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Innovation Through Emergent Order – Why We Need A Team Based Framework #thealphaswarmer #appreciative_insights

One of the most fundamental challenges in any start up is the formulation of the core leadership team that will define and augment the roles and responsibility matrix, delineate the mission purpose and vision; and offcourse the implementation of a set of contexts, toolsets and values that form the nexus of Organisational DNA. Furthermore, this sets the imperative on the formulation of strategic, operational and tactical plans. Whilst ensuring you plan is to ensure you dont fail – in a dynamic, networked and systems based approach – I recommend one to understand the nature of emergent order, chaos theory, perturbations and most importantly adopting ‘porous boundaries‘ to ensure you are rapidly responsive to the ever-changing customer demands and to the emergence of of new market niches!

In the Australian landscape, the last five years has welcomed the explosion of a plethora of agile hubs and incubators which have collectively inspires the image that our golden country is the perfect abode for strategic and disruptive innovators. Andy Clark (author of Leadership and Influence: The Manager as Coach, Nanny, and Artificial DNA) thoroughly investigates and amplifies the notion of emergent order in a startup or incumbant organisations resulting in the exemplification of ‘new’ organisational forms that are dictated by the increasing importance of knowledge and information, the decreasing costs of sharing and transferring knowledge and information across business boundaries, and the need to be agile in the face of non linear change.

Whilst the premise of this is that whilst a complex adaptive system does exist during the forming stages of a start-up, it needs to be supported by a set of robust team values, ground rules or ‘karma’ based principals. This means, that such a system is the emergent product of multiple, often very heterogeneous, interacting forces and that the crucial interactions are not controlled or orchestrated by an overseeing executive, a detailed program, or any other source of strict hierarchical control.

Given such diffuse, multi-factorial, self organising, and soft-assembled organisational forms, how can we (the startup leaders) intervene to push such systems in specific desired directions?

Part of the answer is to ensure you are receptive and open to fostering a culture of information sharing, setting accountability through transparency and encouraging autonomous and intelligent sharing of contextually relevant information which is then acted upon. This will only be possible if you agree and understand the beliefs of all team members, set clear and public accountability, trusted competencies, implement a give and take notion, define meaningful mission value and encourage outcome optimism. Once you pick your partners, you should give them full transparency and trust. You should develop consistent autonomous team member behaviours and always focus on win win being an outcome NOT a strategy! At times, this will mean all team members are leaders, sending out timely information opposed to issuing orders, and then letting the tenets of self organisation flourish. Speed of response, appropriate design of supportive communication and collaboration tools (I specifically use Jira Core, SLACK, Sharepoint, Microsoft Flow and Zapier to achieve this). Ultimately, you want to ensure that you at the very least, define what I learnt as the three rings of inner, middle and outer connectivity.

Ken Thompson, in this article, perfectly delineates this principal and by putting in place simple rules around team behaviours, you will optimise emergent complex behaviours that unify in an almost evolutionary like process of variation, selection and retention. All of this can be quite overwhelming, however, by truly appreciating the tenets of self organisation and putting in place simple behaviours and mindsets; you will be able to manage the unimaginable!