copyright © 2001 Dennis R. Mannisto. All rights reserved. Also see INDEX for all my personal pages.
Peers Must Provide Answers; Managers Must Broadcast Them
x~abstract goes here~x
A better(?) method to resolve problems relieves managers of the duty to resolve by remanding resolution to peers of the complainer. Natural inclinations suggest it is worthwhile (going with the flow of nature), and political history (peer review, jury of peers) reveals a penchant for the method. Testing is required to verify the method's effectiveness.
(This section originally written 3/30/2000 ~ 5pm EST.)
When, in corporations, a worker at any level has a problem the typical recommendation (in the US in year 2000) is to take it to a supervisor or other higher up. Unfortunately this contradicts, or at least disagrees with, natural processes as the manager's disagreeable response indicates. In nature, for example, in a wolf pack the individuals make their own choices but effectively achieve goals that no single wolf could reach. This occurs not because a weak wolf turns for help to a pack leader; rather the stronger one's strength simply fills up the void of power. Thus, it is not authority that resolves challenges, but peer support. Such support may or may not be intentional; a self-serving individual wolf's action proves selfishness operates within the pack. Back in the corporation misguided management discourages selfishness, the cumulative effect of which could serve the well being of the whole team; instead mgmt. reserves authority to resolve problems to itself and weakens the gestalt of the team.
For challenges, then, corporate behavior can improve by reaping the benefits of a billion years of evolution. Rather than escalate, as a matter of policy, a problem out of the hands of individuals, remand problems to the individual's peers. A garage full of mechanics will usually find help and solutions from each other faster than they would from their boss. Typically workers turn to their peers anyway, rather than obeying policies. The boss, similarly will find answers among equivalent bosses.
This natural inclination to work with peers involves trust in their competence, freedom from fear of retribution, and freedom from obsessive greed: one has little to gain from those who are equal to oneself. This frees someone from any desire to impose on those peers. The net effect is that a sense of safety for each one in the group increases as does stability of the entire group of peers; the feeling may differ from actual "safeness," but it works. Peer group stability does tend, quite obviously, to stagnate, solidify, and harden into an impervious mass that cannot benefit from fresh ideas. It (the group) may take on a life of its own, independent of the individuals, to the point that the individuals who initially benefited must relinquish their energy to serve the whole.
Acknowledging achievement and resolution via peer interaction also explains, or is at least suggestive of, the basis for formation of the U.S.: "all men are created equal" reduced the white male King George III and raised white male farmers to the status of peers of the King. In their minds women were not peers, nor were blacks, nor were native tribes people; but at least all white men were mandated as equal. Luckily, legal equivalence has expanded over time. But so have disparities. Rich men have common problems with one another, and single welfare moms share problems, but the two groups have little in common beyond their humanity.
Problems that any individual has are most likely resolved most quickly by turning to a peer rather than to an authority, or a servant, or predecessor. Indeed, turning to someone outside one's peers is expected to bring new trouble that could be avoided; it is therefore avoided and often discouraged. As an example, teenagers rarely turn to their parents for solutions to problems, and only turn to teachers when little is at risk, or when so much is at risk that solutions require authoritative weight to back up the teenager. In a corollary situation, non-peers who attempt to intervene with proposed solutions rarely enjoy success and may even, such as when police face domestic violence, precipitate new problems that the original peers mutually confront before returning to their original difficulty.
That is the essence of my completed my thought: peers provide more answers than bosses. Let me, though, break it down.
Consider Ignatius, the employee, of a typical Western business. Iggy might perform manual labor, he may teach, he may manage billion dollar client accounts. Regardless what he does, he generally works at what he knows how to do. Occasionally he faces problems that he has never faced. This could mean his wife left him and now he faces his ignorance about laundry, or his work presents a peculiar arrangement of boards on the construction project at work, or his millionaire client just died intestate.
Someone, though, has a problem for which they need a solution.
What does he do? Typically a human being turns immediately to someone nearby. This could be physically nearby at the next desk, or personally close as in a close friend, or it could refer to a professional colleague on the other side of the country. In every case the typical person first tries to find someone who is an equal to get help solving the insoluble problem.
{...to be continued ...}
x~material goes here~x. {escalate to higher and higher levels farther and farther removed from the problem}
x~material goes here~x.
Rather than following the preceding typical process, take a second look at the natural inclinations of individual people and develop and benefit from those tendencies. Specifically, someone faces a problem. He deals with it competently, or he tries and fails, or he hesitates in order to look for a solution he lacks. When looking for an answer his first action is to turn to the closest people, and from them he chooses the person most similar to himself, i.e., a peer. This is natural, common, expectable, and most often sufficient for a solution.
However, when this peer also lacks a solution, the two will seek other peers and ask for answers. When he has finally exhausted all possible peers (which may occur immediately if he works alone), then he turns to the next closest authority over him. In organizations, this is the supervisor; freelancers turn to experts. But they always go to the next highest level; rarely, if ever, does anyone seek assistance from an inferior (whether younger, less educated, less wealthy, etc.) Corporate rules usually require what has come to be called "escalation" to higher levels. The problem typically is resolved or kicked up to successively higher levels, until it reaches the top.
But suppose we change the typical process ever so slightly. Once the supervisor has a problem, he will solve it of course. But if he cannot, then rather than kick it up a notch, he must ask his peers. This is what he would prefer to do, just like any other human being; he wants to continue looking capable rather than incapable to his boss.
One more change in method. If the peers to the supervisor cannot provide answers, this still cannot justify escalation. Each of those peer supervisors have staffs, "inferiors" if you will, who are actually peers of the original person with a problem. Thus, each supervisor must first ask his staff for solutions. They are the most likely to have either proven solutions or innovative answers since they, as peers to the first complainer, face the same problems more often than any higher authority.
If and when no one in the expanded pool of peers provides an answer, then and only then do the supervisors report back to the first supervisor about the lack of an answer. In that case, then it gets escalated and not before. But then, at the manager's level, she follows the same process of asking peers, who in turn ask inferiors, who in turn ask inferiors who are peers of the one with the original problem.
Peers help peers.
Thus, peers will always get answers from peers simply because expansion replaces escalation: expanding the pool of peers who can provide answers. It effectively evades, if not defeats, the famous "Peter Principle" in which people rise in their organization to their level incompetence.
This should also (but it remains to be proven) seriously reduce every supervisor/manager's workload and stress level. Because of this, it will reduce the expense of additional management staff.
Managers must go beyond simply receiving the results, and acknowledging resolution. Instead they must disperse that answer, along with the original problem, to as many others in the organization as possible. Otherwise, when the same problem recurs elsewhere the entire process must be repeated; concealing, or burying the knowledge under forgetfulness loses both the knowledge the cost of gaining it. It is more cost effective to pass along the knowledge gained; it enhances the power of the organization proportionally to the number of recipients of the newly acquired knowledge. Secrets defeat success. Again,...
Secrets defeat success.
A second benefit occurs when knowledge spreads. It awakens new innovation, often simply by triggering a chain of thinking unrelated to the original problem. Innovation, while risky, keeps organizations alive with robust vitality.
{x~incomplete~x.}
By acquiring knowledge, the organization enhances its effectiveness. By spreading the acquired knowledge the organization enhances its potential for effectiveness. By permitting any and every individual in it to easily find and use any acquired knowledge, and to do so on demand, organizational effectiveness compounds.
{...to be continued ...}
x~material goes here~x.
{x~incomplete~x.}
A person has a problem but lacks a solution. First, ask peers. If no immediate group of peers are available, then ask the supervisor. The supervisor either [1] provides the best answer, or [2] remands it to the staff under his / her command. Staff provide one or more of [a] the proven (tried and true) answer, [b] possible answer (reasonable, but untested), or [c] admission of insolubility. If [a], then the supervisor disperses the answer to the entire staff to enhance team knowledge and effectiveness. If [b], then the possibility is presented to peers with a request for comments, improvements, or knowledge of its likely success or failure. Possibilities are then tried or dismissed, at the mutual discretion of the manager and / or original sufferer. If tried, they are proven useful or rejected. Regardless the outcome, the manager disperses what was learned to his staff. Failure of all possible answers requires the manager to expand the pool of peers who might have an answer. This is the equivalent to the third initial possibility [c], an admission of insolubility.
Insolubility requires that the pool expands, so the manager contacts peer managers. This action repeats the fundamental peer to peer and peer to manager to peer request for help. They, the expanded group of managers, may similarly provide immediate answers, possibilities, or admissions of lack of answers. However, this level requires that they each seek answers from their staff(s) before admitting insolubility. The peer managers, in other words, must seek answers from lesser staff that are approximately peers to the original complainer. These peers reply to their managers, who reply to the source manager, who replies to the originator. Every successful and failed solution is broadcast to all in order to minimize duplication of effort, repetition of mistakes, and to maximize repeated success.
Imagine a problem going up one level, then across and down to your neighbors; their answers go back up, back across, and back down to you. If no answers come, the question goes further out sideways, then down to your distant peers to attempt to solve.
Peers provide answers for peers.
Managers expand the pool of peers.
Managers broadcast the answers.
Peers learn and effectiveness improves.
This paper presents an alternative method to solve problems within organizations. I did not, however, give proofs, nor provide a record of testing and resulting data that you would expect from an academic research paper. Mine is strictly a theoretical model derived from observation, reading, and a little logic.
Proof can be derived from testing; this is why scholars do it before publishing papers, and why speculative work like this is rarely published by serious journals. As I have none of the financial, labor, or test-bed resources at my disposal I chose to write and present this for those who do have them. I ask only that I be sent the results and copies of any written materials (articles, etc.) prepared from those results.
This working paper simply presents some thoughts that grew out of my private (i.e., non-professional) reading, particularly in the area of Complexity Studies. However, it probably formed itself simply because my work had recently included a year-long assignment writing corporate policies for a client. Since I could not use my thoughts on the client's behalf, I put them together here. Perhaps someone can use them; perhaps they will remember using my work and, miracle of miracles, actually pay me! (Royalties are best. :-) )Anyway, Complexity Studies as a field of scientific inquiry only began in the last decade or so, in the 1980s and then in earnest in the 1990s. The current hub seems to be the Santa Fe Institute, in NM, USA, but it has a large academic following at some major world universities; at least one, the U. Mich., even offers a graduate level certificate in the field.
My notion of peer to peer problem resolution may or may not be new to anyone, especially to scholars. Nonetheless, I have found no such presentation of it in anything I've read. However, two references that are very closely related to my thinking are a book by the scholars Axelrod & Cohen, and a website and organization by corporate titan Dee Hock.
Herewith, some references:
Harnessing Complexity:
Organizational Implications of a Scientific Frontier
by Robert Axelrod, and Michael D. Cohen / Hardcover / Free Press, The / April
2000. Format: Hardcover, 605pp. ISBN: 0684867176. Price: at Barnes & Nobles, $20.80.
The dustjacket version of this book says that organizations can improve their performance simply by focusing on three main issues: variation (encourage experimentation), interaction (share so that the value of experiments enhances the company), and selection (avoid premature reward or cuttoff.) Most reviewers genuinely liked the content, but some complained about the textbook like presentation and style from two scholars. Nonetheless, it gives a practical method for day-to-day use of the cutting edge theoretical science of complexity studies. I haven't finished reading it just yet, but it appears to allow what I've suggested.
- Business Use of Complexity: Chaordic.org
See http://www.chaordic.org/ This web site gives an entirely new method for forming businesses and other organizations, and derives its method from scientific complexity studies. It significantly differs from Axelrod and Cohen's method, primarily because it addresses the formation of new rather than the workings of old organizations. However, they report some success. The founder of this group is Dee Hock, the former CEO of VISA®, thus a leading example of business-by-central-authority. He has parted from his old ways here, and now advocates an organizational form that combines the best of both order (central authority) and chaos (absence of organization.) The term he coined combines chaos and order into "chaordic."
The chaordic (pronounced kay-ORD-ik) method involves seven deceivingly simple steps that may take many months of hard work to definitively resolve. They are: Develop a Statement of Purpose, Define a Set of Principles, Identify All Participants, Create a New Organizational Concept, Write a Constitution, and Foster Innovative Practices. Then begin iterating (repeating) the process to "draw the pieces into a Whole." I particularly like the example principles on the website. My peer-to-peer notion would fall into the last of the seven steps, fostering new practices.
- Academic Model for Retail Use of Complexity
I also found a recent academic paper about centralization vs. decentralization at SFI with this footnote: [p. 27, note 15:] "...It is optimal to couple a decentralized structure with indiscriminate transfer of ideas by HQ" ( Chang and Harrington, 1999.)
### E N D ###
Invitation
I welcome comments, whether good, bad, useful, useless, formalized or smart-ass. Without your comments, I'm just alone on the road, talking to the wind. Email me. Oh, and thanks for reading it!