(Categories: Wzzup)

331019909_bc565bc623.jpgLast week I watched Otto Scharmer explaining his U-theory, and like Joachim, I too was triggered by what was explained by  as a “network organizing structure” and an “ecosystem organizing structure”.  My take away in the difference between the two structures was the role of the stakeholder. It is the difference in who is included in the process of organizing and what emergences from these organizing principles.



The role of the stakeholder in the network organizing structure
A network organizing structure is a fluid way of organizing that results in the persuit of a specific goal. The organizing structure is driven by the dialogue between several stakeholders that try to meet their own goals and that express their own interests. As hinted at in Scharmer’s explaination, not everything is represented by a stakeholder. For example, future generations and the environment are not included in the dialogue. Scharmer also argues that power in the network organizing principle resides in the networks of relationships that one has into different pocket  of the larger system and and how one can mobilze these networks of relational connections and influence them to perform certain actions. This would mean that the actions that are performed are chosen by the stakeholders.

Emergence in the eco-system organizing structure
An ecosystem organzing structure on the other hand is something that includes everyone, and the action the emergence are not predicted in advance. The ecosystem  works as a whole, so it also operates outside the relational connections of a bunch of networked players. An eco-system would be the supply-demand chain of a whole industry. Take the food industry for example, from the soil, farming and agriculture to distribution and consumption. The industry consists of all kinds of parties that are not aware of the role they play in the larger system. Eco-system organizing is about looking at the whole system and creating conditions to allow everyone who is participating in the system to see the whole and to see the others. Today, we have all these different players and little eco-system systems, but the awareness that we are connected with people in this larger eco-system  is very limited. And, so Scharmer argues, to be succesful today, you have to extend your awareness outside the boundaries of your existing relational networks.  Take Nike for example. Nike has got hammered by NGO ’s for what was happing in the companies they are sourcing from in China and other places.

Emergence in an eco-system is when something arises out of the collective which couldn’t have arisen from out of any one of the parts in its essence. That means that it’s in the field between people, institutions, organisations, initiatives, that something new emerges. A pre-condition for that, is that none of those individual parts or players are attached to their own idea of things, but are actually able to step into a space of not knowing. And co-explore, and co-emergerce. Because the solutions to problems in the networked organizing structure are often only considered in the relational networks one is part of. And the sollutions that come out of that structure is an idea that has probably come out of your limited awareness of the eco-system as a whole.


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