business model innovation design we're on a road to nowhere // on a quest to analyze and explore the design of business model innovations, i.e. 'hideous and hidden things' like organizational structures and capabilities, corporate strategies and all things related // on a yellow brick road with a girl, a lion and a straw-man wasting our time // …

“Chaos ist Ordnung, die wir nicht verstehen.” Konstantin Wecker

I am not alone then … BW columnists Jack & Suzy Welch say that there isn’t a good manager in the world who doesn’t have a daily panic attack about the load of stuff he doesn’t know but should, the confounding challenges ahead, and the sheer impossibility of getting it all done … but it’s […]

Via Euan Semple this quote by Dave Snowden: The only way to manage a complex environment is to apply simple rules. If you apply complex rules to a complex environment you end up with a mess.

Via Dave Snowden: If you attempt to control everything you loose control, if you stand above the system amplifying good patterns and disrupting bad ones, if you influence evolution rather than trying to design against idealistic outcomes; then, and only then do you achieve what control is possible. Its all about doing more with significantly […]

Note to myself: lots of video lectures and accompanying powerpoints at the Spring School in Complexity Science These new courses (designed in conjunction with our new MSc Complexity Science) are designed for postgraduate students (perhaps early in their PhD studies or on masters courses) and industrial employees wishing to learn about the principles and challenges […]

On a TGIF night everything’s OK, so get ready for some light food for thought, and some more “organizational pathologies” … Carmine Coyote c/o Slow Leadership calls for leaders to try something new in management, because Pragmatism is fine for second-rate businesses handling commodity products, but that route will never win long-term market leadership. Visionary […]

An article in the Telegraph, reporting from an encounter and interview with Russell Ackoff, grand-father of systems thinking. Some gems include: The idea that you can improve a business by focusing on just part of it is plain wrong, Ackoff says. In fact, it’s more serious than that: attempted “improvements” can actually make everything else […]