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(MRC SIG) › Working Group B: What principles are important in dealing with complexity?
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Up::1
Did you know that the Institute of Risk Management in UK also has a Special Interest Group working on Complexity and Risk. In the last meeting we talked about looking for other sources of advice and opinion. The link to IRMs SIG is
https://www.theirm.org/join-our-community/special-interest-groups/risk-and-complexity/
Up::1I think we are talking about a handbook for Project Leaders to help them have constructive conversations with decision-makers (strawman example attached). This could be developed by offering a comprehensive range of approaches that a project leader could adopt as circumstances suited.
Unfortunately I’m very busy at the moment otherwise I’d develop more fully- but offer a basic strawman sample as a starter.
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.Up::0Following todays discussion (which set me up in a good mood for a very busy day) I was reminded of the work with the Knowledge management group at Henley Management College. We were lucky to be often joined by Stephen Denning who subsequently wrote a great book on business story telling.
He offers a story telling catalog, different approaches for different messages. I like the first of these and thinking if it is the basis of a story construct we can use;
Sparking action.
Leadership is, above all, about getting people to change. To achieve this goal, you need
to communicate the sometimes complex nature of the changes required and inspire an
often skeptical organization to enthusiastically carry them out. This is the place for what I
call a “springboard story,” one that enables listeners to visualize the large-scale
transformation needed in their circumstances and then to act on that realization.
Such a story is based on an actual event, preferably recent enough to seem relevant. It has
a single protagonist with whom members of the target audience can identify. And there is
an authentically happy ending, in which a change has at least in part been successfully
implemented. (There is also an implicit alternate ending, an unhappy one that would have
resulted had the change not occurred.)
The story has enough detail to be intelligible and credible but not so much that listeners
are but – and this is key – not so much texture that audience becomes completely
wrapped up in it. If that happens, people won’t have the mental space to create an
analogous scenario for change in their own organization. For example, if you want to get
an organization to embrace a new technology, you might tell stories about individuals
elsewhere who have successfully implemented it, without dwelling on the specifics of
implementation.There is a full chapter here: http://www.stevedenning.com/Documents/Leader-Ch-1.pdf
After all Elihayu Goldratt did pretty well promoting Critical Chain approach using nothing but stories. Maybe the time for stories has come round again ?
Up::1Hi Team
Attached is the agenda for today’s meeting and the risk map that was discussed during the meeting.
The risk map is a PowerPoint presentation with some draft thoughts on possible approaches – it is easier to see if you run it as a presentation.
I will transcribe the discussion and post when complete. Please use the forum to consider:
* How might we agglomerate the risk map into a few key themes;
* What possible options might we consider as we go forward;
* How might we take the discussion forward from here; and
* What would you like to see in a presentation to ICCPM members to show our progress to date, and encourage more people to be part of the MRC SIG
Cheers
Davin
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.Up::1That is a useful nuance to this pedestrian mind, thank you Davin. I still wonder whether we are trying to change world view, with such change still challenged by one or more of the aspects of human resistance to change? Knowing each human decision-maker is different based on experience, maybe the real challenge lies in understanding their actull mix of cognitive biases which have prevented many decision-makers from seeing our attempts to educate and demonstrate using logic in making our case?
Looking at the risks identified in the risk map and assuming that world view is the issue to change, I am not sure that tackling these will change anyone’s beliefs and way of interpreting the business because the mitigations to these risks are largely logical – show/demonstrate, educate and the like.
We are of course tackling these from the view of logical analysis. But as one WG member said during our dialogue (and captured as ‘Green #2’ in the risk map) in terms of the past decade, we have tried evidence and logic but not made much of a dent in the world views of many decision-makers. We all seem to be searching for a change from insanity by repeatedly presenting evidence to seniors. I believe we are often seen to be snake-oil salesmen these days pushing the ‘complexity buzzword, and dismissed.
Perhaps we need to accept the challenge of the ‘wake-up call’ and the variation of the audience needing to be awoken as indicative of great uncertainty and approach this as a complex project in itself with a challenging outcome of changing beliefs or overcoming resistance and/or cognitive biases? Maybe the right approach is more to do with probe, sense and try again?
Or, perhaps it is time to focus our efforts on ways to shift world views: finding decision-maker’s peers and past mentors who ‘get it’ and have influence; addressing the potential related factors of typical resistance (offering an incremental approach to building a company complex project capability/ecosystem (with the first phase being the risk treatment system)that leaves phase control in their hands as evidence builds to support further investment in the follow-on phases); wprking to test the cognitive biases of our seniors and then focus on shifting those; focusing at the ISO level to build a standard for the conception and execution of complex projects (as was more recently done on sustained collaboration under ISO 44001)?
Or perhaps our Working Group needs to work on a list of options that we offer for Project Managers to try (individually or as hybrid strategies) in nudging problematic world views?
Whatever we do, two of the risk map items are important – we must mitigate the issue of time available for seniors to invest in understanding, adopting and then applying the appropriate practices; and we need to find ways of skirting those who will filter whatever messages we are sending ‘up’.
Ian
Up::1Thank you Ian,
You are correct – I had not included the behavioural aspects into the risk map. I had thought to address them in the potential responses, but they should be in the risk map as well. Amended map attached.
I believe the critical underlying causes of the elements you have referred to (inertia, effort, emotions and reactance) from Nordgren and Schonthal’s ‘The human element’ arise from the world views that people hold. (Please note that I have not read the text, so if I am wrong on this, my apologies). People’s world views lead to ways of seeing and feeling about the world, which lead to behavioural predispositions (not behaviours as there are a few steps between predispositions and actual behaviours). These behavioural predispositions may, or may not, be compatible with the goals and objectives of the organisation. In this case, an interest in, and a willingness to apply complexity methods and tools.
I refer you to my post in Working Group A on 24 May 2021
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.Up::1Some useful points Stephen.
As I reviewed my own notes from the last meeting, two things stood out for me as new and important that, unless I have missed them in the Risk Map (always possible), I do not see in the updated Risk Map: (1) We are facing behavioral challenges (I would add, to change), and (2) Changing just the organizational leaders’ perspectives will still fall short without a supporting ecosystem (I would add, tailored to address complex projects and with a swept up risk treatment system at its core). I think that these are important concepts raised that we should ay least reflect on before dismissal.
On behavioral change when faced with the need to change to a new system, very recent research captured in a new book entitled THE HUMAN ELEMENT by Loran Nordgren and David Schonthal (Now available by pre-order only) identifies four elements to resisting change (paraphrased here): inertia (comfort with the past), effort (how much is required to make the change, part of the Return on Investment judgment), emotions (from grieving loss of beliefs and past system investment) , and reactance( how much control will one have over the change and how fast must it be done). It strikes me that seniors and unaware stakeholders will suffer all these, but leaders of organizations will certainly see significant effort required to create a new ecosystem and with a potential (likely?) high level of uncertainty even after the changes required. Hence it becomes a question of incentives to motivate them to get over their resistance, it seems to me. And that causes me to wonder whether contracting-out a trial complex project to another organization with the necessary ecosystem – and the ability to reset the expectations and mindset of internal seniors – may be an option. But putting aside my suggestion of ‘buying’ a solution, perhaps this is one line of consideration for us?
As to the suggested restatement of our role, I think the restatement around ‘selecting the right models and thinking’ would be applicable AFTER you wake them up by which I mean get them to the stage to be open to change?
As a final point for me for now, I am a big fan of putting all of the sources of risks in front of individual members of the Governance body at the front end, along with ‘best case’ post mitigation residual risks and interdependencies, to scare them into reframing and resetting both their expectations AND their resource application to the ecosystem.
For your consideration colleagues – Ian
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Up::1The risk map is a useful summary of what we have discussed. I believe we have not really grappled with the core, perhaps root cause, of the problem, which the current topic encapsulates. People don’t understand or see the presence of complexity.
On the question “Is the issue one of waking up project leaders and stakeholders…… or having complex projects use more appropriate approaches and tools that deal effectively with complexity?” I say it is the former. We can devise the most elegant tools we might imagine but, unless senior people realise why they are required, it will all be in vain.
Imagine an archetypal 60 year old director of major projects who has installed detailed approvals, monitoring and reporting processes to keep track of his (and it will usually be ‘his’) empire. How do you pitch to him the fact that he is missing the point?
Crafting clever risk analysis and management techniques is seductive but it will be no use if the key stakeholders are not interested.
Up::1I would like to suggest that Working Group (WG) B has well examined the grounds leading to the topic title over the first two meetings. We could continue the discussion in the same way, but we have probably covered the main matters, and risk ‘spinning our wheels’ by just carrying on in the same way.
I have cleaned up the risk map for WG B based on these first two meetings with Richard’s help (see attached).
I would like to use this map as the starting point for our third meeting on 3rd June, and propose that we consider the following:
* Does the topic title still truly represent what WG B is trying to grapple with?
* What possible responses emerge from our thinking to date, and how will those possible responses impact on the influence chain shown in the risk map?
* How would the group like to proceed from the outcomes of the third meeting?
IS this OK, or what would the group prefer to do.
Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.Up::0In our second Working Group (WG) discussion,there was wide agreement that behaviours were one of the key reasons that the problem exists. Not all types of behaviours are bad or inappropriate for managing complex projects. In the experience of the WG members, what types of behaviours have you seen that might contribute to the problem of sleeping project managers and project owners? As a suggestion, I have listed some possible behaviours that could contribute to the need to wake up, or at least encourage an appropriate response, to complex projects by project managers and project owners:
* We have always done it this way, and we should honour the traditions and knowledge of those who came before us by following the processes and procedures that they developed.
* The organisation sets the rules and processes that we should follow, and it is not within our remit to start following some new ideas that have not been approved by management.
* If I follow your ideas, and it doesn’t work, I will be blamed for project failure and it could negatively impact on my career and promotion opportunities.
* We should consult with all stakeholders before changing processes and procedures that we have all agreed with in the past.
* I am in charge here, and you lack respect for my position by bringing up stuff that I have not approved.
I am sure you have numerous examples of the types of behaviours that have created barriers to adopting more appropriate approaches to complex projects that you have been involved in. Would you be willing to share some of your experiences?
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