New KB SIG for consideration: Complexity Science & Organisations
07-Feb-06
45 people in and around Europe have now shown interest in getting a new KB SIG off the ground. The subject of this one is complexity science and organisations, and this is your chance to jump on board and make sure it really happens.
‘What is complexity science?’ I hear you ask…
Complexity science as a discrete domain of interest can be located for its origins within the life sciences. Understood at its simplest level, it is a body of naturalist and evolutionary theories, which seek to describe and account, in part, for randomness, unpredictability and uncertainty. Complexity science offers a vocabulary with which to articulate the evolutionary dynamics and action of phenomena over time and space with greater degrees of holism and in terms of intangible factors. Lewin (1999) presents a generic introduction to and definition of complexity science:
"Complexity science offers a way of going beyond the limits of reductionism, because it understands that much of the world is not machine-like and comprehensible through a cataloguing of its parts; but consists instead mostly of organic and holistic systems that are difficult to comprehend by traditional scientific analysis. […] it remains very much a science - that is, a body of observation and analysis of natural phenomena - rather than being deep theory." (Lewin, R., 1999:x)
The domain of complexity science provides thought-provoking material that both challenges and complements perspectives of day-to-day work, thinking, and life. Complexity science principles such as self-organisation and emergence, for instance, question fundamental issues such as leadership, organisational behaviour, and hierarchical structures, while unpredictability, history and time set the scene for debates concerning certainty, strategy, and task management. Principles such as the edge of chaos, diversity, and pattern recognition also provide additional perspectives from which to consider and understand problems, in addition to providing stimulus for creative activities and opportunity recognition.
So how do we propose to ignite further interest on the topic in a KB SIG? And why should you indicate your interest and join?
Of those 45 people who have so far expressed an interest in the proposed SIG, the following interests in participating in a group emerged. Individuals said they would be interested in:
1) Receiving & reading KB Newswire email
2) Reading posts and comments made by others on KB
3) Accessing the KB website
4) Entering pre-existing discussions online
5) Initiating discussions online
6) Creating knowledge through conversations
7) Presenting and being interviewed by live chat
8) Posting comments
9) Being an active SIG member
10) Actively networking through the group
Would you like to join them? To discuss what?
Those 45 people said they would be interested in discussion with or about authors such as:
1) Ralph Stacey
2) Brian Goodwin
3) Maturana
4) Stuart Kauffmann
5) Ashby, Beer, Forrester & Wiener
6) Olson & Eoyang
7) Eve Mitleton-Kelly
8) Michael Lissack
9) Kant
10) John Holland.
Could you add to the list? Would you like to talk with or about these thinkers too?
In terms of complexity science interests, top themes for proposed discussion include:
1) Self-Organisation
2) Networks
3) Emergence
4) Complex Adaptive Systems
5) Diversity
6) Co-evolution
7) Uncertainty
8) Story-telling
9) Adaptation
10) Unpredictability
These themes were of relevance in terms of applying them to particular domains, including:
1) Change
2) Organisational development
3) Organisational behaviour
4) Philosophy of management
5) Sense-making (organisational and individual)
6) Organisational learning / learning organisation
7) Innovation
8) Strategy
9) Knowledge Management
10) Communication
To get involved, register your interest by making a comment and we will get the SIG moving as soon as possible.
Best wishes,
Carol Webb,
(soon to be) SIG Editor.
Details
- Author:
- Carol Webb
- Publisher:
- KnowledgeBoard
- Date:
- 07-Feb-06
- Categories:
- Sections:
- Home , News
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Member comments (65)
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SIG to appear mid-June
Hi Bill, Carol, et al,
I am happy to say that the SIG will be appearing in mid-June - the technical providers are sorting it out as I type with a due deadline of the end of the month. Add a bit of testing and user acceptance time and then we finally see it appear. Hurray! Particular thanks to Carol for being so patient :)
I'm eager to see this show on the road!
Since my earlier contribution to this thread, I've been doing some theoretical work on autopoiesis for a CSIRO Center for Complex Systems Science joint sponsored workshop on Selection, Self-Organization and Diversity to be held next week, under the title "Emergence and Growth of Knowledge and Diversity in Hierarchically Complex Living Systems". This includes human economic organizations as third order autopoietic systems. I'll put the next draft of the working paper on my web site, and would be happy to share it sooner with anyone interested in critiquing the ideas.
With a couple of students who have now finished their PhD's, I have also been exploring some of the practical implications of the theory, and have a lot more ideas worth trying.
This leaves me even more convinced that many organizations are autopoietic. My ideas need healthy criticism, and I'll be quite happy to debate the issue with Dave Snowden & Dr Spender and others. I also agree that Maturana and Varela's writing on autopoiesis are very heavy going. John Minger's is certainly more intelligible than M&V, but I don't agree with either his or Maturana's conclusions organizations can't be autopoietic.
Hopefully, I will have put my years of teaching biology to good use in translating the core concepts of autopoiesis into more accessible language (and hopefully without distorting the original concepts too deeply).
Belgian perpectives
Hi, i'm a cynefin practitioner, and i work as a crisis/interim manager in Dutch, French and English in Belgium.
Understanding complexity in human relationships is definately the next intellectual and emotional frontier.
Using the Cyenfin model i won Interim manager of the year last year in turning around a three way failing merger in a telecom, data, telephony world.
Understanding the nature of complex systems will become an essential MBA subject as the benefits of working in non ordered systems gains critical mass.
Looking foward to the sig.
Julian
Complexity SIG
Please count me in.
Anne Marie McEwan
Bizintel Ltd www.bizintel.co.uk
New SIG - Complexity Science
Please include me in this new group.
New KB SIG for consideration: Complexity Science & Organisations
Please count me in.
Thanks
Peter Jones
Clinical Specialist: NHS Care Records Service Project / Informatics
Preston, Lancashire, UK
http://www.p-jones.demon.co.uk/
Hodges' Health Career - Care Domains - Model
h2cm: help 2C more - help 2 listen - help 2 care
Looking forward to interactions
Contributors have identified a wide range of resources; it will be fascinating to see how these are explored and how the focus and culture of this group emerges.
I'll suggest a few more resources. As far as written materials are concerned, publications from, or associated with, ISCE publishing www.isce.edu duplicate and add to suggestions currently on our list.
For 3+ years, I was the acting director of the knowledge management programs at Royal Roads University in western Canada. These graduate programs were explicitly designed to explore common ground between complexity thinking and knowledge management. Not surprisingly, they were not well understood from outside, and were considered exciting, valuable and often transformational from inside.
For complexity content, we drew on the work of several authors shown above (and some others, including Brenda Zimmerman). We also had three individuals (face-to-face and/or online) as learning facilitators, who were respected and considered valuable contributors to thinking and application in their workplaces (individuals in the program were typically managers in their 40s or 50s). Dave Snowden was one of them; the other two aren't listed here: Susanne Kelly and Kurt Richardson.
Like some others who have posted, I tend to overcommit, but I hope to be a lurker and contributor in this group.
Complexity Science & Organisations SIG Mailling List
Hi - anyone wishing to join the new Complexity Science & Organisations Mailing list can do so by going to: http://list.knowledgeboard.com/mailman/listinfo/kb-complexity
21 of us are now on there and conversation is starting to emerge...
Best wishes, Carol
Emergence, Complexity and Knowledge
I'm happy to see Peter Bond mention Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela's importance, and Peter Allen's mention of ontology, epistemology and axiology. At least some of Luhmann's work has been translated - Social Systems - 1995 and Essays on Self-Reference - 1990.
However, if the group is interested in doing some serious work on the origins and meaning of knowledge in complex adaptive systems (people, organizations) I see there are still some fundamental gaps in the suggested literature in Carol's headpiece and in the comments.
o Herbert Simon's groundbreaking work on complex systems and organization theory
o Karl Popper's ideas on the emergence of knowledge (as discussed in his 1972 Objective Knowledge and later works.
o Howard Pattee's and Luis M. Rocha's work on the connections between the origins of life and the origins and evolution of knowledge.
o Stanley Salthe's work on hierarchically complex systems, focal levels and the origins of new levels of complexity
o J.J. Kay and E.D. Schneider's works on the thermodynamics of complexity in biology
o K. Ruiz-Mirazo and A Moreno's work on the origins of autonomous systems
o Steven J. Gould's Structure of Evolutionary Theory
o etc.
Detailed references can be found in some of my more recent papers - http://www.orgs-evolution-knowledge.net/Index/PapersandPresentations.htm.
Bill Hall
Interests
Sorry, should have added. I am interested in Varela and the links between his writings and complexity. I am also interested in praxis of complexity...ie how complexity/biology of cognition/the enactive links to practice, especially in terms of pedagogy and in terms of as consultants in organizations. I teach in a grad program that works with students around process consulting and facilitation in a human systems intervention approach so that is my context.
Complexity SIG
I am interested
Next steps: mailing list
Hi All
I've now been given the go-ahead to set up a mailing list for the new Complexity Science & Organisations SIG, so for those of you who I can contact through email/this site I will be sending you info. For anyone who has chosen not to be contactable through their posted comment below, or who posted their comment anonymously, and anyone else who is interested in the SIG but hasn't made a comment, then please email me directly at c.webb@cranfield.ac.uk and I will fill you in.
Best wishes, Carol
complexity and conflict
in my conflict analysis and management work, complexity science is a useful frame. I'd be interested in discussing this with others in the field.
Count me as interested
Definitely interested - though not sure I have the bandwidth for participation in another group. Let's see how it goes.
The reading list is telling ... I think it needs widening.
If we're going to have Brian Goodwin - I think we should have other neo-Darwinists in there (Richard Dawkins, Dan Dennett, Steve Jones, Susan Blackmore to name a few.)
Great to see Ashby, Beer, Forrester and Wiener in there.
Like Dave Snowden I find Kant an odd choice for the sole metaphysical basis. Still, with Maturana in there we will come across Hegel, Varela, Ortega y Gasset. Hopefully as an antidote to the narrow and objective we can get some more pragmatic holistic insights from the likes of Nagarjuna, FSC Northrop, Williams James and dare I say Robert Pirsig.
For me additions would also include Douglas Hofstadter, James Gleick, Ian Stewart, Michael Talbot and Fritjof Capra, not to mention Marvin Minsky and Jean-Pierre Dupuy.
Subject-wise understanding complexity in what makes real knowledge is a huge subject, so we have to be careful not to re-invent where good work has been done already. We probably need a few clearer objectives than simply a wide ranging list of headings for open discussion.
Pre-SIG Newsflash: Complexity & Knowledge Management Book - Contributor Call
Hi All,
Nice to see all your heaps of comments here now... Am sure that this SIG will be a go-er and look forward to creating topics of interest with you to discuss in this forum.
In the meantime, just thought I'd bring your attention to a call for contributions to a forthcoming book on Complexity & Knowledge Management sent to me by Kurt Richardson of the ISCE. I posted details about the call on one of my complexity specific blogs at http://complexcalls.blogspot.com/ - be sure to check it out if you have something to say on this subject!
Best wishes,
Carol
Complexity SIG
I think this SIG is a great idea. I am doing research on complexity and HRM and would very much like to be involved.
Complexity, O.K.
O.K., why not YASIG (yet another ...). And here's my twist:
- I like emergent simplicity even more than complexity, but that's too far out.
- don't count me in: I tend to over-commit.
- acting in complex environment is about setting priorities and knowing what NOT to do.
- Recommended reading list, to the point (because, individually, you can get old and grey cutting through everything out there .. have you really READ the essential Kant?)
1. George Spencer Brown: Laws of Form (it's short)
2. Dave Snowden's book (pun intended)
3. Stewart/Cohen/Pratchett's Science of Diskworld II: The Globe
4. Niklas Luhmann's Organisation und Entscheidung (only available in German, sorry): an anti-humanistic view of how social systems and organizations "run themselves", decluttering social sciences from naive moralistic aspirations. An antidote to the idea that "the next big thing - e.g. complexity - is here to save the world".
And. I would de-emphasize ( for that SIG )storytelling / narrative - it's related but a different beast; de-emphasize the "mechanical" aspect of complexity - there are zillions of mathematicians out there who are experts in that, no need to repeat; and keep the "organizational" aspect in focus.
Complexity
The real challenge of complexity is change. We cannot disentangle ontology, epistemology and axiology - (reality, our understanding of that, and the values aims and goals that drive us). This is not just a new paradigm, but a co-evolutionary meta-paradigm. Fortunately, it is also fun!! In addition, it may even herald the return of common sense and genteel living, though don't hold your breath.
Complexity eh? Who knows?
I'll go along with Dave Snowden's cautious comments, plus add that John Mingers's 1995 book is probably more important, accesible, and useful than the Maturana & Varela and derivative literature.
Kurt's comment is also apposite - who knows what these terms are supposed to mean? So I suspect there's much work to be done before this line of thought adds materially to the human condition.
But I'd like to be able to take part in the SIG and hope to be able to add something to the discussion from time to time.
Complexity SIG
I would like to join in as I am fascinated by complexity and organisational development
From one SIGgy to another
I'm anticipating an interesting agenda for this group based on how it is starting. I'd like to be involved and hopefully add something to this SIG.
Yes it would be great to be involved
It would be great to share knowledge, ideas and stories around complexity and organisations. I am always looking at new ways to implement activities with our communities, which are by their very nature are complex.
Joining the complexity SIG
I would be reallt delighted to participate in the international complexity SIG. It is the way forward for primary care and health services research and policy development. Good Luck
Consciousness and Homeodynamics
This is right up my alley from a consciousness in mental and physical health perspective. I've been working with a new concept, Homeodynamics, which takes complex systems into a mind, body and spirit system (MBSS), integrating them with an evaluation of degree of health. It is based on self-regulative processes and replaces the need for fragmented categories such as DSM IV.
complexity & community
please count me in.. my main interest is in applying complexity ideas to understanding and improving community dynamics, and community engagement and interactions with publicagencies.
Great idea, count me in
Ideally this group will look at the practical aspects of applying complexity thinking in organisational settings.
Count on me !!
Hi Carol,
I am interested in learning more about complex adaptative systems and other topics listed above..
Regards from Brazil,
Paulo
Count me in
Hi Carol, good idea. Currently moving house so things are quite chaotic at the moment. Discussing complexity afterwards will feel like a relief I guess :)
Hi, and thanks...
Thanks for all your comments and support so far folks... don't stop now though - if there is anyone else interested out there and hesitating about whether or not to comment, then just do it :-)
Would be great to hit a record for the greatest number of comments in support of a new SIG (how many would that be by the way Ed?)
Also, have picked up a thread in some comments below, including pointers re discussion on potential themes and authors. The top ten lists above were just that, top tens. There was of course greater diversity of interest represented by my initial search among contacts, and this should be picked up on in initial SIG activities. I collated feedback in a spreadsheet and will make this available as soon as things get going.
Can't wait to get things started, and I'm very looking forward to Dave Snowden's web chat next Tuesday (Valentine's Day is a great day of course for everyone in love with complexity :-) )
Best wishes, Carol
New Sig Idea
Like the idea of the SIG even though the mechanism is still confusing to me.
Keen to pursue the ideas around what constitutes transdisciplinary competence i.e. across disciplines as compared with between them. Systems thinking, communication and modelling forms would seem to be key to collaboration in the exploration of potential futures and the adaptive mechanisms we might need to put in place to respond to them.
Looking forward to conversations
Been eagerly awaiting the start of this SIG for some time. My interest is in the application of the ideas of Maturana and Varela (living systems theoretical perspective) to organisation development. To get a feel for our approach members might be interested in two articles already published on K Board in 2004 and 05 which incorporate a 'living systems' perspective. One addresses the nature of CoPs and conversation as THE mechanism of organisational development. (I prefer to speak of conversation rather than narrative or storytelling.) The second paper is about reconciling technology and knowledge management and features not only Maturana but also Max Bosiot. A site search for peter bond will provide links to the two papers.
Complexity as a basis for all knowledge
It's great to be part of this initiative. I would like to see more on how complexity science can be used as a fundamental science for all knowledge, acknowledging multiple ontologies, epistemologies and axiologies. In particular, I am interested in the evolution of meta-physics, paradigmatic revolutions and what we can say about what we can know.
Which way will it go
For some observers it is perhaps a little surprising that after at least 2 decades of research and discussion there is still no general agreement on what key terms like emergence, complexity and self-organization mean. To the closet reductionists this is naturally a disappointment as surely we need pinpoint definitions to be able to develop 'complexity' into a 'science' like physics. However, others would argue that the very nature of the subject prevents such accuracy and that the day we find such definitions will be the beginning of the end for the field. Like most things in life, I expect the middle ground will be a more realistic scenario in which we aim for definitions, but at the same time resist them, and be willing to bend them to meet specific needs. It'll be interesting to see which way this SIG evolves, the direction of which will largely be determined by the mixture of views participating. I, personally, don't find efforts to absolutely pindown terms particualrly useful and prefer to accept that the context in which terms are used will contribute to a variety of meanings and that this freedom is essential if we are to make sense of local complexity. At the same time, though, I don't believe in Theories of Everything in physics (well, actually I don't really have a great problem with the idea that a ToE might exist, I just don't believe that if we do find a ToE we will ever be able to confirm it), but the efforts to get there have yielded a lot of valuable science along the way. I expect we'll see that some areas of complexity are science-isable and other areas aren't and it is in these grey areas where there is a lot of fun to be had... Anyway, let's see which way the SIG will go....
count me in
I am looking forward to contributing to the SIG.
My main area of research is KM in design practices and I am very interested in complexity in design, emergent systems and behaviours in built environment, complexity and participation, narratives.
lets see if it works ...
Its an important subject and good to see a SIG starting. Some suprising names on the authors list (Kant is if anything the anti-thesis of complexity and I have always seen complexity as providing a scientific back up to the Hegialian concept of thesis and anti-thesis). The obvious ommissions are Axelrod and Cohen (whose book is to my mind the best introduction although I disagree with a lot of it), Cilliers "Post Modernism and Complexity" and Juarrero's outstanding "Dynamics of Action". I would be wary about allowing the SIG to get tied up with Systems Dynamics or some of the more Ghia orientated versions of sustainability however.
On the topics can we please have narrative NOT story-telling (or at least add it in) and the whole issue of networks is also important
I will be looking forward
I think that it is going to be a very interesting SIG as complexity
is one of the reasons for the heightened interest in Knowledge Management
Point of View
Dear Carol,
Recent debate on Climate change have made the relevance of complexity science more evident.But should we call it a "science"?That sounds like a trite.Why not complexity studies?Anyway complexity seems to be the language of future.Ahmad Raza
Count me in
I was introduced to the concept last two years and did not pay enough attention to it until now.
...and the challenge continues!
Hi Carol and hi all other RODEO partners. Looking forward to working with you again on this exiting topic.
I am interested...
Hi, I'm Frédéric Amblard, working as assistant professor in Computer Sciences and interested in agent-based social simulation & social networks. Themes evocated by Caroll are really closed to my research interest, then I'm really interested... even if I don't know actually how this SIG is articulated with initiatives like OnceCS or Giaccs...
atb
Fred
Carol, you can count on me
Very good idea indeed. I'm interested in investigating both the "Nature-inspired" part of it and any agent technological application that can support a complexity approach. You can count on me for the conversation.
I am interested
Count me in. I have been looking at complexity for some time now.
Operationalising complexity
Good luck to everyone on this SIG. At the very least I hope to learn from some interesting conversations, and maybe contribute. At best I hope to move closer to a helpful understanding of complexity - an understanding that helps people to take actions that improve our world. One issue for me is the very term complexity, which seems to move between a defined concept and the everyday view that 'things are complex'. My own interest is specifically in how people collaborate to innovate, with a hobby in reading about evolution. I am still trying to connect them...
Organisation complexity <=> Complex organisation
I hope we can find a good complexity lens to understand the behaviour of organisations that may even to simple, and then we can find ways to scale up the lens.
Having fun.
Good luck
I support this SIG because, if nothing else, it may contribute to the emergence of a common language of complexity.
Innovation and Social Networks
Hello! I am looking forward to learning more about innovation and social networks as I am a newbee to the area. Lets be amazing!
Good idea
My interest is in encouraging and guiding research in this field and I am frustrated by its fragmentation. I hope the SIG may help build a community (rather than Yet Another Community!).
Bob
Excellent initiative
Dear Carol,
This is a great idea and you can count on my support too. I very much look forward to the discussions in this SIG. As you may remember my interest is on organizational crisis management and business continuity. I hope there will be other people in the SIG who would share this interest. Let the SIG begin!
You can count on me
Carol, very good idea indeed.
I'm interested in investigating both the soft part of it and any technological application that can support a complexity approach in the organisations. You can count on me for the conversation.
me too ...
I recently had a conversation with Jim Carroll (Canada) about futurology. We agreed that all that we are doing in futurology is guiding others through complexity. Sure it helps to exchange and enrich out thinking about complexity in a SIG ... !
complexity and innovation
hi all,
I'm quit interested to exchange ideas within the SIG. my background is innovation and social networks. innovation culture is important, findings in complexity science could be heplful for further development of the innovation culture.
Franz
Intervening in complex systems
Hi all
I'm interested in how to intervene effectively in complex social systems. My work is public sector and its struggling with working in complexity.
complexity and lean
I'm new to this area but from the little I've read (or badgered out of carol!) I can sense both that the subject is generally interesting and that there may be a tie to my professional research interest in lean manufacturing and sustainability. I'm hoping to find out more about that here.
As well as being new to the area I'm new to this kind of knowledge sharing method, so please be patient with me while i learn the ropes!
Count me in!
Complexity science as it applies to organisations is something I'm just getting my head around. Keen to join the group and see how these ideas can be applied to real life organisations.
Looking forward
This is an excitiing development in the on-going conversation about applications of nonlinear dynamics to human interactions. Thanks for kicking it off. I'll pass the word along to my associates in the Human Systems Dynamics Institute.
Art + Complexity
As an artist I'm interested in the different perspective that complexity has to offer and look forward to hearing insights from others.
Autopoeisis
I'm interested in complexity science from a publishing/new media perspective. Looking forward to getting involved.
Support
I hope this gets plenty of contributors. I'd like to see a sharing of ideas from the academic aspect and from practical experience of use of compleity in organisations.
Thining diffrently
Exited to learn more how Complexity Science can help people to think differently through conversations and exchange of ideas and experiences.
Hello
Hello - this is Pete Miles from Complexity Solutions, signing on. I look forward to interesting dialogue!
Pete
Complexity SIG - Great Idea
Hi,
I think a complexity SIG is a great idea and can contribute to better understanding of the potential business applications of this emerging science. Good Luck!
Atai
Introduction
Hi to everone, my name's Paul Argyle and I'm an entrepreneur with dangerous academic tendencies interested in using concepts from Complexity Science to better understand growing businesses. I'd like to add Bill McKelvey to the Author's list and in particular his thoughts on Complexity Science being seen as Order Creation science. see http://www.billmckelvey.org/complexity.html
Complexity SIG
Please count me in.
André Spijkervet