The Interventions Insights

Large System Interventions is one of the OD interventions that works on a principle of whole systems. The interventions encompass the involvement of all stake holders either working with smaller groups set by set to large groups in a room with a process that facilitates understanding and emerging of the vision for the people in the organization. The idea of bringing all the stakeholders related with the issue it brings in both inside-out and outside-in approach. The LSI has multiple approaches which address organizational issues such as defining out vision, cultural change (Diversity and Innovation) and structural change (Re-structuring, Mergers and Acquisition) through practices such as Open space Technology, Action Learning and Future search. The examples of IBM Value JAM, Vodafone and Idea Merger and other examples of similar nature involve processes that are mentioned above in bringing in buy-in from the stake holders The concept of emergence is fascinating as the proces...

Understanding Emergence Given that large training and education that focuses on reductionism, as individuals and groups we enjoy trying to reduce complexity and chaos so that it makes more sense to us. Even in the field of large system to change, the reductionist school emphasised that need for reducing complexities, thus the focus on building and using models, that simplify the complexities in organisations into well defined boxes. However when we look at change, and particularly large system change, the focus is on being able to transform that entire organisation,  a comprehensive shift in how the organisation was working, delivering and believing in so far. For such change to happen it is important that all aspects of the organisation are looked into , and thus following well defined diagnostic boxes may not capture the essence of large scale transformation. This brings into fore the power of emergence. Emergence  refers to the process by which a complex set of actors...

Today we discussed in the class of LSIP about the consulting workshop that we had on 21 st June. It helped us to understand consulting and its different types and different strategies. There is one very important thing came into the discussion which is Systems Thinking. It is one of the most important elements of Organizational Development and Change Management Consulting. System thinking is very interesting way to understand any problem and it is different from the conventional way where we study problem isolated from the systems. It talks about mainly sum is greater than the whole. We cannot understand a problem without its relationship with the system. In every system, we should study first the parts of the system and second its interconnections, its relationship with other parts. Only then we can study the system perfectly. Any change in any part of the system affects the whole system. But conventionally when we look at a problem we just study problem not its interconnectio...

A system represents a complex dynamic between its various sub-units. One of the most visible parts of a system is the reinforcing loop. The reinforcing loop is perhaps most visible because it works on an incremental basis. It is that fundamental element in a system that defines growth and increment. As defined by Senge, a system is said to be in a reinforcing loop when each small action builds on the other. This snowball effect of each action building on the previous one can either lead to a virtuous cycle or can actually lead to decline of the system. Most often reinforcing loop, perhaps because of it name, generates a perception of it being that element of the system that fosters growth, thus giving it a positive connotation. In systems thinking however, the concept is far broader. It refers to those elements or actions within the system that lead to amplification and maintenance of certain behaviours. This amplification does not necessarily mean that the behaviour that is gen...

Organisational issues present tend to sometimes manifest as chronic problems, repeated attempts by the organisations to overcome the chronic issue doesn't yield any result and at the mist leads to a superficial solving of the issue. Why does this happen? Organisations while addressing their chronic issues, tend to focus on pain areas rather than focusing on the real issue. for eg: Lack of brand presence in the market, can be because of poor bard building, but if repeated attempts at brand building are nor helping the brand visibility then the problem has to be something deeper. The Reinforcing Loop: But why is it that organisations are not bale to get over their chronic issues? the answer lies in what we call reinforcing loop. Organisations are doing certain activities successfully. the successful completion of their activities helps the organisation achieve its stated goals, because the organisation achieves the stated goals it develops certain assumptions. It could be the...