(Note: the writing below is previously sent as an email update to our circle — those who subscribed to our newsletter or those who helped Product Narrative grow until today)
Hello,
How are you doing?
It’s been a while since the last time we talked. I hope you are doing well.
I’d like to share two interesting incidents that happened this month. They’re unique and thought-provoking, so much so they made me pause the first time I heard it.
Before we dive in, I’d like to give a heads-up that this is a long read
(reading time approximately 8 mins)
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The first incident is a message from someone in my group chat:
“Do you know how to transform an organization and its culture?”
The other one is about an online meeting – attended by six team leads to share insight and analysis of the current initiatives they were working on and the impact on the company goals.
After the meeting was over, one participant reached out to me and vented out his frustration. “It was a waste of time,” he said. “Nobody turned on their camera and it didn’t seem like anyone was paying any attention. To make it worse, there was no analysis whatsoever. It was only updates! What do you think I should do to make the next meeting better?”
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At a glance, these two incidents have nothing in common.
Upon closer look, however, I realize they’re all about the same thing – a system.
An organization is a system. So is a meeting.
Russell Ackoff – a pioneer in the field of systems thinking and a former professor at the Wharton Business School – once defined a system as “not the sum of the behavior of its parts; it’s the product of their interactions.”
Both an organization and a meeting are a human system – made up of people and relationships. When put together, their interactions can make or break a system. In addition, keep in mind, that people have their own thoughts, feelings, and behaviors – all of which make the system complex, dynamic, and unpredictable.
Now, how would you change a system that is complex, dynamic, and unpredictable? Because that is the underlying intention behind those two incidents (one wants to transform an organization and its culture, the other a meeting).
Here I’d like to exercise caution.
While there’s nothing wrong with that particular intention, one thing I’d like to be cautious about is our constant pursuit of “how-to” above everything else.
My worry and concern mirror those of Peter Block – the author of The Answer to How is Yes – who said:
“Too often when a discussion is dominated by the question of How? we risk overvaluing what is practical and doable and postpone the questions of larger purpose and collective well being.”
In this context, I’m worried my colleagues were getting ahead of themselves by already thinking about or devising the “how-to” instead of building understanding of what a system is. Without the latter, it’d be difficult to see and appreciate the complex structure of a system they’re in, resulting in the possibility of going in blind.
Focusing on the "how-to" might be beneficial if the intention is to treat the symptoms, but not the root cause.
This is a tendency that most – if not all – of us have, as we live in a culture that has yielded too easily to what is practical and popular.
Take the second incident for example. Did you know that Harvard Business Review have written numerous articles, from as early as 1976 all the way to the present, that talk about how to run a meeting?
“Each time we try to act on an answer to the question How?, we will fail because, first, the question wasn’t the right question, and second, the answer comes out of someone else’s experience, not our own. It is difficult to live another’s answer, regardless of the amount of goodwill with which it is offered.” – Peter Block
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So, what would be the alternative?
One that I can offer is to start with distinction-building, not how-to; that is we start by sharpening our awareness of the system and our role within it.
This awareness is helpful to make sense of complex situations from a system perspective – considering the whole picture, mapping out the connections and interactions between people in a system, and surfacing the root of the problem.
We call this approach System Work.
It is a principle. And, it’s also way of thinking.
In Product Narrative, System Work is one of the core tenets that underpin Product Narrative; one that shapes the way my team and I see and do everything (including OKR).
My team and I had spent many years practicing and iterating on this; developing it into a curriculum so that others can also benefit from it.
Thus, I’m happy to share that we have started to deploy the System Work program in a few organizations since the end of last year.
The underlying premise of this program is with enough distinctions, you’d be able to find the how. That is, the program equips you with understanding of the core elements related to the system, so that you can device the how-to for your own team and company.
More information about this program can be found here.
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If you can resonate with the challenge I mentioned (e.g. our tendency to prioritize “how-to”) or believe that this type of work (i.e. System Work) can bring benefits to you personally and professionally, I'd be happy to create a space for us to chat; or simply just listen to your thoughts and experience.
Thus, I’m extending an invitation to reconnect and I made this link to easily book your time.
Until then, please take care and stay safe.
Mul