REPLY Why don't organizations function better? (SD6593)

[SDMAIL Jim Hines]

Posted by  "Jim Hines" <jim at ventanasystems.com>

Wade Schuette brings evolutionary processes into the discussion of why
organizations don't function better.  

It turns out that evolution (toward something fitter) has a few requisites
that are probably not well satisfied by most organizations.  One of the most
important is a **very small** probability of changing what others have done
before.  In biological systems the probability of a change (mutation) is
about one in a hundred million.  In organizations, however, it's the rare
person who doesn't want to try something new.  A high rate of change
severely limits the level of complexity that can evolve.  

For more on organizational evolution from an SD perspective see
http://web.mit.edu/org-ev/www/resources.htm.  (Truth in advertising:  I was
involved in that project).  The link "policy origin" takes you to the paper
"The Source of Poor Policy", which might be particularly relevant. 

Jim Hines
Posted by  "Jim Hines" <jim at ventanasystems.com>
posting date  Fri, 7 Sep 2007 11:51:56 -0500