#systems
There is a ‘thing’ called Systems Thinking.
It was a new phenomenon around the early part of the 20th century and is covered amply by Wikipedia’s piece here on Systems Theory.
And here’s a terrific Medium post here by Leyla Acaroglu.
Now, I won’t repeat any of this fabulous download except to say this helped me realise that since getting to work on technology-enabled change in the 1990s, I’ve been in and around this area often without even knowing so.
Interconnectedness; relationships, patterns, emergence, synthesis.
If you’re an Organisation Design/Development or ‘Change’ practitioner you’re going to recognise all of those things; as much as the lines that are drawn, the flows that are plotted and the decision tree that comes from managing power dynamics and the construct of an ‘organisation’.
When I discovered Systems Thinking was a ‘thing’ I was excited and enthused that I’d been in this arena. And then, like I mostly do with things like this, all of sudden in a state of realisation that I was in deficit. How little I really knew about theories and models, I had not studied and therefore had little formal knowledge about this concept. I still think of myself as a Systems Thinking enthusiast and barely able as a practitioner.
What this post is about isn’t Systems Thinking per se, it is about the systems we operate in as people at work.
And in particular the lens of self-management, self-direction or self-determination — whatever term suits the absence of controlling management supervision by some people over other people.
I’ve read most of what I can find on the concept. I’ve immersed myself in the world of self-management as much as I am able to; and committed myself and my work for over 10 years now to this system.
I’ve seen good, bad, indifferent, fake, realistic and joyous versions of self-management and experienced it, worked alongside it and with other people who share similar beliefs and passions for it. I’ve heard from some real sages in the subject and since becoming a team at PTHR, we’ve been operating in a self-managed way. We describe ourselves as self-managed very much on purpose, proudly and with strong beliefs in it as our system.
And yet, many people I know in the self-management world will admit to this:
It’s hard, tough and complex. Harder even than orthodox management controlled hierarchies.
It is. Effectively what you do in a self-managed system is to remove that managerial control. This also removes some certainty; to some people, some safety; and it disperses power.
I’ve had stand-up arguments on topics like
- ‘there’ll always be a hierarchy’;
- ‘self-management is only for micro or tech companies’;
- ‘it’s a charter for coasters, slackers, fakers and breeds ill-discipline’;
- ‘It’s unproductive. It creates more hassle, misunderstanding and even tension’.
- ‘It will only work with highly self-motivated, almost altruistic people who are devoid of ego — and there are too few of those people in the world.’
So there will be lots of people who just don’t believe — or choose not to believe — that self-management has enough advantages to willingly unlearn orthodox management practices and then learn self-managed ways.
Some may ‘play’ in this space and say ‘we’re empowering you, so you be self-managed’. Yet the systems and infrastructure remain orthodox so somewhat negates, stifles or even marginalises any attempts to self-manage.
COVID-19 responses now have most of the knowledge-based working world operating in a dispersed fashion and has somewhat thrust the area of self-direction into the limelight. Of the inability to physically supervise others, and to more digital-only forms of connection and working thrown into the mix so that work can be performed from anywhere and thereby making supervision a more difficult model to operate in.
Words like agile, adaptive and the dreadful ‘new n*rm’ have entered our lexicon with an only patchy or superficial understanding of what these phrases mean in practical terms.
So in this state of dispersed working for knowledge workers, we’re somewhat reluctantly experimenting with new ways of working that require a lot more of a systematic approach to self-direction and yes, self-management. Sure we have an ERP (Enterprise Resource Programme) or CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system channelling work to us. And this may have data trails and accountability and allocation elements. But if you’re not being algorithmically allocated takes, and therefore work comes to you by email or another platform, and you don’t get allocated the work by a supervisory figure, you are self-managing (within a non-self-managed overall system). It’s still the traditional way, just devoid of perhaps immediate allocation by manager, yet still controlled by a sort of ‘managing spectre’.
You’re not being truly supervised unless digitally. With the awful advent of surveillance software for people’s digital machines - reporting keystrokes, browser use, random screenshots and camera takeovers.
In the vast majority of cases, you’re being trusted to manage your workflow, be productive, effective and efficient. Perhaps verbally, or in some form of a report, you are updating your ‘supervisor’ — who now, is really just another person on a Zoom Call, MS Team or Slack exchange and isn’t really casting the managing shadow they once were.
Anyway, instead of surveilling ‘workers’, might the more pertinent accusation or argument is directed to managers.
Asking precisely what they’re now doing if their teams are more self-directed.
Necessitating less supervision by an increase in self-management, there’s a decrease in management overheads surely? Yet those managers are still ‘there’. There’s only so much coaching the competent team needs to justify that type of (very welcome) support.
I already think we know the answer to that as we’ve made this happen already: They (managers) have their own work stack of projects, tasks and activities; that have not much to do with managing others.
So we’d already created autonomy by stealth and somewhat fudged management actions into the mix.
As a result created an unnecessary lag even a pause on things like decisions, innovation and impaired how people can be optimally productive as they have to check with their manager.
Anyway, back to self-management and the importance of it as a system.
Of course, it is a system. But it’s more than that. I get told that. And I also believe it is more than a system.
It’s also about mindsets, attitudes, beliefs, behaviours, values, agreements, models and philosophies.
I am intentionally getting behind the system aspect over the elements of the behaviours here, because I believe that people need a system in order to become clearer on the behavioural and attitudinal aspects of self-management. Yes, people’s behaviours — in the true spirit of self-management — can be ‘allowed’ to shape a system.
I do believe there is an important starting behaviour (intention to self-manage) you then really quickly need a system. Intent alone isn’t enough, and in my view nor is too big a focus on behaviours as the primary focal point once that intent is agreed as the agreed goal.
I’m of the view that without a system that enables people to discover the benefits and plusses of a self-management approach, we’re only ever going to be ‘preaching to the converted’ who already believe in self-management and I keenly want self-management (in all its derivatives even) to cross over to doubters, and become THE way to work.
So that’s why I think in starting, we double-down on the system that fosters and strengthens self-management. We need a system more than we need the behaviours because we learn the behaviours in that system. And if we don’t learn and adopt the self-management behaviours, then we clearly don’t WANT self-management.
We may decry management control and supervision, but if we don’t respond well to a system of self-management, then we won’t make it work. We should perhaps have to opt for more supervision and control. We clearly can’t trust ourselves to be unsupervised.
Therefore the faith in behaviours alone ‘making’ self-management happen is lacking in me.
People — perhaps because of the system they’ve been used to — don’t always respond well to new self-managed frames. Unless they’re being directed, they flounder, are subject to distractions, game the system a bit and can become that shirking, laissez-faire non-contributor that the knockers of self-management believe is a natural consequence of the removal of supervision and control.
So just because I wish
- hierarchies would soften and in many cases, disappear.
- leaders would let go of power (most, even all) and disperse that amongst people who will self-manage and organise and use that power to more collectively-accountable good.
- people would take accountability for what they’re there to do and not try and get away with a minimised variable performance.
- people would know when they’ve got it good and use the space in self-managed environments to the max. To learn, be on the front foot, take responsibility for your own workload and helping your fellow self-managed teammates.
- that more people would try experiments with more autonomous, aligned and adaptive working systems that self-management creates.
doesn’t mean it’ll all happen. We need a system that brings it to action and deliberate doing and being for people.
The system that has its own ‘pressure’ that isn’t oppressive management or human bias, but is a system that brings accountability, openness, transparency, reliability, creativity, engagement, application and ultimately, yes, performance.
I like performance. It’s not the only thing because you perform to DO something and CREATE an impact and ADD value. Performing is the verb of course, not the noun.
In self-management, I like and believe in three noun side of things:
- team agreements, not imposed management doctrine.
- visibility so that all can see how things are going and negate the need for a supervisor to check on everyone’s work.
- the honesty that you might be struggling, need help, have space capacity, want to learn and share with others, will give what’s needed for the greater good.
- that you choose your connection to the purpose, vision or team spirit that you never need a team-building or off-site to bond with others. You’re there because you have the agency of choice that it’s your choice to work with who you work with.
- that you’re a hive mind and not the followers of a manager’s disciple.
And all of these things require a system, processes and helpful guiding forces.
I love self-management more than most people I know who are fans of it, but we cannot rely on spirit or interest in it alone. It needs a co-created and well applied system, with processes and guidance.
Of course, when a system that facilitates self-management is established, some people who BELIEVE they are into self-management, might not actually like that system. It might feel counter to the autonomous ways they thought they were signing up to when they joined in with the self-managed effort.
Here’s the thing:
Knowing you’re going into a self-managed environment to work, you get to know what that means. Not just NO supervision. YOU take the role knowingly that the ethos is one of an accountable, open, helpful way of being to yourself, your own pride and your commitment to your fellow workers.
Open, accountable and helpful ways might need a bit of help then if you’re an easily distracted, low-commitment type who is used to being told what to do by someone else. You may have under-exercised or even outsourced your motivation to succeed to someone else (a manager) and when that’s removed your self-discipline may be under-developed or your temporary sense of liberation and no longer being supervised, turns into a drift, lacking motivation and actually missing the stimulus of being checked upon.
A system of self-management is partly there to replace that stimulus. You won’t get caught out by an overly inquisitive manager. You’ll catch yourself out because your lack of contribution will be as plain as daylight to you or your team.
So the system is the manifestation of the essence and the spirit of being self-managed. Of removing the burdensome lag of management supervision.
Since discovering self-management in and around 2007, I’ve found my system.
My behaviours have changed because of that system. My behaviours have somewhat shaped the system of self-management I feel creates the optimal space for people to flourish, feel fulfilled and successfully do their work in pursuit of a purpose, in line with stuff that means something to them and gives people a sense of worth.
Too under-developed a system will eventually rub up against behaviours which are not conducive to that ethos, essence and spirit.
Self-management is like love. You feel it and there are rituals, ceremonies and yes even processes that demonstrate and use that love. Whether that’s cooking a meal for your loved one without prompt, sending flowers just because or offering a kind and caring ear to a loved one in need. There is a still a system and a process at play that makes the most of that love. The noun and the verb.
So please, self-management believers, don’t underplay the system of self-management because of a romantic attachment to the behaviours and the beliefs. We need that system to counter the toxic yoke of control and biased management.
We can only overwrite the 20th-century technology of management hierarchies if we have a strong enough system to replace it.
Like the hippy movement of the 1960s, love shaped people away from over consumerism perhaps, but it’s taking an alternative system (protest activism and Green New Deal type proposals) to move us away from destroying the planet by asset stripping and natural resource plundering.
We need a system of self-management more than wishful optimism that believing in it will win over the orthodoxies of the industrial era. We need self-management to win hearts but also heads and hands.
And maybe we love it once we’ve built it rather than simply love it into existence.
Let’s build our future with a self-managed system we willingly give our working selves to.
