1) The document discusses the concept of agility at the enterprise level and proposes that true agility is the ability to successfully cope with and adapt to changes.
2) It defines an enterprise as an entity comprised of organizations working towards a shared mission. True enterprise agility results from good systems engineering and an organizational culture that empowers employees.
3) The document argues that understanding complexity and change is key to enterprise agility. It cites frameworks like John Boyd's OODA loop to emphasize the importance of quality information to improve situational awareness and decision making.
The document discusses the differences between ITIL v2 and v3, but argues that the question of which version to adopt is not important. It states that both versions cover the same fundamental processes for improving IT service management. The key is for organizations to focus on mastering the core aspects of incident management, problem management, change management and service level agreements, rather than debating v2 vs v3. Once the basics are stabilized, an organization can consider refinements in v3, but the most important thing is taking action to improve, not getting distracted by questions over framework versions.
Strengthening Operational Resilience in Financial Services by Migrating to Go...run_frictionless
Operational resilience is a key area of focus for financial services firms, and could be thought of as the next goal in addressing systemic risk in the financial services sector. Regulators are also increasingly focused on this risk: it is recognised that despite many years of bolstering financial stability by enhancing financial resilience following the financial crisis, the shocks that come from the operational side can be as significant as the shocks from the financial side.
https://runfrictionless.com/b2b-white-paper-service/
How More Industries Can Cultivate A Culture of Operational ResilienceDana Gardner
A transcript of a discussion on the many ways that businesses can reach a high level of assured business availability despite varied and persistent threats.
The document discusses semantic interoperability within a company. It describes several tools that can be used to describe and structure semantics, including ontologies, tagging, classifications, and taxonomies. It provides examples of how these tools can be applied at an enterprise level, including enterprise ontologies, tag clouds, the Zachman framework, and IBM's Information Framework.
Menos nascimentos numa cidade com falta deESEP Jornal
O documento discute o aumento de nascimentos na cidade de Portalegre em Portugal. Relata que em 2014 e 2015 houve mais nascimentos na cidade e que os nomes mais comuns foram Maria e Clara para meninas e Rodrigo e Miguel para meninos. Entrevistados atribuem este aumento à mudança na perspectiva dos residentes, que agora têm mais esperança no futuro da cidade e decidem ter filhos mais cedo.
This document summarizes a community stakeholder meeting held in Region 8 on July 9, 2015. It includes an agenda with sections on housekeeping, welcome messages, introductions of the PRC Region 8 team members, a presentation on using an audience response system, and the results of several polls questions answered by attendees about substance abuse issues in their community. The purpose of the meeting was to gather input from local stakeholders on key concerns around alcohol, tobacco, other drugs and mental health in the region.
Este documento explica el uso del tiempo presente simple en inglés. Se utiliza para expresar verdades generales, hábitos y rutinas, así como eventos futuros programados. Requiere el uso del verbo auxiliar "do" en forma negativa e interrogativa. La forma del auxiliar cambia a "does" para la tercera persona singular. Proporciona ejemplos de conjugación afirmativa, negativa e interrogativa en el presente simple.
The document discusses the differences between ITIL v2 and v3, but argues that the question of which version to adopt is not important. It states that both versions cover the same fundamental processes for improving IT service management. The key is for organizations to focus on mastering the core aspects of incident management, problem management, change management and service level agreements, rather than debating v2 vs v3. Once the basics are stabilized, an organization can consider refinements in v3, but the most important thing is taking action to improve, not getting distracted by questions over framework versions.
Strengthening Operational Resilience in Financial Services by Migrating to Go...run_frictionless
Operational resilience is a key area of focus for financial services firms, and could be thought of as the next goal in addressing systemic risk in the financial services sector. Regulators are also increasingly focused on this risk: it is recognised that despite many years of bolstering financial stability by enhancing financial resilience following the financial crisis, the shocks that come from the operational side can be as significant as the shocks from the financial side.
https://runfrictionless.com/b2b-white-paper-service/
How More Industries Can Cultivate A Culture of Operational ResilienceDana Gardner
A transcript of a discussion on the many ways that businesses can reach a high level of assured business availability despite varied and persistent threats.
The document discusses semantic interoperability within a company. It describes several tools that can be used to describe and structure semantics, including ontologies, tagging, classifications, and taxonomies. It provides examples of how these tools can be applied at an enterprise level, including enterprise ontologies, tag clouds, the Zachman framework, and IBM's Information Framework.
Menos nascimentos numa cidade com falta deESEP Jornal
O documento discute o aumento de nascimentos na cidade de Portalegre em Portugal. Relata que em 2014 e 2015 houve mais nascimentos na cidade e que os nomes mais comuns foram Maria e Clara para meninas e Rodrigo e Miguel para meninos. Entrevistados atribuem este aumento à mudança na perspectiva dos residentes, que agora têm mais esperança no futuro da cidade e decidem ter filhos mais cedo.
This document summarizes a community stakeholder meeting held in Region 8 on July 9, 2015. It includes an agenda with sections on housekeeping, welcome messages, introductions of the PRC Region 8 team members, a presentation on using an audience response system, and the results of several polls questions answered by attendees about substance abuse issues in their community. The purpose of the meeting was to gather input from local stakeholders on key concerns around alcohol, tobacco, other drugs and mental health in the region.
Este documento explica el uso del tiempo presente simple en inglés. Se utiliza para expresar verdades generales, hábitos y rutinas, así como eventos futuros programados. Requiere el uso del verbo auxiliar "do" en forma negativa e interrogativa. La forma del auxiliar cambia a "does" para la tercera persona singular. Proporciona ejemplos de conjugación afirmativa, negativa e interrogativa en el presente simple.
2022-10-25 Smidig Meetup - from Silos to System.pdfSmidigkonferansen
FROM SILOS TO SYSTEM: BUILDING AND MANAGING ORGANIZATIONS AS SYNCHRONISED NETWORKS FOR THE AGE OF COMPLEXITY
Dr. Domenico Lepore will talk about shifting organizations from silos to systems that are fit for the age of complexity.
Waterfall was never so much of a development management method addressing a customer demand issue. Rather, it is a build management method addressing a product management issue. See how.
The document provides a summary of key insights from "The SRE Report 2024". It discusses 7 insights explored in this year's report, including:
1) Most organizations agree that reliability practitioners should monitor productivity or experience-impacting endpoints, even if outside their physical control, recognizing that reliability engineering must adapt to a multi-party way of building services.
2) Learning from incidents is seen as a universal business opportunity.
3) AI is not seen as replacing human intelligence anytime soon.
4) Smaller companies are often ignorant of specific service levels, while larger companies monitor them closely.
5) No single monitoring tool can handle all needs on its own.
6) E
This document discusses how cloud computing enables business agility. It defines key terms like agility, business agility, IT agility, and cloud computing. The main points are:
1) Cloud computing allows businesses to access resources on demand, enabling greater flexibility, responsiveness, and cost efficiency.
2) Business agility refers to the ability to rapidly adapt operations, innovate new capabilities, and scale up or down quickly in response to changes.
3) Cloud computing addresses the traditional IT cost-agility equation by providing resources in a flexible, on-demand manner that drives business agility through rapid access, analysis, deployment, and scaling of operations.
The document introduces the concept of semantic intelligence, which represents the ability to process data and information based on semantic patterns and rules to gain insight. It also represents the ability to harness shared knowledge in a more efficient, automated way across organizations. Semantic intelligence is defined as supporting complex data relationships, combining structured and unstructured data, complex visualization, rules and knowledge collaboration. It has the potential to unify analytic approaches and technologies to provide a more specific set of solution expectations.
This document provides an overview of agile management principles and practices. It discusses how agile approaches aim to help organizations be more responsive to changes in their environment through principles like empowerment, measurement, collaboration and quick iteration. The document outlines three levels of uncertainty that organizations face and how their need for agility depends on factors like incomplete knowledge, variation in workflow, and the novelty of their work. It also discusses how agile approaches require both more control and empowerment compared to traditional management styles.
The document discusses co-creation of learning and social CRM from an academic perspective. It summarizes the author's research on how actors within value networks, including customer, supplier, partner, and internal networks, collaborate and learn from each other. Interactive technologies help foster emergent learning and creativity within these networks by enabling adaptive leadership and increasing interactions between diverse agents. Organizations play an enabling role through social initiatives like social CRM and enterprise 2.0 to foster co-creation of learning and adaptability across various value networks.
The document discusses how organizations can leverage enterprise technologies to improve performance. It addresses focusing efforts, capturing needed knowledge, leveraging resources, and measuring results. Social media relies on interactive dialogue while social networking uses technology to build networks of shared interests. Key challenges include information overload, costs of social obligations, and information pollution. Metrics like profitability, utilization, quality, and innovation are discussed for measuring organizational performance.
Week 5An Introduction to Systems AnalysisComplex Systems.docxmelbruce90096
Week 5
An Introduction to Systems Analysis
Complex Systems
We all come from and live in complex systems – cultures, economies, political organizations, families, and so on – but one of the constant themes coming out of research in the social sciences is that the level of complexity in our world as a whole is increasing at an exponential rate.
When we talk about a complex system, we are talking about a network of diverse, connected, interdependent, adaptive parts (Mitchell, 2009). We can contrast these characteristics with those of a complicated system that may have diverse parts working together, but they cannot to change.
For example, imagine a watch: it has many diverse parts, connected to each other, and operating in tandem to keep time, but you cannot remove any of its parts without causing it to cease to operate.
On the other hand, imagine a lake: it also have many diverse parts, also connected to each other, and also operating in tandem as part of an ecological environment, but some of its parts can be removed without shutting down its functions, even if its ecology changes.
A watch is a complicated system, while a lake is a complex system. Our discussion here is far from a purely academic one.
Complexity matters for understanding complex systems because they require particular problem-solving approaches. Our understanding of problem-solving approaches to complex systems might benefit from first examining the characteristics of more traditional problem sets and problem-solving approaches to them.
Problem solving is all about optimization, by which we mean finding the optimum solution to a problem. We might understand problems in the first type of problem set by thinking about them as “Mt. Fuji” problems. Mt. Fuji problems are those for which we can find one optimum solution. Take, for example, the problem of figuring out how many rounds of bullets we should issue police academy cadets to teach them how to shoot properly.
We might do this by issuing them a certain number of rounds for practice and then seeing how many can pass the requisite qualification test. Lets say we start with 50 rounds for practice and we find that 25% of the cadets pass the test. Then we give a new group of cadets 75 rounds and we find that 50% pass. 75% pass at 100 rounds, 85% pass at 125 rounds, and then 95% pass at 150 rounds. At 175 rounds we find again that only 85% are passing, and when we increase it further to 200 rounds the passage rate falls back down to 75%. Clearly we would want to do some more investigation into the reasons behind the decline, but suffice it to say that we reached our peak passage rate at 150 rounds. The point here is that in our example, we have one optimum solution to our problem.
Other problems look less like a simple line moving up towards a point and then declining and instead look more like a series of several periods of optimization surrounded by periods of lower optimization, which we might refer to as “Appalachian Mou.
The document summarizes the findings of an IBM study on complexity in IT systems. Key findings include:
1) There is no single agreed upon definition of complexity or approach to reducing it in IT.
2) Complexity depends highly on context and can be classified into different types.
3) Mathematical models from other fields may help understand complexity in IT if applied.
4) Complexity management has parallels to quality management that could be leveraged.
The study is a first step toward defining a discipline around IT complexity management.
I need citations and references to this solution that was pr.pdfaarokyaaqua
I need citations and references to this solution that was provided.
Problem: Several innovations in data management are reshaping the IT landscape. Among them
are: server virtualization, storage virtualization, desktop virtualization, artificial intelligence, cloud
applications, and the near future network virtualization. As an executive, we will ask ourselves,
and discuss, the extent to which the virtualization of processing portends the removal of a
dedicated IT staff. We will discuss the extent to which the CIO is no longer the manager of a
dedicated expert staff, but fully engaged in vendor management and service oversight. Finally we
should ask ourselves the extent to which bricks and mortar will even define the corporation as an
entity. The corporation, or at least its administrative wing, is more of an abstract. Does it matter if
the processing engine of your corporate data is in Bangladesh or Nairobi? Does it matter what flag
the vendor's employee's salute or what god they worship? Once we have achieved global network
infrastructure stability and redundancy, we may find ourselves seriously questioning our
understanding of "corporation" or even employment. Discuss: What is the balance between
sustaining the interests of the corporation's stakeholders (shareholders. Executives, the board of
directors) and sustaining the interests of our staff? Is our traditional staff (bound by the
"contractual" arrangements) significant when weighed against the interests of the stockholders?
This is not an easy or obvious question. Start with Eisenhart. The discussion is not about server
virtualization. That is a footnote to illustrate how technology renders more efficient that which
people once did.
SOLUTION: (The question of balancing the interests of a corporation's stakeholders and its staff is
a complex one that requires careful consideration of multiple factors. At its core, this question is
about the relationship between the corporation and its employees, and how this relationship
impacts the corporation's ability to achieve its goals and create value for its stakeholders. One way
to approach this question is to consider the work of William Eisenhart, a management theorist who
developed a model of organizational effectiveness based on the concept of congruence.
According to Eisenhart, an organization is effective when there is a high degree of congruence
between its strategy, structure, and people. In other words, the people who work for the
organization need to be aligned with its goals and the way it operates in order for it to be
successful. In the context of virtualization technology, this means that the corporation needs to
carefully consider how it uses this technology to achieve its goals while also ensuring that its
employees are able to adapt to the changes it brings. This may involve providing training and
support for employees as they learn to work with new technology, as well as creating a culture of
innovation and continuous learnin.
In the next normal, the Internet of Things is the default production environment, and because of the autonomy, diversity and pervasiveness of its actors, the business cannot focus management on being a supply manager of I.T. -- instead it must be a highly competent demand manager of the information used by things - the technology's information.
The organisation is a system of interrelated and interdependent elements (People, Process, Tools etc.) and as such is somewhat complex. Organisation Agility (Change Capability) is primarily determined by the Organisation System Maturity. By building the right organisation capabilities and their maturity levels we can improve its agility. This paper presents a method for building Change Capability Maturity (Agility) leveraging the Organisation Capability Maturity Framework (which is underpinned by Dynamic Systems Maturity Theory) couples with Agile Practice roll out (leveraging the Agile Manifesto & Principals)
How Financial Firms Blaze a Trail To New, More Predictive Operational Resilie...Dana Gardner
A transcript of a discussion on new ways that businesses in the financial sector are avoiding and mitigating the damage from today’s myriad business threats.
Complexity Theory and Why Waterfall Development Works (Sometimes)Larry Apke
A huge debate rages on in IT these days. There are two rival camps - traditionalists who subscribe to the "waterfall" methodologies and agilists. Most recent evidence suggests that agile methodologies have an edge in project success rates but the traditional methods are still widely practiced and do result in some project successes. There are reasons for the successes of agile and traditional projects that can be explained by complexity theory. This presentation will examine some interesting information about waterfall and agile methodologies and show why complexity theory can help us to predict the relative success (and failure) of applying these methodologies to software development projects.
The document discusses organizing IT asset management. It argues that assets should be managed to support availability of environments for business processes on demand. This requires aligning assets to business needs, managing assets as resources through their utilization impacts, and creating value through flexible and efficient resource utilization. Key goals are to turn existing investments into private clouds and coordinate new approaches to delivering business functions from external applications and services.
Striking a Balance Between Physical and Digital ResourcesOlivier Serrat
Except for entirely virtual libraries, the symbiotic relationship between the physical and the digital is innately powerful: for superior outcomes, it must be recognized, nurtured, and leveraged; striking a balance between physical and digital resources can be accomplished. This paper examines the subject of "delivering digital" from macro, meso, and micro perspectives: it looks into complexity theory, digital strategy, and digitization.
Managing Interdependencies in Complex OrganizationsNicolay Worren
Presentation held at the Organization Design Forum conference in the US, 2006.
For more on this and related topics, see my blog http://www.organizationdesign.net
Adapting to New Realities: The Emergence of Network Organizations and Work Sy...Sociotechnical Roundtable
The document discusses the emergence of network organizations and work systems as a way for companies to gain agility, speed, and adaptability. It provides examples of companies like Apple, Fairview Health, and Cisco that have created internal and external networks for purposes like innovation, collaboration, and rapid change. These network models are becoming more formalized and allow organizations to optimize current processes while also adapting to new challenges through self-organization and reconfiguration. The network form is well-suited to handle flexible, adaptive tasks, as it can construct unique relationships for each problem rather than relying on fixed hierarchies. Overall, the document argues that today's organizations require both hierarchies for optimization and networks for adaptation.
This document provides a survey of trust and reputation systems used for online service provision. It discusses how trust and reputation systems can help address information asymmetry between service providers and consumers online by allowing consumers to see ratings from other consumers about their experiences. This creates incentives for good behavior from service providers. The document provides an overview of different trust and reputation concepts, system architectures, reputation computation methods, examples of commercial systems, and challenges in reputation systems with proposals from literature to address these challenges. It aims to bring coherence to the different proposals and developments in this area.
2022-10-25 Smidig Meetup - from Silos to System.pdfSmidigkonferansen
FROM SILOS TO SYSTEM: BUILDING AND MANAGING ORGANIZATIONS AS SYNCHRONISED NETWORKS FOR THE AGE OF COMPLEXITY
Dr. Domenico Lepore will talk about shifting organizations from silos to systems that are fit for the age of complexity.
Waterfall was never so much of a development management method addressing a customer demand issue. Rather, it is a build management method addressing a product management issue. See how.
The document provides a summary of key insights from "The SRE Report 2024". It discusses 7 insights explored in this year's report, including:
1) Most organizations agree that reliability practitioners should monitor productivity or experience-impacting endpoints, even if outside their physical control, recognizing that reliability engineering must adapt to a multi-party way of building services.
2) Learning from incidents is seen as a universal business opportunity.
3) AI is not seen as replacing human intelligence anytime soon.
4) Smaller companies are often ignorant of specific service levels, while larger companies monitor them closely.
5) No single monitoring tool can handle all needs on its own.
6) E
This document discusses how cloud computing enables business agility. It defines key terms like agility, business agility, IT agility, and cloud computing. The main points are:
1) Cloud computing allows businesses to access resources on demand, enabling greater flexibility, responsiveness, and cost efficiency.
2) Business agility refers to the ability to rapidly adapt operations, innovate new capabilities, and scale up or down quickly in response to changes.
3) Cloud computing addresses the traditional IT cost-agility equation by providing resources in a flexible, on-demand manner that drives business agility through rapid access, analysis, deployment, and scaling of operations.
The document introduces the concept of semantic intelligence, which represents the ability to process data and information based on semantic patterns and rules to gain insight. It also represents the ability to harness shared knowledge in a more efficient, automated way across organizations. Semantic intelligence is defined as supporting complex data relationships, combining structured and unstructured data, complex visualization, rules and knowledge collaboration. It has the potential to unify analytic approaches and technologies to provide a more specific set of solution expectations.
This document provides an overview of agile management principles and practices. It discusses how agile approaches aim to help organizations be more responsive to changes in their environment through principles like empowerment, measurement, collaboration and quick iteration. The document outlines three levels of uncertainty that organizations face and how their need for agility depends on factors like incomplete knowledge, variation in workflow, and the novelty of their work. It also discusses how agile approaches require both more control and empowerment compared to traditional management styles.
The document discusses co-creation of learning and social CRM from an academic perspective. It summarizes the author's research on how actors within value networks, including customer, supplier, partner, and internal networks, collaborate and learn from each other. Interactive technologies help foster emergent learning and creativity within these networks by enabling adaptive leadership and increasing interactions between diverse agents. Organizations play an enabling role through social initiatives like social CRM and enterprise 2.0 to foster co-creation of learning and adaptability across various value networks.
The document discusses how organizations can leverage enterprise technologies to improve performance. It addresses focusing efforts, capturing needed knowledge, leveraging resources, and measuring results. Social media relies on interactive dialogue while social networking uses technology to build networks of shared interests. Key challenges include information overload, costs of social obligations, and information pollution. Metrics like profitability, utilization, quality, and innovation are discussed for measuring organizational performance.
Week 5An Introduction to Systems AnalysisComplex Systems.docxmelbruce90096
Week 5
An Introduction to Systems Analysis
Complex Systems
We all come from and live in complex systems – cultures, economies, political organizations, families, and so on – but one of the constant themes coming out of research in the social sciences is that the level of complexity in our world as a whole is increasing at an exponential rate.
When we talk about a complex system, we are talking about a network of diverse, connected, interdependent, adaptive parts (Mitchell, 2009). We can contrast these characteristics with those of a complicated system that may have diverse parts working together, but they cannot to change.
For example, imagine a watch: it has many diverse parts, connected to each other, and operating in tandem to keep time, but you cannot remove any of its parts without causing it to cease to operate.
On the other hand, imagine a lake: it also have many diverse parts, also connected to each other, and also operating in tandem as part of an ecological environment, but some of its parts can be removed without shutting down its functions, even if its ecology changes.
A watch is a complicated system, while a lake is a complex system. Our discussion here is far from a purely academic one.
Complexity matters for understanding complex systems because they require particular problem-solving approaches. Our understanding of problem-solving approaches to complex systems might benefit from first examining the characteristics of more traditional problem sets and problem-solving approaches to them.
Problem solving is all about optimization, by which we mean finding the optimum solution to a problem. We might understand problems in the first type of problem set by thinking about them as “Mt. Fuji” problems. Mt. Fuji problems are those for which we can find one optimum solution. Take, for example, the problem of figuring out how many rounds of bullets we should issue police academy cadets to teach them how to shoot properly.
We might do this by issuing them a certain number of rounds for practice and then seeing how many can pass the requisite qualification test. Lets say we start with 50 rounds for practice and we find that 25% of the cadets pass the test. Then we give a new group of cadets 75 rounds and we find that 50% pass. 75% pass at 100 rounds, 85% pass at 125 rounds, and then 95% pass at 150 rounds. At 175 rounds we find again that only 85% are passing, and when we increase it further to 200 rounds the passage rate falls back down to 75%. Clearly we would want to do some more investigation into the reasons behind the decline, but suffice it to say that we reached our peak passage rate at 150 rounds. The point here is that in our example, we have one optimum solution to our problem.
Other problems look less like a simple line moving up towards a point and then declining and instead look more like a series of several periods of optimization surrounded by periods of lower optimization, which we might refer to as “Appalachian Mou.
The document summarizes the findings of an IBM study on complexity in IT systems. Key findings include:
1) There is no single agreed upon definition of complexity or approach to reducing it in IT.
2) Complexity depends highly on context and can be classified into different types.
3) Mathematical models from other fields may help understand complexity in IT if applied.
4) Complexity management has parallels to quality management that could be leveraged.
The study is a first step toward defining a discipline around IT complexity management.
I need citations and references to this solution that was pr.pdfaarokyaaqua
I need citations and references to this solution that was provided.
Problem: Several innovations in data management are reshaping the IT landscape. Among them
are: server virtualization, storage virtualization, desktop virtualization, artificial intelligence, cloud
applications, and the near future network virtualization. As an executive, we will ask ourselves,
and discuss, the extent to which the virtualization of processing portends the removal of a
dedicated IT staff. We will discuss the extent to which the CIO is no longer the manager of a
dedicated expert staff, but fully engaged in vendor management and service oversight. Finally we
should ask ourselves the extent to which bricks and mortar will even define the corporation as an
entity. The corporation, or at least its administrative wing, is more of an abstract. Does it matter if
the processing engine of your corporate data is in Bangladesh or Nairobi? Does it matter what flag
the vendor's employee's salute or what god they worship? Once we have achieved global network
infrastructure stability and redundancy, we may find ourselves seriously questioning our
understanding of "corporation" or even employment. Discuss: What is the balance between
sustaining the interests of the corporation's stakeholders (shareholders. Executives, the board of
directors) and sustaining the interests of our staff? Is our traditional staff (bound by the
"contractual" arrangements) significant when weighed against the interests of the stockholders?
This is not an easy or obvious question. Start with Eisenhart. The discussion is not about server
virtualization. That is a footnote to illustrate how technology renders more efficient that which
people once did.
SOLUTION: (The question of balancing the interests of a corporation's stakeholders and its staff is
a complex one that requires careful consideration of multiple factors. At its core, this question is
about the relationship between the corporation and its employees, and how this relationship
impacts the corporation's ability to achieve its goals and create value for its stakeholders. One way
to approach this question is to consider the work of William Eisenhart, a management theorist who
developed a model of organizational effectiveness based on the concept of congruence.
According to Eisenhart, an organization is effective when there is a high degree of congruence
between its strategy, structure, and people. In other words, the people who work for the
organization need to be aligned with its goals and the way it operates in order for it to be
successful. In the context of virtualization technology, this means that the corporation needs to
carefully consider how it uses this technology to achieve its goals while also ensuring that its
employees are able to adapt to the changes it brings. This may involve providing training and
support for employees as they learn to work with new technology, as well as creating a culture of
innovation and continuous learnin.
In the next normal, the Internet of Things is the default production environment, and because of the autonomy, diversity and pervasiveness of its actors, the business cannot focus management on being a supply manager of I.T. -- instead it must be a highly competent demand manager of the information used by things - the technology's information.
The organisation is a system of interrelated and interdependent elements (People, Process, Tools etc.) and as such is somewhat complex. Organisation Agility (Change Capability) is primarily determined by the Organisation System Maturity. By building the right organisation capabilities and their maturity levels we can improve its agility. This paper presents a method for building Change Capability Maturity (Agility) leveraging the Organisation Capability Maturity Framework (which is underpinned by Dynamic Systems Maturity Theory) couples with Agile Practice roll out (leveraging the Agile Manifesto & Principals)
How Financial Firms Blaze a Trail To New, More Predictive Operational Resilie...Dana Gardner
A transcript of a discussion on new ways that businesses in the financial sector are avoiding and mitigating the damage from today’s myriad business threats.
Complexity Theory and Why Waterfall Development Works (Sometimes)Larry Apke
A huge debate rages on in IT these days. There are two rival camps - traditionalists who subscribe to the "waterfall" methodologies and agilists. Most recent evidence suggests that agile methodologies have an edge in project success rates but the traditional methods are still widely practiced and do result in some project successes. There are reasons for the successes of agile and traditional projects that can be explained by complexity theory. This presentation will examine some interesting information about waterfall and agile methodologies and show why complexity theory can help us to predict the relative success (and failure) of applying these methodologies to software development projects.
The document discusses organizing IT asset management. It argues that assets should be managed to support availability of environments for business processes on demand. This requires aligning assets to business needs, managing assets as resources through their utilization impacts, and creating value through flexible and efficient resource utilization. Key goals are to turn existing investments into private clouds and coordinate new approaches to delivering business functions from external applications and services.
Striking a Balance Between Physical and Digital ResourcesOlivier Serrat
Except for entirely virtual libraries, the symbiotic relationship between the physical and the digital is innately powerful: for superior outcomes, it must be recognized, nurtured, and leveraged; striking a balance between physical and digital resources can be accomplished. This paper examines the subject of "delivering digital" from macro, meso, and micro perspectives: it looks into complexity theory, digital strategy, and digitization.
Managing Interdependencies in Complex OrganizationsNicolay Worren
Presentation held at the Organization Design Forum conference in the US, 2006.
For more on this and related topics, see my blog http://www.organizationdesign.net
Adapting to New Realities: The Emergence of Network Organizations and Work Sy...Sociotechnical Roundtable
The document discusses the emergence of network organizations and work systems as a way for companies to gain agility, speed, and adaptability. It provides examples of companies like Apple, Fairview Health, and Cisco that have created internal and external networks for purposes like innovation, collaboration, and rapid change. These network models are becoming more formalized and allow organizations to optimize current processes while also adapting to new challenges through self-organization and reconfiguration. The network form is well-suited to handle flexible, adaptive tasks, as it can construct unique relationships for each problem rather than relying on fixed hierarchies. Overall, the document argues that today's organizations require both hierarchies for optimization and networks for adaptation.
This document provides a survey of trust and reputation systems used for online service provision. It discusses how trust and reputation systems can help address information asymmetry between service providers and consumers online by allowing consumers to see ratings from other consumers about their experiences. This creates incentives for good behavior from service providers. The document provides an overview of different trust and reputation concepts, system architectures, reputation computation methods, examples of commercial systems, and challenges in reputation systems with proposals from literature to address these challenges. It aims to bring coherence to the different proposals and developments in this area.
Similar to SI_INCOSE_2013_The Agile Enterprise (20)
2. Introduction
When discussing the familiar terms “agility / agile” we find that, regardless of the field of
inquiry or technical pursuit, expectations are synonymous with attributes used to describe a
high performance sports car: Agile is quick, Agile is responsive, or Agile is lightweight and
unburdened. These are often the expectations when Agility is discussed within the SE&I
community regardless of the context or level of abstraction within the lifecycle.
Haberfellner and de Weck provided insight into this dilemma, stating that there is a dis-
tinction between engineering Agile Systems and Agile Systems Engineering. At the SI, as we
began traversing the Agile landscape, in both our Customer engagements as well as our own
internal developments, we realized that we needed a deeper understanding regarding the
guidance on how Agility plays into Enterprise-level activities. We wanted Agility and Agile
themes to have meaning within our own culture, lexicon, and Enterprise; as such, we began an
undertaking to define Agility with respect to our SE&I Enterprise. As with endeavors such as
this, we welcome the reader to borrow from and add to in the spirit of advancing the art of
Systems Engineering.
Before addressing this proposition, let’s define what we mean by the term Enterprise:
“An entity comprised of one or more organizations, engaged in a singular mission re-
quiring the development, sustainment, and projection of supporting capabilities in a
changing environment.”
Thus, the dilemma for an Enterprise is how agility is achieved with all of the processes,
interoperability of organizations internal and external to the Enterprise coupled with overhead
planning, checks, and balances that make for a stable and successful business entity? Or, more
to the point, what does agility mean to an Enterprise?
The above description of an Enterprise as a business entity, at first blush, seems an unlikely
candidate for agile practices, principles or guidelines. A high performance sports car, for
example, is a system of interoperable systems, each with processes and rules of operations. But
what makes it “agile”? Agility, although scenario independent, requires context for the term to
have meaning. An Enterprise must be agile against something or in context of something, and
this comparison must make sense. I would like to propose that it is through the diligent process
of architecting and analyzing the business that agility can be properly evaluated, is achieved,
and delivered across and throughout an Enterprise.
Our business approach is to define Agility as it pertains to our Enterprise, and then de-
compose it for analysis. This allows Systems Engineers to understand the Enterprise, specifi-
cally the Enterprise Architectures and processes which define it. At the conclusion of this
paper, the reader will come to see that the defining characteristics that enable Enterprise agility
are twofold, and made of the following key contributors:
1). Enterprise Agility is the resultant of good Systems Engineering – manifested attributes
of a system which satisfies the mission needs in an ever changing and evolving environ-
ment with multiple levels of unknowns, and;
2). An Enterprise Culture that fosters open communication and pushes the power to act
upon and make decisions as the employee encounters change.
3. Defining Agility
Dr. Alberts of the Command and Control Research Program (CCRP) provides the fol-
lowing definition of agility:
“Agility is the capability to successfully cope with changes in circumstances.”
The robust nature of this definition is apparent. The ability to successfully cope with
change hinges upon many decision making capabilities upon which action can take place in a
temporal entity. This leads to Dr. Alberts’ notion of “timeliness”- as he further comments:.
“Agility does not require that one act as soon as they are able to act; rather it involves a
consideration of when would be the appropriate time to act.”
In an Enterprise context, what is timely for the survival of one entity may be rushed for
another, and too late for yet another. Removing the term rapid from the discussion of agility,
especially when outside the realm of rapid software development, establishes an understanding
upon which an Enterprise can act.
Still, there is fuzziness in the very nature of agility, even within Dr. Alberts’ robust defi-
nition, where concepts such as flexibility, resiliency, and innovation come into play.
At this juncture, we turn from the jargonized term “agile” to what it truly encompasses:
adaptability.
Adaptability
Leon C. Megginson of Louisiana State University made this interpretation regarding the
insights of Charles Darwin:
“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but rather the
one most adaptable to change.”
To this end, we explored this concept with the findings codified in Figure 1 below: “The
Enterprise Agility Equation”. Keeping up with the Environment’s rate of change results in
sustainment of the Enterprise. An Enterprise, in this context – business, that exceeds the En-
vironment’s change is in effect controlling the tempo of the business/market engagements, and
has therefore become a disruptor. .
Figure 1: The Enterprise Agility Equation
Similar to Dr. Alberts’ definition of agility, we find the temporal entity herein as well,
together with an even more concrete understanding of flexibility, resiliency and innovation. In
the Darwinian sense, these traits are attributed to the survivability of a species; for the sur-
vivability of any entity, especially a business, these traits are easily transferable.
Complexity of Change
The concepts complexity and change are tightly coupled with regard to discussions around
the implementation of Agility. Referring to Dr. Alberts’ definition, we see the importance of
understanding the circumstances through which we and or the System are experiencing change.
The challenges we face in an information age are the real-time interactions and depend-
4. encies across multiple disciplines throughout and across the globe. The interfaces between
connecting nodes are varied: some are hardwired, so to speak, with easy to predict and obvious
outcomes; others are dependent on other interactions between other entities whose interactions
are based upon the outcome of a completely different set of events and interfaces.
Figure 2: Inter-Dependent Networks
Figure 2 is a recreation of Dr. Alberts’ “Inter-Dependent Networks.” This representation
illustrates the complex nature of our real world activities. Although labeled “network,” A, B,
and C could be entities of any kind, one or all being biological, technical, entrepreneurial,
and/or political. Within each of these networks there are nodes providing a function, service, or
capability. Depending on the technical perspective, the single function of each node and rela-
tionship may in turn create capabilities upon which the other networks call upon for services.
The point is less about the specifics behind the terminology, but more about the relationships.
For example, Network A could be a financial institution with each node an in-
tra-organization providing functions, services, or capabilities upon which Network C, a logis-
tics company, draws from. Networks A and C are both internally connected as well as exter-
nally connected to one another with each connection presenting a potential point of failure (or
success) to varying degrees of criticality. More difficult to see in this representation, as well as
in our day-to-day lives are the dependencies between these networks, within each network, and
the nature of the exchanges between the networks. For example, the model is not capable of
answering questions like how are goods transported, how secure are the data transmissions,
what is the political climate in the country in which we are doing business and or dependent
upon materials for our own business success?
An Enterprise is faced with the challenge of prognostication over a large array of potential
what-ifs and could-be scenarios all with interdependencies on the various events, interfaces
and conditions. It is easy to predict the likelihood of a lit match going out when immersed in a
glass of water. The cause and effect is widely understood and has remained relatively un-
changed for millennia. What is not readily apparent is the multitude of touch points in our very
complex world in which we do business and the degrees of interdependency of an Enterprise’s
internal organizations. As noted in Hobart’s work, Kishido, regarding the Japanese technique
of indirect influence:
“One day the Master was explaining the way in which a small expenditure of energy early
on in a process could be equivalent to, or greater than a much larger effort at a later point…
a butterfly flaps its wings in China, and a week later, there is a storm in New York…
kochou-jutsu, the art of the butterfly.”
Complexity. Prior to now, this term was used without an adequate definition. Although we
have an instinctive sense of what complexity is, for the sake of accuracy and establishing a
common lexicon, this is the definition of complex from Merriam-Webster:
5. a). “A whole made up of complicated or interrelated parts and;
b). A group of obviously related units of which the degree and nature of the relationship is
imperfectly known.”
The second portion of the definition is particularly telling, as the challenge is often more
about gaining information for insight into these relationships that are “imperfectly known.” If,
for example, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) knew which
types of butterflies, size, their weight, gender, wingspan, and under what conditions the beating
of said wings create the chain reactions that lead to the storms of kochou-jutsu, the activity of
these same butterflies would be factored into forecasting technologies.
Figure 3: Mothra
In the HBR article, “Want to Build Resilience? Kill the Complexity,” Andrew Zolli re-
counts the 2009 crash of Air France Flight 447:
“Yet it was complexity, as much as any factor, which doomed Flight 447. Prior the crash,
the plane had flown through a series of storms, causing a buildup of ice that disabled several of
its airspeed sensors — a moderate, but not catastrophic failure. As a safety precaution, the
autopilot automatically disengaged, returning control to the human pilots, while flashing them
a cryptic "invalid data" alert that revealed little about the underlying problem. Confronting this
ambiguity, the pilots appear to have reverted to rote training procedures that likely made the
situation worse: they banked into a climb designed to avoid further danger, which also slowed
the plane's airspeed and sent it into a stall.”
Zolli notes the triggering event of the horrific accident, a build-up of ice that disabled
airspeed sensors, is not in and of itself a catastrophic failure. Looking at this tragedy from the
O-O-D-A perspective, the failure of the sensors greatly diminished the ability for the pilots to
Observe, removing their ability to Orient, Decide and Act in a meaningful fashion. Also, as
noted by Hobart and (sadly) demonstrated by Air France Flight 447, this seemingly small seed
assisted in the development of conditions through which interactions may have a rather large
impact as we traverse the System.
The Systems, Enterprises, Organizations, and many of our day-to-day activities and en-
deavors rely on and are pieces of complex systems or, at the very least, interactions where the
sheer number of inputs and output of these interactions cloud the accuracy of the nature of the
relationships; we find casual misinterpreted as causal. This is true for both Entities and any of
their Relationships.
Change is a concept that is organic in nature. We all know change when we experience it;
the challenge for many of us is to accurately identify the degree of change while change is
taking place. Drawing upon Merriam-Webster once again, we find the following definition for
change, that we will use as the backdrop within this discussion:
6. a). To make different in some particular : alter;
b). To make radically different : transform
c). To give a different position, course, or direction”
It is the ability to notice change that is most important, and brings us to John Boyd and his
Observe, Orient, Decide and Act (O-O-D-A) loop.
John Boyd of the US Air Force revolutionized traditional command and control doctrine in
the 1970s with a C2 process model that accurately captures what we innately understand and do
regardless of our endeavor: Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act. For the purposes of this dis-
cussion, a simplified version of Boyd’s O-O-D-A loop is recreated below:
Figure 4: Simplified O-O-D-A Loop
John Boyd initially became aware of the O-O-D-A loop during his time in theater as a
fighter pilot for the US Air Force. Observing that an enemy fighter was on his “six,” Boyd
would maneuver his F4 Phantom in such a way to avoid being shot down, and depending on the
range, he would employ air-to-air missiles or use the aircraft’s guns to take down the enemy
fighter. We can imagine Boyd in the scenario above: making an observation, orienting his
aircraft accordingly, deciding the best tactic/weapon to employ, and finally, acting. What is
critical here is not the aircrafts involved, their performance specifications, nor the abilities of
the pilot (not to take anything away from Captain Boyd), but the concept that Boyd was able to
perform the O-O-D-A loop faster than his opponent..
In accordance to Boyd’s analysis of his personal C2 process, Dr. Alberts provides the
following commentary on the O-O-D-A loop:
“where better observations (improved quality of information) leads to better awareness of
the situation (orientation), which in turn leads to better decisions and more effective ac-
tions.”
How then does an Enterprise improve the quality of the information regarding itself and its
interconnections and processes to have better situational awareness, leading to better informed
decisions and actions, all within a timely fashion? The answer is twofold:
1). A detailed (Enterprise level) architecture and
2). An accompanying understanding of the processes therein
7. Enterprise Architecture
One challenge faced across the Systems Engineering landscape is defining what architec-
ture is, and subsequently, the Return on Investment (ROI) an Enterprise receives through its
architects and architectures. ISO 42010 defines architecture as:
“The fundamental organization of a system, embodied in its components, their relation-
ships to each other and the environment, and the principles governing its design and evo-
lution.”
Herein we find notes of the Enterprise: the multifaceted and multidisciplinary organiza-
tions that create the Enterprise, and more importantly, hints of the nature of the interconnect-
edness of these organizations through the governing principles in the design and evolution of
the Enterprise. This definition also hints to the concept that the Enterprise is a living entity,
evolving (adapting) to remain successful in its particular environment, similar to a biological
system or entity.
An architecture representing an information system or enterprise is often captured picto-
rially. The symbols making up the graphic provide high-level information that a user, systems
engineer and or a decision maker can use to better evaluate options as the System or Enterprise
evolves. The drafting portion of the development of an architecture view relies heavily on
knowledge of the system depicted. The data, processes, and interactions between and within
the entities all require intimate knowledge of or access to the information. These concepts echo
The Open Group’s description of architecture:
1). “A formal description of a system, or a detailed plan of the system at component level
to guide its implementation;
2). The structure of components, their inter-relationships, and the principles and guidelines
governing their design and evolution over time.”
The architecture provides a robust description of the System or Enterprise, stored in a
central repository. Behind each symbol, there are thousands of words, referenced documents,
and data providing the specifics of every detail that went into the design and building of the
system. Moreover, the processes, interactions, and order of events are documented in the
metadata behind the architecture view so as to enhance data analytics, thus assisting in the
evolution of the Enterprise.
The architecture described above provides value when organized in a consistent, repeatable
fashion. Furthermore, the architecture should be developed in an environment (tool) where the
objects and symbols in each view can be the results of a (relational database) query or per-
formance calculation1
. Architectures developed in this fashion create the baseline against
which the O-O-D-A loop is performed at the Enterprise level.
Frameworks such as DoDAF and TOGAF2
, for example, provide a range of architecture
1
These are concerns for large-scale information systems development and integration efforts. Generally with
these types of engagements, a style guide, working group, and review board are set in place by the Program’s
architecture leadership to ensure the products developed not only have the same look and feel visually, but
more importantly, are developed with the same type of metadata structure so as to ensure the calculation of
value of the architecture
2
Department of Defense Architecture Framework and The Open Group Architecture Framework, respectively.
8. views through which specific attributes of a system or service can be analyzed. The state of the
Enterprise becomes observable and, depending on the framework in which it is developed,
multiple vantage points provide highlights of specific System traits. For example, the DoDAF
Systems Interface Description, SV-1, documents the entities with which a specific System
interfaces. This provides awareness of the nodal activities and networks an Enterprise consists
of, interacts with, is dependent upon, and/ or provides services for. In this sense, the com-
plexities of the Enterprise’s interconnected nature become observable.
Architecture itself is a point of orientation. It allows the decision maker to observe from a
specific vantage point – to orient him or herself within a known entity from which complexities
of the unknown can be mitigated. Continuing with the example of an architecture artifact, the
applicable views within the DoDAF construct are orientation specific. DoDAF “Systems
Views,” for example, are System-centric. This is to say that regardless of the number of entities
and interfaces that comprise an SV-01, there is a specific System [A] against which the model
is created. This System [A], then, is the focal point of that particular architecture. At the En-
terprise level, these architectural views provide the ability for leaders to conduct analysis into
the portfolio of capabilities and services the Enterprise offers; providing insight into the ori-
entation of the Enterprise with regards to its position3
in its environment, as well as its ability to
perform its [business] mission against expected and unexpected conditions. This is especially
valuable when planning evolutionary activities or when a known interconnected organization
is not going to be able to fulfill its business mission requirements, thus leading us through the
loop and into the decision process.
As noted in Figure 1, the successful Enterprise evolves its Capabilities at a rate of change
faster than that of the change of its environment. Recognizing that change is constant, the
Enterprise must decide what actions are favorable for [business] mission success. The leaders
of an Enterprise must make informed decisions based upon the data gleaned from the archi-
tectures developed. Contingency planning, for example, includes decisions made regarding
logistics, supplier notification, and a multitude of other touch points that become known
through the information provided in the context of the architecture. These decisions are often
captured in the form of a plan, against which, action is taken, taking us to the final phase
through the O-O-D-A loop.
The previous stages of the O-O-D-A loop (observe, orient, decide), when properly docu-
mented, provide the plan against which focused action can be taken to ensure a successful
outcome as the Enterprise seeks to change its Capabilities faster than the environment changes.
Architecturally speaking, this plan provides actionable steps outlined to bring the Enterprise
from its current “As-Is” state to the desired “To-Be” state. When properly leveraged, these
architectures are more akin to actionable operating models as opposed to the static, schematic
architectures they are often compared to.
With the understanding that (Enterprise) agility is an amalgam of appropriate decisions and
actions with regard to the change of an environment and the Enterprise’s ability to adapt, it is
no wonder that Dr. Jeanne W. Ross is a champion for Enterprise architectures. In the briefing
“Gaining Competitive Advantage from Enterprise Architecture” delivered at the Weatherhead
School of Management, Dr. Ross explains:
“Architecture, the use of existing IT and business process capabilities to rapidly generate
3
Physical location in the spacetime continuum as well relative ranking when compared to competitors, cohorts
and colleagues
9. new business values while limiting costs and risks, allows for Agility.”
The value of the architecture lies within the understanding gleaned from the relationships
represented, and how these relationships can be leveraged to help the Enterprise succeed in its
mission and continuity of operations, as impacts to the interconnected nodes take place; it also
provides the situational awareness of risks to mitigate and disrupt as appropriate.
Agile Processes
Process is the backbone of many Enterprise activities. More often than not, to achieve a
desired goal or effect, there are steps – often sequential, in order for the achievement of suc-
cess. Instruction manuals and training materials of all kinds are step by step guides to the
process of the activity and undertaking thereof. Therefore these processes are often enforced
with rigor and discipline. Even in the realm of the mundane, we find processes involved in the
simple act of making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Although it is “common sense,” you
must first have the bread prior to spreading the peanut butter or jelly; further still, it helps to
have the required ingredients on hand. Even our human biology is a system of interconnected
systems each with their own processes.
The INCOSE Systems Engineering Handbook v. 3.2.1 borrows from ISO 9000:2000 in
defining the term process:
“Set of interrelated or interacting activities which transforms inputs into outputs.”
Keeping in mind the interconnected and multifaceted interactions and dependencies as
depicted in Figure 2, we see how important the activity of process documentation is, and how
this too falls within the boundaries and value of Enterprise architecture. Without knowledge of
the processes required of each node to achieve its business mission goals, and how these nodes
are interconnected and the dependencies, it is extremely difficult to become fully oriented to
the changes taking place in theater, as the degree of change and impacts thereof cannot be
properly assessed. Moving forward in this context is like “flying blind.”
Every step within a process within an Enterprise must be evaluated to make sure it adds
value and helps the Enterprise achieve its mission. Some steps are critical, while others are less
important, depending on the task, Customer, and planned use of the product and or services
delivered. For example, an IT system deployed locally versus the traditional monolithic satel-
lite used by NOAA requires a much different levels of reliability and availability. A hardware
failure on my company provided laptop requires a walk to the IT department on campus; a
hardware failure to one of the polar-orbiting environmental satellites (POES) requires a trip
into outer space. Time, money, availability of resources and the like come into play when de-
termining not only the specialty reengineering discipline of the “ilities,” but also as to how the
Systems are designed, developed, and the processes used. The idea then, is not just to cut
corners, but to know through experience and expertise, when tailoring a process is acceptable,
and what steps can be abbreviated or removed completely.
The ability to determine the value added by the processes within an Enterprise is the focus
of Lean Six Sigma activities, which ultimately serve to push the Enterprise through the
O-O-D-A loop with greater efficiency. The identification and removal of wasteful steps within
Enterprise processes that have evolved over time that have not been in lockstep with the
changes of the Environment in relation to the individual process which combine to create the
overarching processes of the Enterprise and said effects on total system objective is an act of
adaptation and thus, agility.
10. The INCOSE Systems Engineering Handbook v. 3.2.1 provides the following definition
and guidance regarding tailoring:
“The manner in which any selected issue is addressed in a particular project. The organi-
zation may seek to minimize the time and efforts it takes to satisfy an identified need
consistent with common sense, sound business management practice, applicable laws and
regulations, and the time sensitive nature of the requirement itself. Tailoring may be ap-
plied to various aspects of the project, including project documentation, processes and
activities performed in each life‐cycle stage, the time and scope of reviews, analysis, and
decision‐making consistent with all applicable statutory requirements.”
Tailoring a process or the activities within a process can save time, energy, and money;
also, it must be consistent with common sense. Someone who is not intimately familiar with the
product being developed, the in- theater uses and challenges, will not have the expertise to
determine which activities and processes must be followed and which processes and activities
can be tailored. The same is true with the development, evolution, and adaptation of an En-
terprise. Without expertise gained from experience within the Enterprise or environment in
question, the guidance of leadership is once again “flying blind.” Although the roadmap pro-
vided by an information-rich and well-documented architecture can help mitigate this short-
coming, the combination of intimate knowledge of the Enterprise, its operating environment
and an information rich architecture is a recipe for success. The actions of said Enterprise begin
to take on the properties of Agile as noted in the introduction. These successful companies are
the innovative and adaptive corporate entities that are continuously self-tailoring with respect
to their environment. This continuous cycle of change, as noted by Dove, is the backdrop of the
cycle and the market dynamics, which results in a never ending O-O-D-A loop (Figure 4) with
respect to the speed of change (Figure 1).
The Culture of Agility
A large contributing factor in the [amount of] agility within an Enterprise is its culture.
Although Organizational Behavior plays a large role in Agile themes, Organizational Behavior
is a theme much too vast for the confines of this paper. Still, this effort would be remiss without
touching on this topic at a minimum, especially with regards to employee empowerment.
The architecture of an Enterprise is not limited to its information technologies. A key
component in any successful business is its human capital, how they are organized, interact,
and are managed through leadership.
In “The 21st
Century Manufacturing Enterprise Strategy,” author Rick Dove addresses this
aspect of the Enterprise: “These systems must be structured to allow decisions at the point of
knowledge, to encourage the flow of information, to foster concurrent cooperative activity, and
to localize the side-effects of sub-system change.” Members of the business must be empow-
ered so as to actively participate in the O-O-D-A loop as they encounter change. A leadership
style that fosters information exchanges through open communication will uncover opportu-
nities to refine its processes, removing inefficiencies and increasing its rate of change as it
adapts to the Environment. Dove continues:
“Whether decisions are made by people or programmed machines one thing is true, they
can only be made quickly and accurately if they are made at the point of maximum in-
formation. Consequently, where people are involved, truly agile enterprises will push most
of the decision making process down to the lowest employee ranks, where the work is
actually done.”
11. In traditional military Command and Control (C2) Enterprises, the concept of empowering
those on the front lines of the engagement to make decisions instead of having to report back to
someone in higher rank for orders, is referred to pushing “power to the edge.” This concept is
very similar to that as noted by Dove.
As described by Alberts & Hayes in Power to the Edge:
“Edge organizations are, in fact, collaborative organizations that are inclusive, as opposed
to hierarchies that are authoritarian and exclusive. In socio-economical terms, hierarchies
are socialist and edge organizations are marketplaces. Edge organizations are organizations
where everyone is empowered by information and has the freedom to do what makes
sense.”
At first blush, this may seem somewhat Utopian, and slightly impractical. There are cer-
tainly some roadblocks ahead of each Enterprise, and our current business environment inhibits
an entire workforce from having access to all of the information required to make the “right”
decision. Coupled with costs in developing skills in areas and training associated with the
progression of the field, many Enterprises may find themselves financially burdened. Fur-
thermore, many Enterprises are organized and operated from the traditional hierarchical C2
structure and chain of command. Optimistically speaking, it may not be the fear of losing
power that keeps management from fostering a culture towards being that of the described
“edge organization,” but instead: “the road to destruction is paved with the path of good in-
tentions.” Without insight into the Enterprise strategic plan and details behind financial con-
cerns, an employee encountering a challenge may make what s/he believes to be the right de-
cision, but may in turn prove very costly for the Enterprise – something that leadership would
certainly prefer to avoid, mitigate or appropriately lead using their greater awareness of the
Enterprise’s situation.
And although this is somewhat of a worst-case scenario, true agility is scenario inde-
pendent – agility being the ability of the Enterprise to respond to the rate of change of its En-
vironment and adapt to the new Environment accordingly. Furthermore, the role of leadership
in an “edge organization” shifts from being that of Control to that of Guidance, as noted by
Alberts & Hayes: “Instead of being in control, the enterprise creates the conditions that are
likely to give rise to the behaviors that are desired.” These conditions are the processes and
architectures that align with the command intent of the Enterprise. The need and nature of each
task is articulated along with the goal behind each process and job description – all of which
flows from the Mission statement down to the lowest employee ranks.
Even with the latest information technologies, robust architectures and a well informed and
dedicated workforce, unless an Enterprise employs the mindset where the decision making
process is pushed down to the lowest employee ranks thus creating an edge organization, its
ability to respond and adapt to an environmental change will suffer. This is a critical piece in
the Agile Enterprise structure.
12. Conclusion
The goal of this paper was to help shed light on Agility in context to businesses, especially
those Enterprises engaged in Systems Engineering and Integration efforts. Having defined and
decomposed the constituent attributes that enable Agility, we find that when applied to the
Enterprise, Agility is a reflection of the interplay between the Enterprise (its architectures,
process and people), and its operating Environment.
To that end, we hope the reader will agree that the defining characteristics of Enterprise
Agility are twofold, and made up of the following key contributors:
1). Enterprise Agility is the resultant of good Systems Engineering – manifested attributes
of a system which satisfies the mission needs in an ever changing and evolving environ-
ment with multiple levels of unknowns, and;
2). An Enterprise Culture that fosters open communication and pushes the power to act
upon and make decisions as the employee encounters change.
It is through the combination of good systems engineering and an Enterprise culture whose
leadership empowers its workforce to make decisions that the fullness of Agility is realized. It
is this author’s humble opinion that Enterprises that operate in such fashions will always be
leaders in their fields regardless of their respective markets or domains: Agility is scenario
independent.
13. Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank the following individuals who contributed resources and
knowledge to advance the concepts put forth in this white paper:
1). Fisk, Charles L., The SI Organization, Inc.
2). Harris, Pritchett A., The SI Organization, Inc.
3). Janosko, Jodi, A., The SI Organization Inc.
4). Oliver, Deborah, G., The SI Organization Inc.
14. Biography
Don E. Brown II has worked in the Systems Engineering and Integration fields for the past
14 years. He started working as a technical writer and gradually became more engaged in ho-
listic Systems Engineering execution, specializing in architecture development. He graduated
from Bucknell University in June 1997 with a bachelor’s degree in Philosophy before gradu-
ating from Pennsylvania State University in December 2006 with a master’s degree in Infor-
mation Sciences.
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