The Interventions Insights

In my last blog, I shared my journey of using FutureSearch to create a New vision for i labs at TISS. In this blog, I share the journey of co-creating an LSI for a social sector organization in Kolhapur, Maharashtra. Part 2: How World cafe Transformed an NGO in Kolhapur Two months after we conducted the i labs visioning exercise, One of the core members of i labs, who is a student of Livelihoods and Social Entrepreneurship- Social Work went to Kolhapur for her Rural Practicum. It was a one-month stint with an NGO in Kolhapur that works with farmers in areas of livelihoods, health and education. The NGO was a 15 Member team, of which three were founding members- The Director, Secretary and Treasurer. The other twelve were employees of the organization who had spent between one to seven years with the organization. During the stint with the organization, the TISS students noticed several dysfunctional elements in the team- there was no clarity of the direction in wh...

HABITS, PROCESSES AND ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE Organisations run on processes and habits, not just a few but hundreds and thousands of them put in place by the managers for smooth functioning at some time.   These could be referred to and has come to be recognised as the corporate culture. Habits form a large form of corporate culture but the entirety cannot be defined by it. However, the habits, routines are in fact processes in practice, outnumbering the actual no. of processes. Therefore, if we talk about improvement, then it should be our endeavour to bring in continuous improvement by changing both the habits as well as processes. Gradual and continuous improvement and bringing about change in both the processes and habits is what pertains to LEAN Movement. Lean implies continuous improvement. Lean Process Improvement is the process of continually reviewing a process identifying waste or areas in a process map that can be improved. It is an on-going feedback process of ...

I was first introduced to Large System interventions through a course in my Masters program at TISS. I was very fascinated by the idea of creating solutions for complex systems using group wisdom. Over the course of my next three months of the semester, I actually put my theoretical knowledge of LSI to practice. Here's an excerpt of my experiments with LSI! Part 1: Envisioning a future for i labs using Future Search i labs is a student-led platform that promotes the spirit of entrepreneurship at TISS Mumbai. Founded by three TISSians- Ajay (HRM), Priya (LSE-SW) and myself, Chaitanya (ODCL) in January 2019, i labs had come a long way from being just a series of entrepreneurship talks. In June 2019, we conducted impactathon- a competition for Juniors on campus to create solutions for real-world problem. After celebrating the overwhelming success, reality hit the three of us- We had just 9 Months left on campus. This also meant that what we created as i labs would ...

THE POWER OF HABIT For humans, change is difficult. To bring about a change in habit becomes incredibly difficult at the starting point itself. Why? One wonders… Most of us are under the delusion that we’re making decisions all day long. However, most of the actions we take on a daily basis are habitual. The start may be a conscious decision, a choice but becomes a loop with reinforcement and ends up as habits. We do such actions without thinking. At some point, we started with a decision, which later became automatic. Overtime, these habits become deeply ingrained. This book focuses on how habits emerge within individual lives. Duhigg, in this section, explains the neurology behind habit formation. THE NEUROLOGICAL COMPONENTS OF HABITS Habits begin with a CUE, a trigger telling you which habit to use and puts it into automatic mode. A ROUTINE, acts out as a habit, which could be physical, emotional, and mental. A REWARD, is the result of routine and reinforces h...

Large Scale Interactive Process Methodology The LSIP is a methodology which simultaneously involves large or very large groups of people by enabling impactful conversations leading to transformational changes. It is used for formulating, strategizing and implementing change.  In this method, consultants see themselves as an expert in the process of WSI and view clients as an expert in the content. The process could be participative or democratic depending on the context of change. The method employed is based on the formula of DVF > R for change to happen wherein D= Dissatisfaction, V= Vision, F=First Steps and R=Resistance to change.  The role of the consultant is to create a shared understanding of the above components. They make the dissatisfaction with the current way of things general knowledge, undertake vision activities to make people visualize a common future and develop first steps to achieve the said vision. While th...

SYSTEM THINKING PARADIGM Systems innovation can be seen to be based upon the premise that the system we are interested in is not functioning. On a foundational level or a vision of how the whole system could be better. When we extrapolate this out we can recognize that many of the systems in our society and economy are not functioning as they could. We often hear the word broken associated with health care or educational systems. There is widespread recognition to the unsustainability of many systems such as how we do food production to how we manufacture retail and use consumer goods. This leads us to the conclusion that maybe there's something not quite right about this whole set of systems that make up our economies. Once one comes to this insight one is then invariably driven to make some inquiry about why and what might be done about it. A superficial inquiry would lead us to the conclusion that whoever is managing these systems is just doing a bad jo...

Systems thinking – It is the ability to see both the distinct elements of a system or situation and the complex and changing interaction among those elements.    Systems – An entity which maintains its existence through the mutual interaction of its parts. A system is composed of at least two elements and a relation that holds between them. (Akoff (1971)) Simply put systems is set of interrelated parts that function as a whole to achieve a common purpose.   Systems thinking is a world of purpose, context, interconnectivity and behaviour. Systems thinking is one of the major tools of systems analysis (the application of systems theory). A diagnostic tool with a disciplined approach for examining problems more completely and accurately before acting, allows us to ask better questions before jumping to conclusions. It is a universal and powerful frame work used in a number of situations, disciplines and fields. It is used to gain sufficient understanding and ins...