tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-242440782024-02-24T20:46:27.724+00:00Bits or pieces?A node between the physical and digital.<br>
The rants and raves of Simon Wardley.<br>
Industry and technology mapper, business strategist, destroyer of undeserved value. <br>
<i>"I like ducks, they're fowl but not through choice"</i>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comBlogger1080125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-55593852970234831562024-02-03T20:38:00.061+00:002024-02-03T20:49:48.672+00:00A good enough map<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">I’m often asked whether we can add a new axis onto a Wardley map or some new legend; to be blunt, I prefer not to.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">When you create a Wardley map, you first start by identifying users and their needs. For example, a Tea Shop has users like the business that wants to sell cups of tea to members of the public who will hopefully drink it. The Public and the Business are connected through a cup of tea.</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><b><i>Figure 1 - </i></b></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Users and their need for a cup of tea</i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdDK7_kvC0fkbYJNouIDIUHo0yfvBugq5bKMmUxavEs3YKYzMNHZok1ibhTtU4jGlaRGeElExA0dVfmajAKTQHNdZJFaQbzx3RgYnMX3z2I0q9KX5ITL5ViB6f6LoXYv2aCslodOxxKJXmZdq0EeL6TBFMWUO-frYqS-M3UDfMe5JgLiodljA1Rg/s1075/map04.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="390" data-original-width="1075" height="145" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdDK7_kvC0fkbYJNouIDIUHo0yfvBugq5bKMmUxavEs3YKYzMNHZok1ibhTtU4jGlaRGeElExA0dVfmajAKTQHNdZJFaQbzx3RgYnMX3z2I0q9KX5ITL5ViB6f6LoXYv2aCslodOxxKJXmZdq0EeL6TBFMWUO-frYqS-M3UDfMe5JgLiodljA1Rg/w400-h145/map04.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br />Once you have users and needs, you expand it by considering what capability and components are needed to make a cup of tea. This creates a graph, a chain of what is required.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Figure 2 - A chain of the cup of tea</i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis7Jrf_1Hy_mo_wV3aRbkan8-1IbQI1YhzuyWJt4soGNWFQvA6tL1tV5QKk_-A0iRR1HcyEzpGqZkHGU0AGpn390Y5hR2DB20-nwrbNfEqrmrK5rrjLjdeofZfCzs6CHyrXVSaH8lFMT9UdSkLM7DfCbt2zDrIXqkLFadV4Xg6H4sTn-StJzlWKQ/s1158/graph.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="815" data-original-width="1158" height="281" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis7Jrf_1Hy_mo_wV3aRbkan8-1IbQI1YhzuyWJt4soGNWFQvA6tL1tV5QKk_-A0iRR1HcyEzpGqZkHGU0AGpn390Y5hR2DB20-nwrbNfEqrmrK5rrjLjdeofZfCzs6CHyrXVSaH8lFMT9UdSkLM7DfCbt2zDrIXqkLFadV4Xg6H4sTn-StJzlWKQ/w400-h281/graph.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i><br /></i></b><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">But it’s not any old graph; we order it by placing the users at the top and then the components according to how visible we think they are. For example, a cup of tea needs at least three components — tea, hot water and a cup. Now, what is the most visible element? How often do you ask for “a cup of Earl Grey” or an “English breakfast, please”? Is this more frequent than you talk about the type of cup? Is that more often than you enquire about the hot water used?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Once we have ordered the chain, we go through the entire chain asking “how evolved” each component is and placing the components according to an evolution axis from the genesis of something entirely new and never done before to more of a commodity. This creates the Wardley map.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Figure 3 - The map of a cup of tea</i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu57QR02tkbGRD-7d7sxw-sOXmZ6NYJ5jBvbBnzSSUugQx-Asn5OhFI-P3TU0VSd5ldgb4JcnOEvEIe9NzYA99VkgY-hr7MQeSGMX15R82NMdpwou7Jy48E-48MLqnw6IOto2-DQCQ829Ta_XB9igN6KAkyE8TqfPmWYhXBy7S2-nt8ymYxcv83Q/s1425/Map02.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="843" data-original-width="1425" height="236" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu57QR02tkbGRD-7d7sxw-sOXmZ6NYJ5jBvbBnzSSUugQx-Asn5OhFI-P3TU0VSd5ldgb4JcnOEvEIe9NzYA99VkgY-hr7MQeSGMX15R82NMdpwou7Jy48E-48MLqnw6IOto2-DQCQ829Ta_XB9igN6KAkyE8TqfPmWYhXBy7S2-nt8ymYxcv83Q/w400-h236/Map02.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Finally, we tidy this up by adding a line of evolution at the bottom and an indicator for the value chain. NB. There can be many value chains on a single map; there is, in practice, no y-axis because that is contained within the chains themselves; it’s more of a directional indicator, i.e. the further you go down the chain then, the less visible the components become to things higher up the chain.</span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Figure 4 - A Wardley Map</i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihblskbe-D6AMOBBf8GIIHIw_HVGS7JnhQDCu9bzy3qeBXJqkdwSmUuH1sYxiUcSR43dBfhNbxP9jHj2LFdraEwsbkv276qFGEdwZhegaz71XVvhWJZjIZQTZQfEsNDT5fpVhfJCYj_cCjZYy8YXFwGJAwT1b9PSIoPy0ROOe9kGhTT_ZdSmbZcA/s5333/SEACON%20conv%2022.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3000" data-original-width="5333" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihblskbe-D6AMOBBf8GIIHIw_HVGS7JnhQDCu9bzy3qeBXJqkdwSmUuH1sYxiUcSR43dBfhNbxP9jHj2LFdraEwsbkv276qFGEdwZhegaz71XVvhWJZjIZQTZQfEsNDT5fpVhfJCYj_cCjZYy8YXFwGJAwT1b9PSIoPy0ROOe9kGhTT_ZdSmbZcA/w400-h225/SEACON%20conv%2022.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Using this map, we can now:-</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Challenge what we are doing</b> — “Why are we custom building kettles?” or “Why is the cup more visible than the tea”?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Add missing components</b> — “Have we thought about staff to make the tea?” or “What about milk?”</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Add missing users</b> — “What about regulators?” or “What about staff? Don’t they have needs?”</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Add missing needs</b> — “What about a nice place to sit?” or “wifi?” or “A payment method?” or “How about some biscuits!”</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">We can use the map to discuss how to manage and measure the system, how and where the landscape is changing, where we should focus on improving operations, and where to differentiate. There is an awful lot to be discussed with this simple but imperfect map.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">However, that discussion does require thought, communication and challenge. As simple as it is, the map provides massive information compression compared to text. To compensate, it also delivers a constraining framework (a strong opinion in both the view of value chains and evolution), which enables discussion despite the vast amount of information. Even with this, I have found in research meetings that two hours per day is the maximum time people can work on maps without becoming mentally exhausted. Mapping may be simple, but it is also mentally challenging.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Adding another axis will increase the effort required and the potential for confusion. That alone would make them less valuable. So, yes, you could add more axes, colours, symbols, or more of everything in our attempt to build the perfect, all-encompassing, 15-dimensional, AI-driven supermap of the future. However, adding these features doesn’t make the maps more understandable or useful. Instead, stripping stuff away might be the better path.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Figure 5 - The super map of the future, courtesy of ChatGPT.</i></b></span></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLAtiM12W4jiARzTkpSHSspaDnKZdKTjWysv8b39ZuPnijZSkprafLc1UFMB-0ug9JVNz8YeNn4r3bXjo2QTY-aeH-VGQree7v94139LvLVLz2h3LPRcrMxxPticP1v_eBchP7-pfMcYjtuPXbzo70NBQi6ZvzR0zEcz8Bjuip1UHc1C1Ivy1OzA/s849/supermap.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="849" data-original-width="841" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLAtiM12W4jiARzTkpSHSspaDnKZdKTjWysv8b39ZuPnijZSkprafLc1UFMB-0ug9JVNz8YeNn4r3bXjo2QTY-aeH-VGQree7v94139LvLVLz2h3LPRcrMxxPticP1v_eBchP7-pfMcYjtuPXbzo70NBQi6ZvzR0zEcz8Bjuip1UHc1C1Ivy1OzA/w396-h400/supermap.png" width="396" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The maps are good enough for me until something better and simpler comes along. I follow the path of Less is often More.</span></div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-75648320640768750132024-01-30T19:47:00.002+00:002024-01-30T19:47:29.631+00:00<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">If you’re coming here for the latest and greatest in project management techniques, then I’ll stop you there. In this article, I will go through some basic principles that are well over fifteen years old and have been used from heavy engineering to low earth orbit. There will be no new-fangled concepts or terms, just basics that have been tried and tested.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">Nor will I spend my time waffling on about the sorry state of many technology projects or outsourcing efforts. Failure rates above 70% have been consistent since the 1990s. They are almost as common as the excuses:- communication issues, mismatched expectations, lack of clarity on purpose, difficulties in managing remote teams and cultural differences.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">I will use an example from 2012: the building of HS2 (high-speed rail) in a virtual world. I like examples, and this project, run by James Findlay, was delivered on schedule and under budget. I’m picking it because it’s old, and HS2 doesn’t have a good record in the public eye.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">However, before we go through the tips, I want to use that same example to show you what was typical in government in 2010–2014 (when I was more active in the UK government). I don’t know the current situation; you must ask them, not me.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><h4><span style="font-family: courier;">How things used to be done.</span></h4><span style="font-family: courier;">The image below is the graph of the system for building HS2 in a virtual world; it’s the sort of diagram you’d often find on whiteboards in engineering departments. It contains multiple connected components with many acronyms, such as PIMS for Project Information Management System or CRM for Customer Relationship Management system.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><b>A systems graph</b></i></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfL86oft0xgpZSLltz4a3fk7nwW2EO0WWaJXH4tn-SQYHHUFSquoaIq9HtaKxlWXbWIpbuMT37VlBMczLHGQRz_qotnIMpUdS8qZzSQXbX9II_KJpfFnrSWZF3RDmMMoytAa4PF2qAvwrmEl7-dwBKqCo7kBoiD-nIKeXzjOfnhGq6nxVsjiFdxw/s1920/HS2IMG.002.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfL86oft0xgpZSLltz4a3fk7nwW2EO0WWaJXH4tn-SQYHHUFSquoaIq9HtaKxlWXbWIpbuMT37VlBMczLHGQRz_qotnIMpUdS8qZzSQXbX9II_KJpfFnrSWZF3RDmMMoytAa4PF2qAvwrmEl7-dwBKqCo7kBoiD-nIKeXzjOfnhGq6nxVsjiFdxw/w400-h225/HS2IMG.002.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Now, to “ensure” value for money, it was common in 2010 for organisations (both commercial and governmental) to outsource most of the project. This was often done by breaking the project into smaller groups of components (in this case, I’ve called them LOTs) with components that sounded similar to each group grouped together, e.g. a LOT for infrastructure or a LOT for engineering.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">A detailed contract with mountains of specifications was then written for each LOT. People had learned that projects often massively ran over cost because of poor or faulty specifications; hence, a lot of effort went into this. Once the contract was written, these LOTs were put out for tender.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Breaking the project into LOTs</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQcH_Tk9hLh3PmvM3TVa-DVHG1L1kOy9QnZD0Zf51X6l4j63QgZC11hqkKhSamDeL0ZziMczx68nZNdVNrgwVwf_P12JCpw-q_bwUKJ9z2Wa7jZtGaSb0ZH88EbXUDVCUFNxVlbiyo2f5cslYItKlbua5ErETkuJ0aoeQo1hIIuKddFGcsHgX4MA/s1920/HS2IMG.003.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQcH_Tk9hLh3PmvM3TVa-DVHG1L1kOy9QnZD0Zf51X6l4j63QgZC11hqkKhSamDeL0ZziMczx68nZNdVNrgwVwf_P12JCpw-q_bwUKJ9z2Wa7jZtGaSb0ZH88EbXUDVCUFNxVlbiyo2f5cslYItKlbua5ErETkuJ0aoeQo1hIIuKddFGcsHgX4MA/w400-h225/HS2IMG.003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">80% of the time, as a rule of thumb, these LOTs would then massively overrun in both time and cost because of poor or faulty specifications despite our best efforts. When you specify what you want in a contract, if you change your mind, that will incur costs. The process for this is known as change control.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">People would moan about the specifications as the cost spiralled, often doubling, tripling or more. Those people would then commit to never making the same mistakes again, and next time, the specification would be better.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">It wouldn’t.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The same cycle would repeat.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">This has been going on for decades.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: courier;">I was stunned when I first encountered this problem (in a commercial organisation in 2007)</span></span><span style="font-family: courier;">. It’s a straightforward thing to fix. Since then, I’ve watched billions being wasted unnecessarily.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><h4><span style="font-family: courier;">How to fix things</span></h4><span style="font-family: courier;">The first thing you do with any project is to focus on the project users by asking the questions:-</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">1) <i>“Who are the users?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: courier;">and</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">2)<i> “What are the users’ needs?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">For the above graph, I’ll assume that a good job was done identifying users and their needs, and hence, I’ll create an image with that information extracted.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><b>Users and their needs.</b></i></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0utq6LujT9cxK7FS7W9rjEIV7UnxCoFGRdppecgcJzeLaYkn2EWfb3ibXu3yjjDa0f7lNThZm4xB8Jvnr6LX3pbSYWUeQbERdwuNLeV5eCOw76pmlf-RNL-zhtMS1_4tziueoRksTxSS2avA9F8VKoyJahWWXWT7oW4HEJZOZj3RBtZenBcV59A/s675/IMAG01.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="143" data-original-width="675" height="85" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0utq6LujT9cxK7FS7W9rjEIV7UnxCoFGRdppecgcJzeLaYkn2EWfb3ibXu3yjjDa0f7lNThZm4xB8Jvnr6LX3pbSYWUeQbERdwuNLeV5eCOw76pmlf-RNL-zhtMS1_4tziueoRksTxSS2avA9F8VKoyJahWWXWT7oW4HEJZOZj3RBtZenBcV59A/w400-h85/IMAG01.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">In practice, it’d be a great month if 30% of the organisations I meet did this. You will be stunned at how many multi-million pound projects are undertaken with no clear idea of the actual users or their needs.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">Once you’ve identified the users and what they need, you need to ask another two questions.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">3) <i>“What capabilities do we need to meet those needs?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">and</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">4) <i>“What components do those capabilities need?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Capabilities, users, needs and components are all subtly different forms of … components. The key is understanding the relationship, i.e. this component needs that component. In other words, a USER needs this USER NEED, which needs this CAPABILITY, which needs these COMPONENTS, and on and on. I’ve taken our example from above and expanded the components we are looking at.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>A chain of needs</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIGv5xHPvvpeCnMiP9Exa1wpN1qkykntRrcxA1ZUb02B3YfGzqpWzhcb5j-a7eNEnAX17mcvONX33HoQSzqPgP9Mp_NbkZNZkg2IR-ohxaKqPmE19jlw6fRyVuGpQdCFOxlYd5-hr20EmASW31qQlNOAX6tG16dHDNgiD7_HklDLAMU7CpGybyqA/s1920/HS2IMG.006.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIGv5xHPvvpeCnMiP9Exa1wpN1qkykntRrcxA1ZUb02B3YfGzqpWzhcb5j-a7eNEnAX17mcvONX33HoQSzqPgP9Mp_NbkZNZkg2IR-ohxaKqPmE19jlw6fRyVuGpQdCFOxlYd5-hr20EmASW31qQlNOAX6tG16dHDNgiD7_HklDLAMU7CpGybyqA/w400-h225/HS2IMG.006.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Unsurprisingly, we call this a chain of needs. You should never forget that those relationships can come in multiple forms: A needs B or A needs an absence B, or … there are many.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">However, let us keep it simple and stick with A <b>needs </b>B.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">This chain of needs is a graph, and whilst it is a significant first step, it doesn’t quite get us where we need to be to fix these contract problems. The next step we need to take is to turn this graph into a map, and we do that by simply asking the following question:-</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">5) <b><i>“How evolved are these components?”</i></b></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">That component might be knowledge, data, practice, a value or an activity. We use different labels to describe the evolution of each component type. I’ve provided a table of those labels and highlighted the labels I will use.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Labels for different stages of evolution<br /></i></b></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhbx85gcNkP8FRjUvgfUenbVsQJqIu1SkQhBTB7KrgVgYngpwAaRdr4YVVRBle5IcEwGDuDJUoCtfE-kcDDPVzy-pBv-ADJVM14uQwJSlDHNZKaPIVl7QgvGMD_Jh1dTQA6Iee-cCcCZxT1ebYnhVWe6lahv871zF-y2dsSN8Hbwh7jr86pytKPQ/s1884/labels.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1052" data-original-width="1884" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhbx85gcNkP8FRjUvgfUenbVsQJqIu1SkQhBTB7KrgVgYngpwAaRdr4YVVRBle5IcEwGDuDJUoCtfE-kcDDPVzy-pBv-ADJVM14uQwJSlDHNZKaPIVl7QgvGMD_Jh1dTQA6Iee-cCcCZxT1ebYnhVWe6lahv871zF-y2dsSN8Hbwh7jr86pytKPQ/w400-h224/labels.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Using those labels (the x-axis on the map), going through each component and asking, “How evolved is this?” I’ve turned our graph into a map. This was the high-level map that I created with James Findlay in 2012.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>A map of building HS2 in a virtual world, 2012<br /></i></b></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv1KMxdTzEM5-wByUc8WcBCHBB1wtsHC8uqkYCx_FGt9inSXRD9uxy_FKB6d-Z1cE_7V8Eu4ULCYTDWUjaSXzQ3IyUdaeEXAWCOAETZ677PH8UwjPTmFiJE4OqDi61y2G53_VBFkLAY1Z2veO36fPlE63AIyOvhh73qpbIY_Kmxk9v31iYuBE2dA/s1920/HS2IMG.007.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv1KMxdTzEM5-wByUc8WcBCHBB1wtsHC8uqkYCx_FGt9inSXRD9uxy_FKB6d-Z1cE_7V8Eu4ULCYTDWUjaSXzQ3IyUdaeEXAWCOAETZ677PH8UwjPTmFiJE4OqDi61y2G53_VBFkLAY1Z2veO36fPlE63AIyOvhh73qpbIY_Kmxk9v31iYuBE2dA/w400-h225/HS2IMG.007.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">While creating the map, you’ll often find yourself adjusting the chain of needs — that’s perfectly normal. It is perfectly normal to adjust the map because it is always an imperfect landscape representation. We are not trying to create the perfect map. We are attempting to put our assumptions about a project onto the map so that others can challenge it or tell us what we’re missing or where we are going wrong.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">In practice, we’ve been challenging it all along. Go back and look at the questions:-</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">1) “<i>Who are the users?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">2) <i>“What are the users’ needs?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: courier;">3) <i>“What capabilities do we need to meet those needs?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">4) <i>“What components do those capabilities need?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">5) <i>“How evolved are these components?”<br /></i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">That last question is always fascinating. More often than not, I come across corporations custom-building stuff, a commodity. But why? Alas, most organisations tend to run on stories, and the problem with stories is we associate good leaders with good storytellers. When you challenge someone’s story, you say, <i>“You’re not a good leader”</i>. This never ends well.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">With a map, I’m saying the map is wrong, not the person. Challenging the assumptions in a map is much easier than challenging the assumptions in a story.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">Suppose we do that and end up with a good enough map that has been challenged many times. How does that help fix our contract problem? Using maps, we have learned many technological, economic, social, and political patterns. Few to discuss in a post. However, I will discuss one pattern: <i>“There is no such thing as one size fits all”.</i></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">When we look at the map through the lens of project management methods, it turns out that some methods are more robust in different places of the map, i.e. agile / XP works best in the more genesis/custom built phase because it reduces the cost of change and change is the norm. On the other hand, Six Sigma works best in the more industrialised/late product/commodity space because it reduces deviation, and you don’t want deviation with a commodity. In between Lean / SCRUM / MVP work best because we’re still learning about the space. I’ve summarised this in the following image.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Different methods work best in other parts of the map.</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwiG_6Phj5Y89LF6YPGsnO-OkN11K0I7Ey0_3IjZ3kyPKj-VSMlJbRDtUa0LIWtTfe9inxE7FR4WUfoSZOtNit8ewSDfegARvp42uA71W2B5_OOaZUA7lmk9Jd1A6Sq8Ts8pZl4GOASTKgoN0EvkiBQ6j8QRz4y7pMFqYZ8A2e_rynn2bb94SzMw/s1920/HS2IMG.008.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwiG_6Phj5Y89LF6YPGsnO-OkN11K0I7Ey0_3IjZ3kyPKj-VSMlJbRDtUa0LIWtTfe9inxE7FR4WUfoSZOtNit8ewSDfegARvp42uA71W2B5_OOaZUA7lmk9Jd1A6Sq8Ts8pZl4GOASTKgoN0EvkiBQ6j8QRz4y7pMFqYZ8A2e_rynn2bb94SzMw/w400-h225/HS2IMG.008.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Now, we can ask the question:-</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">6) <i>“How are we managing these components?”</i></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">On the map, we can show how we think we should be managing it, i.e. where we should be outsourcing and where we should be building in-house with agile techniques.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Applying different methods to a map</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm8lNfYxTmys56QnpQglgt0Lub4HghpkD_87yc-EU6E9tz6h8IzxHRpT182f2s3VBm2UZg4_IypN6BdEv208RRRPHfAhr5vb2RWOGVsAUB04bdBdKLGyFnXlba3OOpLNZG7QUL7LF1YeK3NGupQ7VOaper5Rs3B7AMIuQSOVQ-arUOkcUoWOySKg/s1920/HS2IMG.009.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm8lNfYxTmys56QnpQglgt0Lub4HghpkD_87yc-EU6E9tz6h8IzxHRpT182f2s3VBm2UZg4_IypN6BdEv208RRRPHfAhr5vb2RWOGVsAUB04bdBdKLGyFnXlba3OOpLNZG7QUL7LF1YeK3NGupQ7VOaper5Rs3B7AMIuQSOVQ-arUOkcUoWOySKg/w400-h225/HS2IMG.009.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">This is precisely what James did, understanding the context and use of appropriate methods. It’s how he delivered the project on budget and on time. He is not the only one; there have been many projects before and since.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">Of course, we can go further. We can start breaking the project down into smaller groups and continuing to apply appropriate methods to determine what parts we can turn into a LOT structure for outsourcing to a market through a detailed specification, what we need to build in-house on a time & material basis and where we need to focus on off the shelf products or partnership or maybe even a LOT contract but with a different focus such as outcome rather than specification.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">As an example, I’ve done this in the following map. This is your starter for ten, a point of conversation on how we manage something:-</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Breaking the project into appropriate contracts</i></b><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDm8beaGB0Lgv55Xj2gJxQuCcBPpt-ASqCUhyphenhyphenpYT9nHJVJ4hLmDAHmwKSl-GOpdFVs7zsyG3gvyMFWTepqTxivfVFLdpLWWluA3dcr-T7CeUaD58-780tfkaQ3mBNfPPEBG_QWhxBexNcRm0MikHayIBaP0QOugnyFho3cr66Y08Hmaz_x1XOzTw/s1920/HS2IMG.014.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDm8beaGB0Lgv55Xj2gJxQuCcBPpt-ASqCUhyphenhyphenpYT9nHJVJ4hLmDAHmwKSl-GOpdFVs7zsyG3gvyMFWTepqTxivfVFLdpLWWluA3dcr-T7CeUaD58-780tfkaQ3mBNfPPEBG_QWhxBexNcRm0MikHayIBaP0QOugnyFho3cr66Y08Hmaz_x1XOzTw/w400-h225/HS2IMG.014.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Now that I’ve shown you how to do this let us return to our earlier example and demonstrate what usually goes wrong with projects.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><h4><span style="font-family: courier;">Why do projects go so wrong?</span></h4><span style="font-family: courier;">We usually compound this mess with a fatally flawed contract, needing to understand users, their needs, the components involved, the methods required, and failing to challenge what is being planned. This is so common that I would not view 80% of projects failing as a problem but as the norm. Instead, I view the 20% succeeding as a remarkable feat of human achievement. Somehow, they succeed despite every action we take to cause them to fail. Heroic stuff.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">To demonstrate the contract problem, let us take one of the LOTs from our original proposed contract structure. In this case, I will take LOT 1 — Engineering.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>LOT 1 — ENGINEERING<br /></i></b></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGVW8bkyVS24wh5qvoDDfl-DVv157QhzyWgawFxisXWB9KvhDsmsWTcuVbW56LA6fsqPF393RM4ZYl0uKUwBV165kX52HvPo1VCorI4AjRhjNRXp5-ew9iRekt_vNVR1xjfvJWkepk_w8GHJ-LDEZ_ULhriqS3EzB3sUFQ3c0I0XJN9Dra_FzcFg/s1920/HS2IMG.010.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGVW8bkyVS24wh5qvoDDfl-DVv157QhzyWgawFxisXWB9KvhDsmsWTcuVbW56LA6fsqPF393RM4ZYl0uKUwBV165kX52HvPo1VCorI4AjRhjNRXp5-ew9iRekt_vNVR1xjfvJWkepk_w8GHJ-LDEZ_ULhriqS3EzB3sUFQ3c0I0XJN9Dra_FzcFg/w400-h225/HS2IMG.010.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Now, let us overlay that LOT onto the map we created.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>LOT 1 overlaid on the map.</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKHH6ZHzynC44kq48P1sc2lj8Z8DNdnXjh-umNlf07V16p2GjJb8jHdn5gAwCSaPkHV_KdB93-E6YKNlC_jiRYwVubYboqfgzUxj5ULlQheRpHUF0VEN65r1I6J8dIpMmu8AqIkode_ltXB8tnDshTpN93ypLm-a6xX6eG_q4A4lWr6VxuV0H9ZA/s1920/HS2IMG.011.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKHH6ZHzynC44kq48P1sc2lj8Z8DNdnXjh-umNlf07V16p2GjJb8jHdn5gAwCSaPkHV_KdB93-E6YKNlC_jiRYwVubYboqfgzUxj5ULlQheRpHUF0VEN65r1I6J8dIpMmu8AqIkode_ltXB8tnDshTpN93ypLm-a6xX6eG_q4A4lWr6VxuV0H9ZA/w400-h225/HS2IMG.011.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">What we are trying to do is to specify in detail the entirety of LOT 1 before putting it out to tender. However, there should be an obvious problem. Part of LOT 1 (the more commodity elements) can be defined and specified, but many of the project components are towards the uncharted space, which means we are still learning. These parts can NEVER be specified precisely because they are changing; they are uncertain by nature.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">By trying to create a specification around LOT 1, I have made a cast iron guarantee that there will be massive amounts of change and, hence, cost overruns. No amount of promising to specify future projects better will overcome the issue that you can’t precisely specify the uncertainty. The problem is the contract (see map).</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>LOT 1 guarantees massive change control costs.<br /></i></b></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbCQQ1fyYldX30Toe6hLiTayoYJcNVPOBO9DjYFKDi2kr2ijLAz9ceFSSdleLhFHpHjQpGr2TSUPmZNkxFHZb8qBog_xYpa7Z2VXKrccY6apWlRRHwZc_bHgiFjXNwkeDunpJaVauchzIrMR6TkD8z8Wb6Yl4fxXK21BGOZfnuCOfalSGeKv00VA/s1920/HS2IMG.012.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbCQQ1fyYldX30Toe6hLiTayoYJcNVPOBO9DjYFKDi2kr2ijLAz9ceFSSdleLhFHpHjQpGr2TSUPmZNkxFHZb8qBog_xYpa7Z2VXKrccY6apWlRRHwZc_bHgiFjXNwkeDunpJaVauchzIrMR6TkD8z8Wb6Yl4fxXK21BGOZfnuCOfalSGeKv00VA/s320/HS2IMG.012.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Naturally, this almost guaranteed failure is only compounded by other faults within our purchasing systems. These include:-</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">1) <b><i>A tendency to focus on costs alone.</i></b> </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: courier;">While it might seem prudent, it will drive vendors to use your projects as training grounds for their people,</span></span><span style="font-family: courier;"> who are put into more lucrative projects. You can often spot this if you have access to the GitHub of your project by the rapid turnover of people.</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">2) <b><i>An assumption of talent.</i></b> </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">For some bizarre reason, the idea often exists that a vendor will have done this thing many times before. That will certainly be true if you’re talking about a commodity component such as computing provided by a utility cloud like AWS. But if your project is a complicated structure spanning components from genesis to commodity, your assumption of talent and expertise can rapidly be faulty. They can easily be less capable than your own people.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">3) <b><i>Shifting the risk to others.</i></b> </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Whilst using an “approved” contractor and an “approved” process will reduce the political risk for yourself by providing someone else to blame, this does not mean it reduces risk to the company. If you keep failing despite repeating the same process, question whether better specification is the answer.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><h4 style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Wrapping it up</span></h4><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">This process I’ve outlined above has been successfully used on several projects for over 15 years. There is no magic here, no secret sauce, and nothing too taxing because those six simple questions are at its heart. Anyone managing a project should be able to provide a reasonable, though never perfect, answer.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">These questions are my simple tips for managing any project.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">1) <i>“Who are the users?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">2) <i>“What are the users’ needs?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: courier;">3) <i>“What capabilities do we need to meet those needs?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: courier;">4) <i>“What components do those capabilities need?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: courier;">5) <i>“How evolved are these components?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">6) <i>“How are we managing these components?”</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Now, as I said, this is a fundamental article. There are many paths to failure, but if you get this lot wrong at the beginning and end up with a contract structure based upon specifying that which cannot be specified, you’re likely heading towards a costly mistake.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><h4><span style="font-family: courier;">Additional notes — Graph versus Map</span></h4><span style="font-family: courier;">For those who don’t understand the difference between a graph and a map, the following images should help. The top three images are all graphs, and they are the same. They each contain three nodes connected by two relationships. You can rotate the components by any degree you wish and remain identical.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><b>Graph versus Map</b></i></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgflrwl2YNHjS2NYCHly9kpD7l1DkcmvupTK6Na24FPfZ6fKFjk1-HN4yALRmzMN0lZkg92lPfv1scXfZ3d0OBF97wBEzD6p9dKW4iExMxFHA2C_yJH-ZcdPktqNME5Wdo5_8iDOuYsOsZNcAMd2Z9nRC6T6BU3OqTf6_t40AQkknF78Mdb0JTDYQ/s1893/Maps.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1027" data-original-width="1893" height="217" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgflrwl2YNHjS2NYCHly9kpD7l1DkcmvupTK6Na24FPfZ6fKFjk1-HN4yALRmzMN0lZkg92lPfv1scXfZ3d0OBF97wBEzD6p9dKW4iExMxFHA2C_yJH-ZcdPktqNME5Wdo5_8iDOuYsOsZNcAMd2Z9nRC6T6BU3OqTf6_t40AQkknF78Mdb0JTDYQ/w400-h217/Maps.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">However, the bottom three images are all maps and completely different. If you rotate them, they also mean something else. The distinction between a map and a graph is that in the map, the space has meaning. This is why, with a map, you can’t just move a component (keeping the relationships the same) and expect the map to have the same meaning. It’s also why they are great tools for understanding territorial, economic, social, technological or political landscapes.</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Almost everything you’ve ever seen in business that calls itself a map is instead a graph:- mind maps are mind graphs, business process maps are business process graphs, etc. What gives space meaning is the anchor (i.e. the compass or, in our maps, the user) combined with the position of pieces (i.e. this is west or east of this, or in our maps that this is higher up the value chain than that) and consistency of movement (i.e. north is north or in our maps, this is more evolved than that).</span></div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-8453978308885530412024-01-10T17:32:00.002+00:002024-01-10T18:48:29.811+00:00<div><span style="font-family: courier;">I am occasionally asked how to combine Wardley Maps with Cynefin. They are complementary tools, not a replacement for each other nor something that can be mashed into a "holistic" view (except in the mind of DALL-E which kindly created the image which makes no sense whatsoever). They explore a problem space from different viewpoints and both are useful in their own right and should be used together. To explain I'll use an example.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The following is a very simple map, built with <a href="https://onlinewardleymaps.com/">onlinewardleymaps </a>that has a <b>user </b><i>expressing </i><b>some thing that they need</b> which is <i>fufilled</i> by some <b>capability to meet the thing the user needs</b>. That capability is represented as a pipeline because, in this case, there are multiple choices to fulfil that need. The choices are products from Competitor 1, Competitor 2 and Competitor 3 (see figure 1).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><i>Figure 1 - </i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>A basic map of user with needs and multiple solutions to that need</i></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBUG3VrG7p3_NQVFCNwlFy-93r4N4p-tbd2GH-xBtozbcW-rmaVfVh0c2ZJPrlhok5V2xQ9AUH6SOVFmVVq1O1IuCpkPyHauV371Iz4lHn7hVjTT0zlrioG-sF53l6lopS_vo0bujZv7d2VhYZTviYEJ6a1t1i6Gsd1S6w8rr3XZaRMcSHUQ830w/s1262/Some%20Random%20Map,%20January%202024.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="727" data-original-width="1262" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBUG3VrG7p3_NQVFCNwlFy-93r4N4p-tbd2GH-xBtozbcW-rmaVfVh0c2ZJPrlhok5V2xQ9AUH6SOVFmVVq1O1IuCpkPyHauV371Iz4lHn7hVjTT0zlrioG-sF53l6lopS_vo0bujZv7d2VhYZTviYEJ6a1t1i6Gsd1S6w8rr3XZaRMcSHUQ830w/w400-h230/Some%20Random%20Map,%20January%202024.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">There are few things to note with the map. <br /><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">1) <b>Maps represent a chain of relationships.</b> Normally we describe this as needs as in This needs That. Needs are just a form of relationship and there is no reason why you can't use other language to describe that relationship such as expresses, fufilled or constrained by. If it helps explain the landscape you are looking at to others, don't be afraid to experiment.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">2) <b>Maps have logical ANDs</b>. For example, if we explore down the chain of Competitor 3's solution then we find that it contains multiple components i.e. this capability from Competitor 3 <i>needs</i> <b>thing </b>AND <i>needs </i><b>another thing</b> (see figure 2)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2 - </span><span style="font-family: courier;">Maps contain logical ANDs.</span></i></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4uv1qFEC1zVAMWkm8M9_XhUh9A4JhOKk20R_O6XxeXpjgHFLUBIwNgw6KlshPe4DThKqfH7jCR9miRSzAbmL5fJn_yCJEoBrPL__Ur5DhyBmukCEcS7j8y7mhSJbrfs2gN7Vy2l0_Ilo0eAGYpuTaXiZFNp8wh-6F2x7ca_faWJv4-cyWinHGXA/s1262/Some%20Random%20Map,%20January%202024%20(1).png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="727" data-original-width="1262" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4uv1qFEC1zVAMWkm8M9_XhUh9A4JhOKk20R_O6XxeXpjgHFLUBIwNgw6KlshPe4DThKqfH7jCR9miRSzAbmL5fJn_yCJEoBrPL__Ur5DhyBmukCEcS7j8y7mhSJbrfs2gN7Vy2l0_Ilo0eAGYpuTaXiZFNp8wh-6F2x7ca_faWJv4-cyWinHGXA/w400-h230/Some%20Random%20Map,%20January%202024%20(1).png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">3) <b>Maps have perspectives</b>. That is true even within a map. Hence the user of this capability might not be concerned with the components that make up the capability, whereas the provider is. Often, we stop mapping a chain at the point we have no influence or control over. As a rule of thumb it's not a bad idea to explore both up and down the chain (outside of your normal areas of influence) because you will often find that what the user describes as their need is not their actual need, and understanding your supply chain and the risks within it can help mitigate against shocks. Just ask all those manufacturers who have ignored their supply chains and then hit Brexit, COVID and the Ukraine war.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">4)<b> Maps have logical ORs</b>. The pipeline in the map above represents a choice. You can choose either the solution from Competitor 1 OR Competitor 2 OR Competitor 3. This is not necessarily an exclusive choice i.e. you could have a bit of Competitor 1 and a bit of Competitor 2. For example, if the pipeline is power then you might use a bit of nuclear and a bit of solar. Nuclear OR solar would be your choices.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">5)<b> The components in a pipeline are all independently evolving</b>. The pipeline doesn't say that Competitor 1's solution evolves to become Competitor 2's solution but that the three competitive solutions are at different stages of evolution. Ideally, you would represent the entire pipeline (where the square box is) as the most evolved stage of the entire market. Sometimes you don't, but then you are conveying that the market is far less evolved than it should be, e.g. 100s of CIOs custom building ERP in identical ways, making consultants wealthy when, in reality, the entire space should be a commodity.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">6)<b> There may be distinct and shared components</b>. If we explore down the chain of both Competitor 1 and Competitor 3's solutions (<a href="https://onlinewardleymaps.com/#clone:m0J1Cohc74CkqGvha5">I'll provide the map here</a>) then we might find common components as well as unique items. For example, our Competitor 1 solution requires expensive consultants. The reason why I highlight this is to point out that the solutions by the competitors to provide the same capability may be fundamentally different (see figure 3).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3 - </span><span style="font-family: courier;">Map of distinct and shared components</span></i></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2yAPXAaAe0li3VdHoIhhA4Yw4oreOKKXDCYALtKM2rXiA3zw6a-UsVDKpokAwgmm4lPXjEibzEJLE6nFczN_il7C49p2XsBa7UxUMhYZlkoY3jonqU7rLpYi8491rLCBva5LMg8mzzbxM-09i1Zo1Cjm_Kel3oRLpIEiOt3F6CzB-l7Ro1tLwRQ/s1262/Some%20Random%20Map,%20January%202024%20(3).png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="727" data-original-width="1262" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2yAPXAaAe0li3VdHoIhhA4Yw4oreOKKXDCYALtKM2rXiA3zw6a-UsVDKpokAwgmm4lPXjEibzEJLE6nFczN_il7C49p2XsBa7UxUMhYZlkoY3jonqU7rLpYi8491rLCBva5LMg8mzzbxM-09i1Zo1Cjm_Kel3oRLpIEiOt3F6CzB-l7Ro1tLwRQ/w400-h230/Some%20Random%20Map,%20January%202024%20(3).png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">If we explore those solutions in more detail (these maps are purposefully trivial), we may find many components involved. Tudor Girba (who runs <a href="https://feenk.com/">Feenk</a>) spends his life trying to make systems explainable. To show the problem, I'll switch to a graph format to show one system which provides a set of capabilities. (see figure 4)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 4 - A graph example of a system</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht_DTymz32e1dWH-7WBL7OwWDnLjEmdjun8sXh0SjJi8mXKBr2fI0iWUeNzOBiylZPtIpYqn6S5gAKZRfPlBoRt_hYhduGG1a2mDFCuUqGatNqpT0N2M30CKcXTBi0t0sEZkBJZXu-erYocKT2fJQKOwEOJRIUjR4CdFFn43mi4Hd4jPTTjhXbyQ/s349/Solution04.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="349" data-original-width="345" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht_DTymz32e1dWH-7WBL7OwWDnLjEmdjun8sXh0SjJi8mXKBr2fI0iWUeNzOBiylZPtIpYqn6S5gAKZRfPlBoRt_hYhduGG1a2mDFCuUqGatNqpT0N2M30CKcXTBi0t0sEZkBJZXu-erYocKT2fJQKOwEOJRIUjR4CdFFn43mi4Hd4jPTTjhXbyQ/w395-h400/Solution04.png" width="395" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">In our map, we said we had multiple possible solutions to provide the capability. So, sticking within the graph format, this is an example of multiple systems providing the same capability (see figure 5).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 5 - Graphs of multiple systems providing the same capability</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1VtA__LLp7YIydbuzjHHyrlw27LbQpB-yHr3rOOwhtDHVyRCr2z-zm6zCnGgHKggD4AfQ9vWxPxeKsY6GH3vOKzL6wTQk5tafPilwUddQ2qr-qLtIV_A08p9z5ZTgRw4Wi8vw6hCB-DP-H034M6AKInkyNoMmLyYaKhFXZHd6jmQGWiD6sS1gWQ/s1219/Solution03.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="849" data-original-width="1219" height="279" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1VtA__LLp7YIydbuzjHHyrlw27LbQpB-yHr3rOOwhtDHVyRCr2z-zm6zCnGgHKggD4AfQ9vWxPxeKsY6GH3vOKzL6wTQk5tafPilwUddQ2qr-qLtIV_A08p9z5ZTgRw4Wi8vw6hCB-DP-H034M6AKInkyNoMmLyYaKhFXZHd6jmQGWiD6sS1gWQ/w400-h279/Solution03.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Whilst each system is <b>complicated </b>(having many components operating in a defined and known manner), the "right" solution is still emerging. This means the problem space itself is <b>complex</b>. Within that one pipeline you can have multiple <b>complicated</b> solutions to a <b>complex</b> space which is still emerging. Those are terms from Cynefin, and if you want to know more about that subject then talk with <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-snowden-2a93b/">Dave Snowden</a>.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The point I want to make is you can't simply transport Cynefin terms onto the evolutionary axis of a map, i.e. you can't substitute custom and product for terms like complex and complicated. It doesn't work like that. Also, when you are mapping, you should keep Cynefin in mind. It's a useful mental framework.<br /><br />Every time you feel the urge to mash these frameworks into one all-encompassing ubermensch framework then just look at the DALL-E picture provided (from a prompt of mixing Wardley Maps and Cynefin) and stop. They are different but complementary. A diversity of viewpoints is not a bad thing.<br /><br /><i>Figure 6 - DALL-E's representation of a Wardley Map with Cynefin.</i><br /><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi615J_snr3zZCfhaB6hY1Smq-yy3yo92Zz3F83k2i3DdR_NSufmdrLpFNrz74s9h0A2XTLbDzshvEAxKt4IgINvRhMVP_6zoM8qLe2oa8EwwEY7vRL3CcFCRHas90ae10dNEuPVEK3t9INpPgb8LtpkGFxNShr86BuQsBWxqoZnM13HPlDGxdw5w/s1024/DALL%C2%B7E%202024-01-10%2014.56.19%20-%20An%20artistic%20representation%20of%20a%20conceptual%20blend%20between%20Wardley%20Maps%20and%20the%20Cynefin%20framework.%20The%20image%20should%20depict%20a%20detailed%20map,%20with%20topograp.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="1024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi615J_snr3zZCfhaB6hY1Smq-yy3yo92Zz3F83k2i3DdR_NSufmdrLpFNrz74s9h0A2XTLbDzshvEAxKt4IgINvRhMVP_6zoM8qLe2oa8EwwEY7vRL3CcFCRHas90ae10dNEuPVEK3t9INpPgb8LtpkGFxNShr86BuQsBWxqoZnM13HPlDGxdw5w/w400-h400/DALL%C2%B7E%202024-01-10%2014.56.19%20-%20An%20artistic%20representation%20of%20a%20conceptual%20blend%20between%20Wardley%20Maps%20and%20the%20Cynefin%20framework.%20The%20image%20should%20depict%20a%20detailed%20map,%20with%20topograp.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">So, how do I know which of those competitor solutions to choose? Well, that's a topic for another post. It's enough to know that you can map multiple options.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Follow ons </b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">If you want to know about Cynefin, talk to <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-snowden-2a93b/">Dave Snowden</a> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">If you need help understanding what systems you have, talk to <a href="https://feenk.com/">Tudor Girba</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">If you want a mapping tool try <a href="https://onlinewardleymaps.com/">OnlineWardleyMaps</a> and if you use it, then think about becoming a <a href="https://www.patreon.com/mapsascode">patron</a>. It is a community tool.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">If you want to learn more about mapping, why not join us at <a href="https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/map-camp-2024-tickets-771392936037">Map Camp</a>.</span></div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-35032365170162167702023-12-07T13:13:00.022+00:002023-12-07T14:14:09.491+00:00How to organise yourself - the dangerous path to Explorer, Villager and Town Planners<p><span style="font-family: courier;">Explorers, villagers and town planners (<b>EVTP</b>) is a system for organising a company that is having to deal with constant change due to an evolving environment. It's over 18 years old, it's a small part of the concept of mapping and it has been used successfully in several companies, BUT it is a difficult path to follow. I used to call this system - pioneers, settlers and town planners - unfortunately the colonialist overtone of those terms made it problematic for many and with good reason.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">At the heart of <b>EVTP </b>is the idea that as things evolve then the characteristics of such things also changes e.g. the first ever computer is not the same as a highly industrialised cloud instance of a virtual server. Because of this, the manner in which we manage and deal with those things must also change as it evolves e.g. the techniques by which we manage computing infrastructure at a hyperscale today are not the same as the techniques we used in the past. To effectively cope with an evolving space, therefore, requires different aptitudes (as in skillsets such as engineering or finance) and different attitudes (as in mindsets). The three essential mindsets that we need are explorers, villagers and town planners and they can all be brilliant people.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Explorers are brilliant people.</b> They are able to explore never-before-discovered concepts, the uncharted land. They show you wonder but they fail a lot. Half the time the thing doesn't work properly. You wouldn't trust what they build. They create 'crazy' ideas. Their type of innovation is what we call core research. They make future success possible. Most of the time we look at them and go "what?", "I don't understand?" and "is that magic?". In the past, we often burnt them at the stake. They built the first ever electric source (the Parthian Battery, 400AD) and the first ever digital computer (Z3, 1943).</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Villagers are brilliant people. </b>They can turn the half baked thing into something useful for a larger audience. They build trust. They build understanding. They make the possible future actually happen. They turn the prototype into a product, make it manufacturable, listen to customers and turn it profitable. Their innovation is what we tend to think of as applied research and differentiation. They built the first ever computer products (e.g. IBM 650 and onwards), the first generators (Hippolyte Pixii, Siemens Generators). </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Town Planners are brilliant people. </b>They are able to take something and industrialise it taking advantage of economies of scale. This requires immense skill. You trust what they build. They find ways to make things faster, better, smaller, more efficient, more economic and good enough. They build the services that explorers build upon. Their type of innovation is industrial research. They take something that exists and turn it into a commodity or a utility (e.g. with Electricity, then Edison, Tesla and Westinghouse). They are the industrial giants we depend upon.<br /><br />Now we have the basic idea: why should we implement this, and how do we do that? Well, the answer to the first question is - don't implement it. The process is not easy and you will fail if you don't follow every step. The only reason you would consider implementing the structure is if your organisation is so messed up with infighting, inertia, and inability to change that when compared to your competitors then you are seriously worrying about the organisation's future. In all other circumstances, keep whatever organisational structure you have "as is" because nobody enjoys a re-organisation except leaders who want to feel they are doing something and management consultants who get paid for it. Leave the org alone.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">If you really must change the organisation, then these are the steps you have to take.<br /><br /><b>Step 1 - Principle</b><br />Take the following principles listed in the doctrine table (figure 1), gather a diverse group of people in your organisation and ask them, "How good are we at these?". Get them to vote on the table, add "red" or "green" or "blue" circles or squares or stars for things that you are good or poor at. Just make sure you create a label for what the symbols mean (see figure 2)<br /><br /><i>Figure 1 - The doctrine table.</i></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjagL8_JzTCeVXMO0U9ebb-wrQCwvoeswRwHTOJV3D2EnAakezbuQ-Mgrbr3LAV8kzq0tkxP9VdziZUmElTPSWG0fLuis4IuyBACZawdm63eV2vDnY4hiq1sPcdtDYDxRTifxI429fBi8QL0ni7bBdaoFXxQxvnvYUi_0iPahX_yhVm6FuPYHP7ZA/s1920/EVTP.015.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjagL8_JzTCeVXMO0U9ebb-wrQCwvoeswRwHTOJV3D2EnAakezbuQ-Mgrbr3LAV8kzq0tkxP9VdziZUmElTPSWG0fLuis4IuyBACZawdm63eV2vDnY4hiq1sPcdtDYDxRTifxI429fBi8QL0ni7bBdaoFXxQxvnvYUi_0iPahX_yhVm6FuPYHP7ZA/w400-h225/EVTP.015.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 2 - A hypothetical filled in table (I'm not sharing actual client's information).</i><br /><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPDPna7Cxzz7Q87f6F3M60DNfWZDKT95h04uYA-TUFRB574sor6UbN4rl4OsTUN261n-syqOzeWpz0cnlcxKtL3118xvIf2ZRUHiAL_WQE94AtATbtW4Y034PLn9-2JtwByMI2Dt-Bv9L0afVHoiq6YPCe5NTaoQq7ZoaMXuLjWmoI2AklLbhVkQ/s1483/DOC01.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="729" data-original-width="1483" height="196" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPDPna7Cxzz7Q87f6F3M60DNfWZDKT95h04uYA-TUFRB574sor6UbN4rl4OsTUN261n-syqOzeWpz0cnlcxKtL3118xvIf2ZRUHiAL_WQE94AtATbtW4Y034PLn9-2JtwByMI2Dt-Bv9L0afVHoiq6YPCe5NTaoQq7ZoaMXuLjWmoI2AklLbhVkQ/w400-h196/DOC01.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The purpose of filling out the table is just to give you an idea of what state you are in and where you need to focus. In practice, 30-40 people spending 30 minutes filling out the table is enough to give you an idea. It's also worth spending an hour discussing the results with the group. The conversation is usually the most enlightening part. However that means you could have wasted as a group a total of 60 hours work on doing this, which is a lot but it's better to do this first and decide that you're ok and don't need to go further rather than pursuing the rest of the steps.<br /> <br /><b>Step 2 - Improving Awareness.</b><br />This is the most time-consuming part. It's where we start at the bottom of the doctrine table, fixing every principle and working your way up. Let us assume that you're hopeless at every one of those principles which is quite common with organisations today. One fast track method of introducing principles is to use Wardley Maps.<br /><br />Whenever you build a Wardley map, the first thing you need to do is identify the users. This is good for the map and it's also one of our basic principles. The users - whether it's public or the business or government regulators or all three or something else need to be marked on the map (see figure 3) as they are the anchor around which the map is built. Rather unimaginatively, I've added one user to our map called <b>users</b>.<br /><br /><i>Figure 3 - Know your users.</i><br /><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsxGbxG_1hoxZd4UHWpNpviPwfdynTgVIrxO6KwMexosIDH73KZJPKZiCtOfR8DjuM20OYLMXsFyeNnBfQ59QX_QN3HVf8djOfhRyFZvqZYgG9f8zRCKNngogaWDkT5kfxMKSxjkiQJfaLON2NHyeb5xGeKjgwKsNpuDYi-km3Lv-tROBJ8EWkKA/s1920/EVTP.002.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsxGbxG_1hoxZd4UHWpNpviPwfdynTgVIrxO6KwMexosIDH73KZJPKZiCtOfR8DjuM20OYLMXsFyeNnBfQ59QX_QN3HVf8djOfhRyFZvqZYgG9f8zRCKNngogaWDkT5kfxMKSxjkiQJfaLON2NHyeb5xGeKjgwKsNpuDYi-km3Lv-tROBJ8EWkKA/w400-h225/EVTP.002.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br />Now you have your users, you need to work out what their needs are. These you add to the map (figure 4) and fortunately, that's another principle ticked off. I know I'm a bit blase about this and actually getting to understand your user needs involves tasks like talking to them (you'd be gobsmacked at the number of companies who fail at this). I know it takes work.</span></p><p><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 4 - Understand your user needs</span></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiT6ZqRbz052J_P1YnCxvLsaAdpwf33i0zR5ChFv3GTuXVxSrCrX6-cV9KXcK0zdJKtDJSr9pGLQL9f9L6IaX5XR8YsUxGXYvyRg8bHIdd056DzevUjBCnLcueiUfFe_B2tfpGo93NCV4p2CJTNjrk-KwhJnbhDO_FwsfyB8ZQq_zzf4FVODQgzqQ/s1920/EVTP.003.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiT6ZqRbz052J_P1YnCxvLsaAdpwf33i0zR5ChFv3GTuXVxSrCrX6-cV9KXcK0zdJKtDJSr9pGLQL9f9L6IaX5XR8YsUxGXYvyRg8bHIdd056DzevUjBCnLcueiUfFe_B2tfpGo93NCV4p2CJTNjrk-KwhJnbhDO_FwsfyB8ZQq_zzf4FVODQgzqQ/w400-h225/EVTP.003.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br />Of course, meeting those needs requires many components, i.e., an entire supply chain (of physical, technological, data and practice components) is necessary to make it happen. Since those components are all evolving we need to do several things. We need to understand what the components are, the relationships between components, how this connects to use needs, and how evolved those components are. How you manage, purchase, finance and build a totally novel and new concept that has never been done before is radically different from how you manage, purchase, finance and build a highly industrialised commodity. If someone says to you that "we should use agile everywhere" or "we should use six sigma everywhere" then they are either inexperienced or a management consultant trying to flog you their latest fad. Either train them or show them the door.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">To recap, we need to understand the details and what is being considered (how evolved this). I've added that to figure 5. This is a Wardley Map.</span></p><p><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 5 - Understand the details and know what is being considered.</span></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyMQZC9LDwck4rAbIZp0XTQUMBaLENRoqonVWM_6suetBrv2Gw_oU6p8J_cn_kGKdjvVXLP9rPvUayqSHBLLWfLRYY2nBJRNlPvk7s_OHglGbB3plkJut0FgtBKWRXlJKYLfddhII51okZJEsmmuyoulR3K0xcsG1qf227zoZOLMi5M612Lj7Avg/s1920/EVTP.004.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyMQZC9LDwck4rAbIZp0XTQUMBaLENRoqonVWM_6suetBrv2Gw_oU6p8J_cn_kGKdjvVXLP9rPvUayqSHBLLWfLRYY2nBJRNlPvk7s_OHglGbB3plkJut0FgtBKWRXlJKYLfddhII51okZJEsmmuyoulR3K0xcsG1qf227zoZOLMi5M612Lj7Avg/w400-h225/EVTP.004.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /> </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">All maps are imperfect representations of a space but they enable people to expose their assumptions in a manner which allows others to safely challenge. I say safely because most organisations run on stories whilst telling everyone that great leaders are great story tellers. When you challenge someone's story, you're actually telling them that they are "not a great leader". People tend to get defensive at this. By putting the story into an imperfect map, I can challenge the map without challenging the person. I can say, I think this map is wrong. It might be missing a component, missing a relationship or having a component which is considered less evolved than it really is.<br /><br />In figure 6, I'm challenging where we've placed app certification. You probably won't believe this, but in 2023, we still have organisations custom-building their own private clouds in a world where finally, most people have accepted that the public cloud is a utility.</span></p><p><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 6 - Challenge assumptions</span></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWIwybueZFRO7JkdDWIgZnKppjXljolE71ni9Do4Vgzqg2IsBtbdJrRKB4yizCyqjOAoJMbZGrbRxqZcP3hiF1lZ7m2cAZPSuLlOjlsIAA8pG_ikVVhl6MLzvrm1rRAsDTMwtvg2Zj29WN3Co0aW0GVxQZ8xEEbQzUpzocxtljsYairtlZtukqvg/s1920/EVTP.005.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWIwybueZFRO7JkdDWIgZnKppjXljolE71ni9Do4Vgzqg2IsBtbdJrRKB4yizCyqjOAoJMbZGrbRxqZcP3hiF1lZ7m2cAZPSuLlOjlsIAA8pG_ikVVhl6MLzvrm1rRAsDTMwtvg2Zj29WN3Co0aW0GVxQZ8xEEbQzUpzocxtljsYairtlZtukqvg/w400-h225/EVTP.005.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">When it comes to challenge, the cheat sheet for mapping can be helpful. Simply look down the list of properties, marking off each one for the component and that should give you an idea of how evolved it is (see figure 7)<br /><br /><i>Figure 7 - Cheat Sheet</i></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiopHLD6RCCHCe0xcQ-FPvyWOiZGcxhZ2KlzWs79mD1ywB6w7YMQwrIScGvlKf5uLO2nIMMVF6HRdNG2i3_ZZwoYg2_BUpZNW0L1xvPpCtC6Vb71JGT6z4S77htOrd0lSJxsCLOmfSd_8ZXyyQtr9o6BHWEFnHpoQQPm1Bpw0eAShDr4-_DOjJfNg/s1920/cheatsheet.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiopHLD6RCCHCe0xcQ-FPvyWOiZGcxhZ2KlzWs79mD1ywB6w7YMQwrIScGvlKf5uLO2nIMMVF6HRdNG2i3_ZZwoYg2_BUpZNW0L1xvPpCtC6Vb71JGT6z4S77htOrd0lSJxsCLOmfSd_8ZXyyQtr9o6BHWEFnHpoQQPm1Bpw0eAShDr4-_DOjJfNg/w400-h225/cheatsheet.jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">Building a map is relatively simple process that gets easier with experience - understand the users, their needs, the components involved (SBOMs of Software Bill of Materials will help), how evolved the components are and then challenge the map. You can even get ChatGPT4v to help.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">However, with any large enterprise then you're going to have a lot of maps and those maps are dynamic because they exist in a constantly changing and evolving landscape. If you try to map out the entire landscape before you do anything else - you will fail. It's like painting the Forth Bridge, a never-ending task. Which means we need to take an iterative approach to mapping.<br /><br />The best way to do this is to create an Intelligence Function (or what I called Spend Control in UK Gov - bad name, my fault, don't repeat that). Let us start by asking a question. If you can map a system in a few hours, then what scale of project do you think it's worth spending those few hours understanding the users, their needs, the components involved, how evolved the components are before starting on the project? Pick a figure - a £1M project, a £100K project, a £10K project or every project? I suggest starting at £100K to begin with, you can change it later. Whatever figure you decide is your limit.<br /><br />You now need a bit of policy. What you're going to do is create an Intelligence Function in your organisation and introduce the policy that any project over your limit must be mapped by the group building it and that map must be taken to the Intelligence Function for challenging before building of the project starts. People will complain. They will ask why do they need to do this. You just simply need to say "If you're spending £100K on a project, I just would like us to understand who the users are, what their needs are, what components are involved and have someone challenge it before we begin. It's worth the few hours". Many will still grumble. <b>Be firm</b>.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">I will warn you now that a lot of politics will be involved. People will try to find exemptions; they don't want to be challenged in any way, and they certainly don't want to expose that they are spending £100M on a project that they have no idea what their users or user needs are. To help reduce the political pressure, make it clear that this is only for new projects, new re-compete, and new upgrades and doesn't affect the existing pipeline. Eventually all that stuff will come through your Intelligence Function but let time work its magic.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The second problem is your Intelligence Function is going to be overwhelmed. That's okay; let them challenge what they can and allow other projects to pass through with a "no comment". Over time, you'll need to staff it up appropriately.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">Lastly, it's an Intelligence Function. It will give advice on the project by challenging the map. The group building the project should have the autonomy to ignore the advice if it wishes. But make it clear that this is pre-mortem challenge and all projects will go through a post-mortem learning. If the project fails because the advice was ignored, questions will be asked.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">Getting this up and running is not a simple task. Give yourself a year before it is smoothly running. All the time, you'll be improving the situational awareness within the organisation of the landscape you are operating in.<br /><br /><b>Step 3 - Advice</b><br />As more maps are created, and there is less fighting over mapping and the challenge introduced, then you can extend what the Intelligence Function does. With many maps, you can start to identify duplication in projects - don't underestimate how much large organisations duplicate the same thing or the same process, often custom-building it in different ways. The record, to date, is one financial institution that has managed to rebuild risk management over a thousand times in the organisation. We don't quite know how many times because we stopped counting. Duplication of effort on the order of a hundred times or more is quite common. Be prepared to be shocked, that's the horror of looking.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">With many maps, you should be able to start to spot duplication. Often you'll find the same component doing the same thing (which can be spotted by relationships being the same on different maps) but called a different name. We love our acronyms and technobabble. Finance tends to be the worst for this btw. A bit of duplication is not a bad thing (for reasons of avoiding systemic failure) but it should a conscious choice. Anyway, the Intelligence Function should be able to start not only challenging on the map itself but also suggesting that one group goes to talk to another group because they are building similar components (see figure 8).</span></p><p><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 8 - Spotting duplication.</span></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgamKADMBge6vwTHpZ7g0SzBsE9fmHxH9snbevdERTCI0EmKN8ZwIgN_wCkhOgBUCf-bR4exqP7kb5PMeZ61G8B46Fnvs3C4RuYWy3Mj2VspX9CFV0KnKGMmfHZsooeOaqlRnTW3Agz-9ppDDaGDE6Y5gS-zgdTrPsVoS9KFjB8r0a4z85ZOu4QmQ/s1920/EVTP.006.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgamKADMBge6vwTHpZ7g0SzBsE9fmHxH9snbevdERTCI0EmKN8ZwIgN_wCkhOgBUCf-bR4exqP7kb5PMeZ61G8B46Fnvs3C4RuYWy3Mj2VspX9CFV0KnKGMmfHZsooeOaqlRnTW3Agz-9ppDDaGDE6Y5gS-zgdTrPsVoS9KFjB8r0a4z85ZOu4QmQ/w400-h225/EVTP.006.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">With enough maps, you can even start to build profile diagrams and spot candidates for common services as opposed to the old-fashioned way of some executive sticking their finger up in the air and declaring we need this as a common service. The maps become both a common language and a source of data for identifying opportunities. That also happens to be two principles but for now, you can leave those until a bit later.<br /><br />The other quick win you can introduce refers to methods such as project management and contracts. Since all components are evolving and we can actually visualise the components then we can apply appropriate methods to map (see figure 9 and 10). </span></p><p><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 9 - Different Methods works in different contexts</span></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE9SRwzDrTKyTFrmBBOeev6SwyubV3Z8Nc31PmH9M0ush3gH5WHvgJzVbPcDSmGSDsQvNW4GNq31FRpBvAbzSzzqQFJ0IEVkb-i25MjCQbHrWYy4Mpq2_RB5V0s5CgMh75ewIVrnAf9Kvj7cgbZshL4jAJ0GwW7lidsUS-aPcKd2nXOIM3lrJaBA/s1867/ContextMethods.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1073" data-original-width="1867" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE9SRwzDrTKyTFrmBBOeev6SwyubV3Z8Nc31PmH9M0ush3gH5WHvgJzVbPcDSmGSDsQvNW4GNq31FRpBvAbzSzzqQFJ0IEVkb-i25MjCQbHrWYy4Mpq2_RB5V0s5CgMh75ewIVrnAf9Kvj7cgbZshL4jAJ0GwW7lidsUS-aPcKd2nXOIM3lrJaBA/w400-h230/ContextMethods.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 10 - Applying appropriate methods to a map</span></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirRNkKjSHbSE30AD5ZGo_XsBC_yFn5WYhSLsRuwHHKY1KlDFn6qVJ6iLhXKaJc6A9VvYxsxDWi9-XvDW-Aeert4-4eLGMIWxr-HqhJxMfJzdaHHSUN03ulOGWozi5-gLB8yWXumXGHi42yErfnJWrpMoim9BYcEN46kBVX5WFJNO2_NmPcBELzYw/s1920/EVTP.007.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirRNkKjSHbSE30AD5ZGo_XsBC_yFn5WYhSLsRuwHHKY1KlDFn6qVJ6iLhXKaJc6A9VvYxsxDWi9-XvDW-Aeert4-4eLGMIWxr-HqhJxMfJzdaHHSUN03ulOGWozi5-gLB8yWXumXGHi42yErfnJWrpMoim9BYcEN46kBVX5WFJNO2_NmPcBELzYw/w400-h225/EVTP.007.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">This should stop all the management consultant led "lets agile everything" or "lets six sigma everything" or "lets [add some term] everything" fads that they love to create. If you haven't already fired all the management consultants by now, this will be a good time. If anyone grumbles just say use ChatGPT because its cheaper than ChatPPT which is what these management consultants mostly are.<br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><br />This principle of appropriate methods doesn't solely apply to project management; you'll find you also need different methods for purchasing, finance, operations and even marketing. <br /><br />The other low-hanging fruit is contract structure. Big outsourcing projects tend to fail because we try to cover an entire project with a single contract structure whilst that project contains multiple components at different stages of evolution. The problem is you can define the industrialised components well and hence use a very structured / rigid form of contract for those components. Unfortunately, the components in the uncharted space (e.g. the genesis of the novel and new to the custom-built) can't be defined. If you attempt to, you will inevitably incur massive change control costs. This is NOT a fault of lack of specification but instead trying to specify what is still evolving and changing. If you look at figure 10, by mapping it and applying appropriate methods, you've already neatly broken it into ten different contracts with defined interfaces for which appropriate contract structures can be applied.<br /><br />Give yourself another year to get the advice aspects of the Intelligence Function up and running. OK, you might be thinking - "hang on, that's two years" - well, it is. But two years to go from a lack of understanding of users, user needs, components involved, lack of challenge combined with inappropriate methods, massive duplication and flawed contract structures to something which is reasonably sane or at least is on the path to being sane is very fast for a large organisation. Especially one that is used to executives pondering for a year or so on what to do before publishing a fairly meaningless "strategy" with the help of management consultants based on no situational awareness whatsoever.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">At this point, you should already have seen visible improvements in the organisation. Just to check, it's worth re-running that doctrine table test (step 1). Given you also now have some level of visibility on the landscape and hence you can observe the environment, it's now worth talking about measurements. There are many measurements you can add such as price per transaction or delivery times or success rates. You might already be using some. Don't overload them, pick a handful and start using that to monitor progress from now on.<br /><br /><b>Step 4 - Improvement.<br /></b>Two years in, you should now be pretty good at all the phase I principles in the doctrine table and have at least caught up with those lucky few organisations (and there are few) who were good at this in the first place. The bottom of the table should be looking rosy. Now, you've got the long climb up the table (figure 11),</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><i>Figure 11 - Climbing the Doctrine Table</i><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCkoBjyUQE6EG9G4Bmo-LFbgZmfWg1FrT5PIyVrGgfhl3WOBLBC4I1gvbf__1-HFWQQ4ghdhPMYVUqwR1T_OTWYnuqOOUpfLaIIKx-_D4zRzI2obxRKsJXg1_TMXulyEpb5IFxK1ZMol7qvCnVBIKLi-ZL-exn4ABUHMbndKcOqiKsvj7KschDsw/s1920/EVTP.008.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCkoBjyUQE6EG9G4Bmo-LFbgZmfWg1FrT5PIyVrGgfhl3WOBLBC4I1gvbf__1-HFWQQ4ghdhPMYVUqwR1T_OTWYnuqOOUpfLaIIKx-_D4zRzI2obxRKsJXg1_TMXulyEpb5IFxK1ZMol7qvCnVBIKLi-ZL-exn4ABUHMbndKcOqiKsvj7KschDsw/w400-h225/EVTP.008.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">You want to start introducing all these principles into the organisation. You want to recruit against them, reward behaviour that demonstrates them and build up slowly. Complete phase I first (if not already) and then move into phase II and then up.<br /><br />During Phase II, you'll hit one principle which is <b>Think small teams. </b>At this point, you want to start introducing the concept of small teams built around the maps (see figure 12). <br /><br /><i>Figure 12 - Think Small Teams</i><br /><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY4RByyfP6IDPZ-cpO4qM_0SuRwXx6j_ORCuccwyE02wn-et9twn5n940OCqDILQW28kwFetz6WFYRSPBzmEVLHEc4R8bfMoPSlIqc7QjAesy-lkeLP-R2p4lE9Ff4caY6f_z-oQJBT43K030A9Su4szGal2Xv8_Is6jWTdLgYUMWqPyEj2N0EWQ/s1920/EVTP.009.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY4RByyfP6IDPZ-cpO4qM_0SuRwXx6j_ORCuccwyE02wn-et9twn5n940OCqDILQW28kwFetz6WFYRSPBzmEVLHEc4R8bfMoPSlIqc7QjAesy-lkeLP-R2p4lE9Ff4caY6f_z-oQJBT43K030A9Su4szGal2Xv8_Is6jWTdLgYUMWqPyEj2N0EWQ/w400-h225/EVTP.009.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">There's already a lot of good work out there on how to do this including Amazon's Two Pizza model. As a general rule of thumb, teams in the uncharted space of genesis / custom built should be 3 to 5 people but by the time the project becomes more industrialised (i.e. late product, more commodity) then Two Pizza (12 people) or slightly larger is fine. If the team is too large, use the maps to help break it down into smaller components. Use the relationships in the map (lines between nodes) to determine the fitness function (i.e. service delivery, dependencies and metrics) of each team. Do remember, that all the components are evolving. <br /><br />After about a year, you should start floating the idea of their being different attitudes (i.e mindsets) and not just aptitudes needed in each team. Don't however, do anything yet.<br /><br /><br /><b>Step 5 - Explorers, Villagers and Town Planners.</b><br />You should be three years in, those bad old days of unknown duplication, no-one focusing on user needs, regular out-sourcing failures, management consultant fads that never worked out and the general all round strife should be past memories. Even issues like tech debt should be slowly clearing out of the organisation. When you run that doctrine test, most principles should look positive and you should be feeling pretty happy about things. If you're not, keep going with Step 4, you're not ready yet.<br /><br />At this point, we will take the most dangerous and experimental step. We will re-organise the entire organisation to cope with constant evolution and change. Before you do this, consider stopping. If the organisation is doing well against competitors then take a break. Don't inflict any more change.<br /><br />If you take the path, this means two things.<br /><br />1) When we populate teams, we not only include the right aptitudes (engineering, finance, marketing, operations etc) but also the right attitudes (i.e. explorers, villagers, town planners)<br /><br />2) We introduce a mechanism of theft.<br /><br />The basic characteristics of explorers, villagers and town planners are outlined in figure 13<br /><br /><i>Figure 13 - Explorers, Villagers and Town Planners (EVTP)</i></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7f_1hTLHSZei8uSWwaoYUWXALcgFQzB-SDaZERidRyrliYNdejplAcVyvT-ImwUljI_CGzgzwS8bCaxwanFOrSNrJoDZMxMN1r4rvD4E45uY2FRosaYcy56kL62oNwTpxNAS4JQytAZMViEfuPxD8416ITY3228emDqDfnLGwcWik2s-Lzi0NAA/s1920/EVTP.011.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7f_1hTLHSZei8uSWwaoYUWXALcgFQzB-SDaZERidRyrliYNdejplAcVyvT-ImwUljI_CGzgzwS8bCaxwanFOrSNrJoDZMxMN1r4rvD4E45uY2FRosaYcy56kL62oNwTpxNAS4JQytAZMViEfuPxD8416ITY3228emDqDfnLGwcWik2s-Lzi0NAA/w400-h225/EVTP.011.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The way it works is as follows. You create a parallel structure to the company which consists of pools of explorers, villagers and town planners. You allow people to select their own attitude and to change if they wish to. Then, when new projects appear, you populate the cells with not only the right aptitude but also attitude (all explorers together or all town planners together, etc). Let that bed down for a little time.<br /><br />Then you introduce a system of theft. You allow teams of villagers to declare they are taking over some project run by explorers in order to turn it into a better product. You allow teams of town planners to declare they are taking over some product run by villagers in order to turn it into a utility-like service. As this starts to grow, you dismantle the rest of the organisational structure into the pools and introduce guilds across all the pools, i.e. guilds of engineers and guilds of finance (See Figure 14).<br /><br /><i>Figures 14 - Pools and cells.</i><br /><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXiXcYqsqgakrYHOY38aoRM-yrfHlk0OovGoFsXMy1XvVXXlcByl763Dyb_k-Fo3j8GsFu72nTdT_fuPmZOiZiXmWb30aV0Ax0qE-i5OrMeoXd6fvqpNOvsZRqfRUi3i0NS-L8SOGFUPY6IAVseTxqFyuHVJsoT4va6_yYc6Wfs-KXXXl1kOUsdA/s1920/EVTP.013.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXiXcYqsqgakrYHOY38aoRM-yrfHlk0OovGoFsXMy1XvVXXlcByl763Dyb_k-Fo3j8GsFu72nTdT_fuPmZOiZiXmWb30aV0Ax0qE-i5OrMeoXd6fvqpNOvsZRqfRUi3i0NS-L8SOGFUPY6IAVseTxqFyuHVJsoT4va6_yYc6Wfs-KXXXl1kOUsdA/s320/EVTP.013.jpeg" width="320" /></span></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: courier;">There will be a period of readjustment and chaos as you re-organise. This is not for the faint hearted, and if you have any doubts, keep focusing on step 4. This leap into step 5 should never be done unless you have almost all the principles in place and operating well. If you don't have those principles in place, I can guarantee you will fail.<br /><br />What you're aiming for can be seen on the map. It's a constant process of team stealing from team, which replicates the evolution that occurs outside the organisation (see figure 15).<br /><br /><i>Figure 15 - Dealing with constant evolution.</i><br /> </span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHp-ddK1UGVOEb3qy6l8nsdSKNfs2_kAPkgIy4WBuavPsarA4rquXan_rhJZfVZmjOdVqmwBMPyTLuGKNXJtaG6XEj_vUwaXG1fmdx9XB3vFCjzBLCzqeQM4X4gCSDwXzdJ_1fkWKKVk2b3O6pB8RXb-RVD_uz5IHVww0SBksqyc8BnpB723cGpg/s1920/EVTP.014.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHp-ddK1UGVOEb3qy6l8nsdSKNfs2_kAPkgIy4WBuavPsarA4rquXan_rhJZfVZmjOdVqmwBMPyTLuGKNXJtaG6XEj_vUwaXG1fmdx9XB3vFCjzBLCzqeQM4X4gCSDwXzdJ_1fkWKKVk2b3O6pB8RXb-RVD_uz5IHVww0SBksqyc8BnpB723cGpg/w400-h225/EVTP.014.jpeg" width="400" /></span></a></div></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /> </span><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Of the few who have gone down this path, the results have been remarkable and as one exec told me <b><i>"the organisation found itself naturally falling into the structure"</i></b>. I cannot emphasise enough that there are too few examples to be confident of the structure and there is a litany of failure of those who have tried without principles in place. One of those failures was an organisation that got suckered into Gartner's bimodal nonsense and thought they could get themselves out of the mess by adding another bit. I did warn them. Don't do this. Fix those principles first. <br /><br />This structure was right on the edge of what was possible in 2005 (when it was first used) and remains at the edge today.<br /><br /><b>Step 6</b><br />There's bound to be something beyond this. I don't know what it is. I've never been beyond EVTP. You will have to experiment to find it, and most of those interesting experiments are occurring in Chinese organisations. So keep an eye on organisations like Haier.</span></div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-65885547097819582302023-11-09T16:48:00.011+00:002023-11-09T20:32:22.593+00:00Why the fuss about conversational programming - Part III<p><span style="font-family: courier;">In the last post, I explored the idea of code as maps. In this post, we will dig a bit deeper and try to understand the essential role of open source.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">To begin with, let us understand what code (or software) is. Code is a set of symbolic instructions. They are symbols that alter the behaviour of the system. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The following symbols ...</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">#include <stdio.h><br />int main() {<br /><span> </span>printf("Hello world");<br /><span> </span>return 0;<br />}</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">... alter the system's behaviour, making it print the words "Hello world" to the screen.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">If you think about where we are heading with conversational programming, we are moving from a world where code is just text and into a world where other forms of code can exist, such as maps. <span style="text-align: justify;">The reason for this is that both enable different forms of discussion to occur around the problem space. In the world of text, the conversation tends towards the rules, style and syntax. In the world of maps, the conversation tends towards objects, relationships and context.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier; text-align: justify;">You've probably seen this for yourself. Walk into any engineering department, anywhere and you'll find whiteboards. A very different conversation is happening on the whiteboard compared to what is happening when programming the text on a screen. Both conversations relate to the problem space.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier; text-align: justify;">In figure 1, you have the text (code) that creates a map. I've provided an example for you <a href="https://beta.onlinewardleymaps.com/#clone:aHyGOF1CbsiNaymDHp">to look at</a>. The conversation we have around the map is very different from the conversation we have around the text.</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoh5vV4uuS8FsGAPgJdsQ7nBqXdpWOZdLcC9J5lxezobDw-rOKyBI9bJ9d_3_B2TolZikHqwk0KkUp8Utx0TthxFMGQphMnV2s4MxgV_wTm41XN-cvWJQSPXuUS-TxBjecscyPCJ-QqajIOlF0yJ0KzklkOAJ3JRPwc27z9dti079cbjo-ne4ilQ/s1920/NewTemp.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoh5vV4uuS8FsGAPgJdsQ7nBqXdpWOZdLcC9J5lxezobDw-rOKyBI9bJ9d_3_B2TolZikHqwk0KkUp8Utx0TthxFMGQphMnV2s4MxgV_wTm41XN-cvWJQSPXuUS-TxBjecscyPCJ-QqajIOlF0yJ0KzklkOAJ3JRPwc27z9dti079cbjo-ne4ilQ/s320/NewTemp.001.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-family: courier; text-align: justify;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: courier; text-align: justify;">With earlier versions of ChatGPT (a LLM or large language model), I could provide the code and discuss things such as syntax. With ChatGPT4v (a LMM or large multi-modal model), I can provide the map itself and start a conversation about its context. I'm not saying that we will only use maps to code but instead that the entire set of symbolic instructions that we use to program something will include text and maps. In fact, it already does.</span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">ChatGPT is a system which has been trained on a lot of data. That data consists of symbols and those symbols have changed the behaviour of the system (the model) through training. As a good friend of mine, <a href="https://twitter.com/@ajbouh">Adam Bouhenguel</a>, points out, the data is your code and the compiled version is your model weights.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">With multi-modal systems (such as ChatGPT4v), the "model" can be trained with images, with sounds, and with a variety of other sources. Maps are just images, and if ChatGPT4v wasn't programmed (i.e. trained) on images, then it wouldn't be able to interpret, analyse and have a discussion with me around the map.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Our world is increasingly one where the symbolic instructions (the code) that change the system's behaviour (i.e. the effect of programming with code) include text, data, images and a vast variety of other things. Text, data and images are all "code" in this world. They create the software that we use. In reality, they've always been "code" (ask any modder), we've just become a little preoccupied with coding in text.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">There is a danger here. Over many decades we have fought the open source battle to wrestle control from the hands of the few and give to the many. In our new world, the few have once again brought their proprietary ideas to the space and demanded subservience. Even worse, they've dressed themselves up as being open. They will often open source "code" by which they mean a subset of the symbolic instructions used to program the system. They don't open the training data (which is also part of the symbolic instructions used to program the system), they might not even open the model weights. It's not open source.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Basic freedoms of open source include free redistribution, access to source code, freedom to modify, freedom to create derivative works and non discrimination. Without all the symbolic instructions used to program the system then you can't freely modify it. What if I want to reprogram my system by changing some of the training data ... I don't have access to that. It's not open source even when you hand me the model weights because that's the compiled version. I want the actual code, the training data used. The joke of course is that even the "enlightened" who share model weights can often add clauses on their use. There is nothing remotely open about most of the AI projects out there claiming to be open. It's all openwashing.<br /><br />To confuse things more, the OSI is looking to redefine what open source means. Why? There is nothing wrong with what open source means. The problem is a whole bunch of people trying to claim that code (a set of symbolic instructions) doesn't include data or images (a set of symbolic instructions) and that somehow software (a collection of symbolic instructions) only includes the text bit. The OSI just needs to make it clear that this is not open source.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">This is the world we're going into. An entire new era of high level conversational programming which is tied down with proprietary foundations dressed up as open. We are handing technological sovereignty (from individual to national) to a small group of players that we have no reason to suspect have your benevolence in mind. I did <a href="https://twitter.com/swardley/status/1642244008645730305">warn about Feudal Lords</a>. I did warn <a href="https://twitter.com/swardley/status/1657743390065213442">why nurturing open source is so important especially in multi-modal space</a>.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Laughably, the <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ai-safety-summit-1-november-roundtable-chairs-summaries/ai-safety-summit-2023-roundtable-chairs-summaries-1-november--2">UK led an AI safety summit</a> last week. I say laugh but if you're in the UK then you might want to cry especially given so <a href="https://ai-summit-open-letter.info/">many voices were ignored</a>. You would have thought that handing over national sovereignty in the landscape of technology to a few would be the major safety issue. Apparently not. When it did get mentioned it was often along the lines of the hazards of open source, guardrails and control which is exactly where the lobbyists would take it. A ray of sunshine however came in the form of Oliver Dowden who provides <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/british-deputy-pm-throws-backing-behind-open-source-ai-downplays-risks/">some backing to open source AI</a>. Alas, not all countries are as strategically inept as the UK. The summit was barely underway before China Gov signalled its intended role in <a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/china-willing-enhance-communication-with-all-sides-ai-regulation-vice-minister-2023-11-01/">open source AI</a> and a number of <a href="https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3240764/alibaba-ceo-eddie-wu-reaffirms-ai-commitment-aims-turn-e-commerce-empire-open-tech-platform">Chinese enterprises</a> have reinforced that message since. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Fabulous. We get to sit and watch China accelerate, take over the AI space and have the benefits of AI shared amongst its population as we enter this new world of conversational programming whilst we hand over sovereignty to a few as the "great and good" chatter about safety and how they've saved us from some future mythical frontier AI because of a signed note whilst missing the iceberg shaped hole that is sinking the boat. Top job. Trebles all round.<br /><br />If anyone is laughing, it has to be China.<br /><br /></span><div><span style="font-family: courier;">IN THIS SERIES on "Why the fuss about conversational programming" …</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">[Jan 2023] <a href="https://swardley.medium.com/why-the-fuss-about-conversational-programming-60c8d1908237">What is conversational programming, PART I</a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">[May 2023] <a href="https://swardley.medium.com/why-the-fuss-about-conversational-programming-70a8b7ca0d2b">Code as maps, PART II</a><br />[Nov 2023] Why open source matters, PART III</span><br /></div></div></span></div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-82891549457291823742023-10-04T14:49:00.010+01:002023-11-09T17:30:57.419+00:00THE FOURTH INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION HAS A NEW PATH. <p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>1.0 INTRODUCTION<br /></b><br />The Fourth Industrial Revolution (<b>Industry 4.0</b>) has been described as revolutionising<i>[1]</i> the global business landscape. It is the<i> "next phase in the digitization of manufacturing"[2]. </i>It represents<i> </i>an era of connectivity, advanced analytics, automation, robotics, and new manufacturing approaches from additive techniques to chemputation<i>[3] </i>to IoT, digital twins, AI, blockchain, and augmented reality.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">It is so exciting, that some enthusiasts have already moved beyond its simple vision of efficiency and productivity<i>[4] </i>and into a new transformative vision<i> </i>of <b>Industry 5.0</b> with an <i>“orientation to the worker”[5]</i>. This leads to the question of what path should we be following. 4.0? 5.0? Or should we just wait a couple of months until <b>Industry 6.0</b> appears, if it hasn't already?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">In 2022, DXC Leading Edge, brought together a group of 17 individuals with experience and expertise in manufacturing, mapping and business transformation to map out the sector. From this exercise, a set of critical issues facing the manufacturing industry emerged. These are: -<b> supply chain matters</b>, <b>management doctrine matters</b>, and <b>sustainability needs useful metrics</b>. Whilst Industry 4.0 or 5.0 or I assume the soon to be appearing 6.0 barely got a mention, the research was more aligned to the values set out in the EU Industry 5.0 vision.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Supply chain matters<br /></b><i>“Political interference, mandated lockdowns, arbitrary trade sanctions, quarantined ports, natural disasters”[6]</i> there is a vast range of disruption going on in today's supply chains. However, according to a 2021 McKinsey Survey, whilst 48% of senior supply chain leaders could describe risks to their first tier of suppliers, that figure plummeted to less than 2%<i>[7]</i> for the third tier and beyond. There are collaborative efforts such as IMDS<i>[8]</i> in the automotive industry, CDX in the airline industry<i>[9]</i>, regional efforts such as CONNEX Kentucky <i>[10]</i> and commercial entities promoting this space such as Snowflake<i>[11]</i>. However, supply chain information remains siloed and fragmented. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">One of the most illuminating efforts the research group encountered was the CSH (Complexity Science Hub Vienna) mapping of the entire Hungarian production economy through transaction-level VAT records <i>[12]</i>. Popular corporate supply chain techniques such as lean production, just-in-time delivery, supply base reduction, decreasing buffers and supplier integration may have increased profits but led to highly vulnerable systems. By graphing out the Hungarian economy through transaction records (see figure 1.1), CSH demonstrated that the entire economy can be viewed as a collection of tightly connected directed networks rather than separate supply chains. Using this graph, they noted that 45% of the entire systemic risk of the Hungarian economy can be attributed to 32 companies out of 91,595. </span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 1.1 – Graphing the entire Hungarian Economy </span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF1hiLeoIA2VrWABMbUeqZaUfbRqmNf4csrAh5W0xmiCOLKaPCaUlsfXKMd02uMi6TFAB_lkd2JOzicnaafEmY_iG6gtKyOOdwQvHD1O8sf7GYVZ2iBw3vi-wXAlZZxl6riVCQC9j6f_zCu8wU5MRc1du9Yl0arKjSm8Iq4pnqjjFIfwqtN825wg/s709/Graphiing%20Hungarian%20Economy.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="380" data-original-width="709" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF1hiLeoIA2VrWABMbUeqZaUfbRqmNf4csrAh5W0xmiCOLKaPCaUlsfXKMd02uMi6TFAB_lkd2JOzicnaafEmY_iG6gtKyOOdwQvHD1O8sf7GYVZ2iBw3vi-wXAlZZxl6riVCQC9j6f_zCu8wU5MRc1du9Yl0arKjSm8Iq4pnqjjFIfwqtN825wg/w400-h215/Graphiing%20Hungarian%20Economy.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><br />Management doctrine matters<br /></b>Management doctrine contains the set of principles by which we operate. One of the earliest discussions within the research group was on the use of agile techniques within manufacturing often citing the example of Tesla’s transformation of the automotive sector with extreme manufacturing <i>[13]</i>, the use of robot swarms and the introduction of factory mode which is a software mechanism for determining compliance. The net effect of this should not be underestimated, with Tesla making hardware changes every 3 hours compared to Toyota with fast-track changes of approximately 2.5 years. To be clear, Tesla is operating at a speed of change of around 14,600 times faster than its competitors <i>[14]</i>. By comparison, Ford’s CEO in a frank interview described how legacy car manufacturers could not even compete with Tesla in software because of the techniques they use and the supply chains they have built <i>[15]</i>.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">However, whilst agile methodologies in software can produce outstanding results, they are not suitable for all contexts. This is not a new concept and was noted by the work done in designing HS2 (high-speed rail, UK) in a virtual world <i>[16]</i>. Agile techniques tend to far outperform other techniques when dealing with spaces that are rapidly changing due to their iterative nature. However, not all spaces are changing so rapidly and, in such cases, more prescriptive approaches can be useful. This was highlighted in <b>The Evolution of Project Management</b> in 2022 <i>[17]</i>. When considering the entire system rather than a component, a mix of techniques is often required. The <i>“use of appropriate methods”</i> is a fundamentally different principle from the <i>“use of agile”.</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">In the case of Tesla, the methods for the manufacture of the entire car (a system which is changing in output) may not be the same as the methods used to manufacture components within that system. Just because Tesla uses agile techniques does not mean that the manufacturer of nuts and bolts within the car would be best served by agile. Our understanding of the supply chain, the components involved, how evolved they are, the use of appropriate methods and our ability to respond to feedback matters. This last point can clearly be seen in the Joe Justice video on Tesla DCM (digital self-management) <i>[18]</i>. The replacement of management itself by a principle of fast feedback directed to staff.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Sustainability needs useful metrics.<br /></b>Manufacturing sustainability data is mostly estimation relying on consultancy services, carbon accounting engines <i>[19]</i> or models such as USEEIO v2 <i>[20]</i>. Estimation will lead to inaccuracies in measuring the environmental impact of supply chains <i>[21]</i>. Supply chain visibility is crucial to address this issue, but according to Deloitte, 71% of respondents to their joint survey with the Chartered Institute of Procurement and Supply have limited or no visibility beyond tier 2.<i>[22]</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The findings from the research group are summarised in Figure 1.2.</span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 1.2 – The six boxes. </span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVLfjRAVx9NRdW1DEiLbhTuYCBvS4P53zNxrrEDXP742RNfy88cW7yjZAGHEHNDykPxB5p-qf8fgZx-u67Cx_m2m8zy5eiPwnzQfzJK_Vu-ptqpJ1Jc5fMYU-uL5AdT_1xGHcnxAl3ZXqqq6Dt8KsQgoBzy2EMCYzVsxcOcOg1Y_0qGUpTpMbboA/s789/manufacturing%20-%20synthesis.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="356" data-original-width="789" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVLfjRAVx9NRdW1DEiLbhTuYCBvS4P53zNxrrEDXP742RNfy88cW7yjZAGHEHNDykPxB5p-qf8fgZx-u67Cx_m2m8zy5eiPwnzQfzJK_Vu-ptqpJ1Jc5fMYU-uL5AdT_1xGHcnxAl3ZXqqq6Dt8KsQgoBzy2EMCYzVsxcOcOg1Y_0qGUpTpMbboA/w400-h180/manufacturing%20-%20synthesis.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><b>2. ANALYSIS: A MINORITY REPORT?</b></span></p><p><b><span style="font-family: courier;">2.1 PRIORITY</span></b></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The process the research follows is detailed in section 3. One of the critical steps in this research is the creation of a priority list for investment. This priority list is shown in Figure 2.1 with a comparison to aggregated analyst reports and ordering of the list by ChatGPT and BARD. </span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2.1 – Priority list and comparison to Analysts</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOOmY7PAhWopCfSwDV9yyZKTwpJqx99nvaWIz54BmB9l1ePb0j8LyizCHZFYu8y92oyoTHYc-M9dT4VtBzKFuJqMhU6KP_7UzlHJri48yEE89U1TE6oTHrp6SsY1BYs7n09w5cwTv7r_OnYrLfo1EawZwgDuxarT9klaGnySGuyPlCIS8EKAGXzQ/s753/Manufacturing%20Investment%20Focus.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="753" data-original-width="601" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOOmY7PAhWopCfSwDV9yyZKTwpJqx99nvaWIz54BmB9l1ePb0j8LyizCHZFYu8y92oyoTHYc-M9dT4VtBzKFuJqMhU6KP_7UzlHJri48yEE89U1TE6oTHrp6SsY1BYs7n09w5cwTv7r_OnYrLfo1EawZwgDuxarT9klaGnySGuyPlCIS8EKAGXzQ/w319-h400/Manufacturing%20Investment%20Focus.png" width="319" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><b><br /><br />2.2 DISCUSSION<br /></b><br />The research group focused on supply chain awareness, management doctrine, customer dynamics, sustainability and data analytics as their main priorities. The analyst reports were focused on process improvement, additive manufacturing, AI, supply chain awareness and sustainability.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The first thing that should be noted is the very high degrees of cohesion between the Analysts, ChatGPT and BARD results. The latter are being used to pick up signals from general literature; hence we can hypothesise that the general literature supports the analyst view.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The large differences mostly centred on the use of <b>technology </b>including AI and automation favoured by analysts versus the research group’s focus on management doctrine e.g. <b>principles </b>such as<b><i> “use appropriate methods”</i></b>,<b><i> “understand your supply chain”</i></b>,<i><b> “focus on user needs”</b></i>, <b><i>“fast feedback to staff”</i></b>. <br /><br />That analysts favour technological (and machine-centred solutions) whilst the research group centered on more people (and system-orientated solutions) echoes the differences between Industry 4.0 (with pillars of connection of machines, making processes more automated, productivity and profit) and Industry 5.0 (with pillars of human factors, sustainability, adaptability and customer focus) <i>[23]</i>. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><br />2.3 WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR ME?<br /></b><br />The process used has surfaced a pronounced view towards people rather than technology. Whether that view is more accurate than simply listening to analysts remains unanswered. Any investment will also be highly contextual i.e. a steel manufacturer is not the same as an automotive company. Those caveats said, the priority list given in figure 2.1 can be used as a guide to asking questions about your context. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">For example, if you are looking to invest further in process automation, you probably want to start by asking how well do you understand your supply chains? If your organisation contains significant amounts of manufacturing data, you should be asking how you are making this more open and exploring opportunities to collaborate? If you are currently looking at investing in agile manufacturing, you should be asking questions about whether the context is suitable and what tasks are suited to more prescriptive approaches? If you are looking at automation, you should question carefully whether you are looking at the machine or the system? If you are looking at sustainability, you should be asking how much is estimated and what can be done to reduce that estimation?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><br />2.4 NOTEWORTHY<br /><br /></b>During the research, a few noteworthy examples and papers were highlighted by the research team. These include: -</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>International Material Database System (IMDS)</b><i>[24]</i>. A collaborative effort in the automotive industry for the management of hazardous materials that provides insights into the supply chain.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Complexity Science Hub (CSH) Vienna</b><i>[25]</i>. For the application of complexity science to trade networks including the analysis of the Hungarian economy and the more recent map of Austria’s pig trade network.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Future International Trade (FIT) alliance</b><i>[26]</i>. A supranational body focused on creating awareness about the importance of common and interoperable standards for digital bills of lading. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>From mechanistic to system thinking</b><i>[27]</i>. A seminal lecture by Russell Ackoff which helps remind us of our tendency towards reductionism with machines rather than looking at the entire system. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Avery Dennison SmartTrac and the AD Maxdura tire tag</b><i>[28]</i>. Embedded UHF RFID tags for the tire industry enabling the tracking of the full lifecycle.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Harvard Atlas of Economic Complexity</b><i>[29]</i>. Though not cited elsewhere in this report, the tool provided a general high-level view into trade between nations and connections between component industries. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Carbon aware computing</b><i>[30]</i>. Though not cited elsewhere in this report, the idea of time shifting and location shifting was considered applicable to computing and manufacturing in general. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>The Climate Game</b><i>[31]</i>. Though not cited elsewhere in this report, the concept of using gaming to motivate appropriate behaviours within a manufacturing organisation was discussed and influenced the final six box actions. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><b><span style="font-family: courier;">3 PROCESS</span></b></p><p><b><span style="font-family: courier;">3.1 THE RESEARCH PROCESS</span></b></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The complete process of determining the six box (figure 1.2), starting with the collection of words to categorisation to mapping to analysis to consolidation and finally synthesis is shown in Figure 3.1</span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3.1 – The Research Process</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJgDrAIdqa-NxwYkZ2pWw_BW9cHZC6HGAbZu9VD6GO5HKgPs6pzko7me2Kn5j3lhTKFNAl82ogEByICFuMKlY65chAyHRMMN4mYkCoxe44eTxFl-eQP6C3I_Eyh9lU0cNiPUWBlWS0vVIUjtTRjqEBTqoGeOhg6-eUx5IuHorkc3Z33utpNck-dA/s1598/manufacturing%20-%20process.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="393" data-original-width="1598" height="99" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJgDrAIdqa-NxwYkZ2pWw_BW9cHZC6HGAbZu9VD6GO5HKgPs6pzko7me2Kn5j3lhTKFNAl82ogEByICFuMKlY65chAyHRMMN4mYkCoxe44eTxFl-eQP6C3I_Eyh9lU0cNiPUWBlWS0vVIUjtTRjqEBTqoGeOhg6-eUx5IuHorkc3Z33utpNck-dA/w400-h99/manufacturing%20-%20process.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br />Whilst the method enabled us to determine a different view for manufacturing, it is likely affected by the number of perspectives used. In this case, three were selected – <b>Agile Manufacturing</b>, <b>Automation </b>and <b>Supply Chains</b>. Hence the result can only be considered relevant to those three perspectives.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The process is also relatively time-consuming: -</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">* Collection of words: 1 hour<br />* Categorisation of words and selection of perspectives: 1 hour<br />* Mapping of perspectives: 6 – 14 hours per map.<br />* Analysis of map and selection of priority areas: 2-3 hours.<br />* Consolidation and comparison: 2-3 hours<br />* Synthesis: 3-4 hours.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">Should the reader wish to repeat this effort, then the entire process can take 15-26 hours for a single industry or topic, assuming any mapping work is done in parallel. For each map, a diverse group of people with a wide range of experience for the chosen topic are ideal. You should aim for at least 8 people per map.<br /><br /></span></p><p><b><span style="font-family: courier;">3.2 COLLECTION</span></b></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The first step of the process is the group’s collection of words that matter for the future of transportation. This can be simply achieved by post-it notes on a miro or whiteboard (Figure 3.2).</span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3.2 – the cloud of words related to the future of manufacturing.</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO0hYd2ufLHf_UGDhkTC21lsEU8hIqBWKesjCEps_-4cPemrXmiiVbM_QIQU_lExJRXQOO9u60HTNrMhO-Pg9E8-SnvOmtQvqRpzY_9ZSWNNPUA9LG04T5WJ57_1HWc5CdZRXoOhfPVZc2UYjN7L2AGptq_2-XpCVqRt4uMRP2ULgWsJGt47yQgQ/s652/manufacturing%20-%20collection.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="544" data-original-width="652" height="334" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO0hYd2ufLHf_UGDhkTC21lsEU8hIqBWKesjCEps_-4cPemrXmiiVbM_QIQU_lExJRXQOO9u60HTNrMhO-Pg9E8-SnvOmtQvqRpzY_9ZSWNNPUA9LG04T5WJ57_1HWc5CdZRXoOhfPVZc2UYjN7L2AGptq_2-XpCVqRt4uMRP2ULgWsJGt47yQgQ/w400-h334/manufacturing%20-%20collection.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><b><br />Notes<br /></b>As an observer, I will note that in the collection of words, the group placed significant emphasis on technological advancements including IoT, chemputation, additive manufacturing, digital twins, predictive maintenance and cobots. I consider it reasonable to say that the group initially started with relatively high degrees of alignment with the analysts' focus on process improvement through technology including additive manufacturing, automation and use of AI. The concept of management doctrine was not initially raised.<br /><br /></span></p><p><b><span style="font-family: courier;">3.3. CATEGORISATION</span></b></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The next step of the research process is to categorise the words into themes (highlighted in grey) and then, through a process of group voting select three themes as perspectives to map (highlighted in purple). This categorisation is shown in figure 3.3 </span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3.3 – the categorisation of words into themes.</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiazkbBemkhd90Ml1oTMs-mwLn4H8xqv_5K8CkWOiB14lBQx56ctrQJGtZhJQxV5ocB-5Fg664t_fkLqbDbuIydxpxiDQfXLXYM1VBg6ZcSk7ibH4vdYH1_mYuETTcjCuhrkHjejjiGzLkhGW96kpDrUrwJ4K0g3UsH55dSUdb7-romaYVoczw-dQ/s1171/manufacturing%20-%20categorisation.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="644" data-original-width="1171" height="220" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiazkbBemkhd90Ml1oTMs-mwLn4H8xqv_5K8CkWOiB14lBQx56ctrQJGtZhJQxV5ocB-5Fg664t_fkLqbDbuIydxpxiDQfXLXYM1VBg6ZcSk7ibH4vdYH1_mYuETTcjCuhrkHjejjiGzLkhGW96kpDrUrwJ4K0g3UsH55dSUdb7-romaYVoczw-dQ/w400-h220/manufacturing%20-%20categorisation.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><b><br />Notes<br /></b>As an observer, I will note that at this early stage, the concept of management doctrine (principles) was not raised in any meaningful sense beyond discussion on how to focus on agile manufacturing and what this meant for other manufacturers. The discussion within the group focused on assembly lines, process types, material types and jobs to be done.<br /><br /></span></p><p><b><span style="font-family: courier;">3.4. MAPPING AND ANALYSIS</span></b></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">Each perspective was then mapped by the group until a consensus was achieved that the map was a useful representation of the space. Onto the maps were added areas of importance for investment. These were then subdivided into areas of highest priority.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The maps are provided below, but one map on the perspective of agile methods is highlighted (figure 3.4.1)</span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3.4.1 – Manufacturing map from the perspective of agile methods.</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm0dKaUD-p6-zkLNS_Y9esO_Zl3HCb_QqB3i6ojGLcrNUV7zy6Thn6hVpNx6bqv1J67Ejxygj5qkc-uljPkDHsNXdaie5A9b9ANSCY7ZjbJfzrJPdi5g6C_MCHj6SnrvnV_J6JCDA5CxygdfDA3Kgw3DNy4KVfqFJaoTVBsfmRxXmxlIFDYamMGA/s1266/Manufacturing%20%20AGILE.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="776" data-original-width="1266" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm0dKaUD-p6-zkLNS_Y9esO_Zl3HCb_QqB3i6ojGLcrNUV7zy6Thn6hVpNx6bqv1J67Ejxygj5qkc-uljPkDHsNXdaie5A9b9ANSCY7ZjbJfzrJPdi5g6C_MCHj6SnrvnV_J6JCDA5CxygdfDA3Kgw3DNy4KVfqFJaoTVBsfmRxXmxlIFDYamMGA/w400-h245/Manufacturing%20%20AGILE.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Notes<br /></b>This was probably the most fraught map that the group created. It started with a conversation on not just the use of agile but what we were looking for and what the manufacturers were attempting to achieve. In that discussion, the idea of implementing change and the speed of change took hold as the dominant factors. This led to the subsequent exploration of methodology, supply chain, observation, simulation and even the ontology of the models used.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">During the exploration of investment areas (see figure 3.4.2 below), the idea was expressed that agile methods were focused on the flow of material in a changing system and that speed was related to adaptability. Whereas traditional methods and process improvement were focused more on the speed of movement of stocks in a defined system. This led to a realisation that from an entire system approach there could be many different methods operating at the same time and hence the concept of right tooling through management doctrine appeared.</span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3.4.2 – Investment map from the perspective of agile methods</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoOZvw6zp67Ys3sm4RliAce-73j-fuUAYHOQ9uzGJCI6xTeXE-ZtkSaB2_Z5a7DoM_hEACwW4Oj9sPsJx2O5knunUSs9ZsQy_8LwR2MsljhaiIEwwXJeCBJCi_CDzgxLKKEwGs8SmDDQ0ing51KENYOvHgJ7VQuq7NGr7BBC_PcJAMI36d8PsQzw/s1371/Manufacturing%20AGILE_INVESTMENT.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="842" data-original-width="1371" height="246" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoOZvw6zp67Ys3sm4RliAce-73j-fuUAYHOQ9uzGJCI6xTeXE-ZtkSaB2_Z5a7DoM_hEACwW4Oj9sPsJx2O5knunUSs9ZsQy_8LwR2MsljhaiIEwwXJeCBJCi_CDzgxLKKEwGs8SmDDQ0ing51KENYOvHgJ7VQuq7NGr7BBC_PcJAMI36d8PsQzw/w400-h246/Manufacturing%20AGILE_INVESTMENT.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />The use of <i>"right tooling"</i> in software is not a new concept, it has been established in the mapping community for over 18 years. An example of this would be the use of appropriate methods in the building of HS2 (high speed rail) in a virtual world in 2012 which was delivered ahead of budget and schedule <i>[32]</i>. A map illustrating how appropriate methods can be applied based upon the context of the system that is being built is provided in figure 3.4.2.1 <br /><br /><u>Figure 3.4.2.1 – Using appropriate methods on a map<br /><br /></u></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjk8O05M5MDgHDXplQsVisajdzbPBGO0Uh2K97JN8mk4rheZsUeIQQml0N1MRhqUV-OG4aD1DBOkFH62ehWzJ3IjLOcaktrM-vpWzReP5kc6kBdCHTHnqt_E4UgycF6Fst8liip71afzTq6AeNCkvZdQS9u3hoY1s3WrcqFOF3Hi5rj3rWhF93waw/s1565/ManyMethodsVC.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="895" data-original-width="1565" height="229" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjk8O05M5MDgHDXplQsVisajdzbPBGO0Uh2K97JN8mk4rheZsUeIQQml0N1MRhqUV-OG4aD1DBOkFH62ehWzJ3IjLOcaktrM-vpWzReP5kc6kBdCHTHnqt_E4UgycF6Fst8liip71afzTq6AeNCkvZdQS9u3hoY1s3WrcqFOF3Hi5rj3rWhF93waw/w400-h229/ManyMethodsVC.jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />The other maps created are also provided for reference.</span><p></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;"><br />Figure 3.4.3 – Manufacturing map from the perspective of automation</span></u></p><p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjctqnlE79v8W_MbIxzGk7SSMnNE7Pyy7XiGFi81l_W38n-gFHUOuPhcYJGe6oulFVEiJZxgAug0RBS4txrPYO-CSqe3J6Slpau05zp3y9Dv9bPT1VM16WsrNf4O0z2LOYJZzx7c3rePXgE7wfvb-uEWekx4M8yKPXkbhfEXfytjvnhXEh4twsKmg/s1263/Manufacturing%20%20AUTOMATION.png" style="clear: left; display: inline; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="774" data-original-width="1263" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjctqnlE79v8W_MbIxzGk7SSMnNE7Pyy7XiGFi81l_W38n-gFHUOuPhcYJGe6oulFVEiJZxgAug0RBS4txrPYO-CSqe3J6Slpau05zp3y9Dv9bPT1VM16WsrNf4O0z2LOYJZzx7c3rePXgE7wfvb-uEWekx4M8yKPXkbhfEXfytjvnhXEh4twsKmg/w400-h245/Manufacturing%20%20AUTOMATION.png" width="400" /></span></a></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3.4.4 – Investment map from the perspective of automation</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8gGH_NELyOJQWf2DN1fmiG9byn5UREsbINOTmZs1TAZEtm0awXyoJrVl6-2uK8b8X0EHwQjZfVF0HiBHoXs0dA7mXl9i00DJ7ZLCN_Pasohta6TBKy2K-zDR3cLJmIYTSfAnVJktD2YuUTHutZ4nk8iKM3J-ZHIlgW7unzVHboJXrinp67UgpTA/s1376/Manufacturing%20AUTOMATION_INVESTMENT.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="839" data-original-width="1376" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8gGH_NELyOJQWf2DN1fmiG9byn5UREsbINOTmZs1TAZEtm0awXyoJrVl6-2uK8b8X0EHwQjZfVF0HiBHoXs0dA7mXl9i00DJ7ZLCN_Pasohta6TBKy2K-zDR3cLJmIYTSfAnVJktD2YuUTHutZ4nk8iKM3J-ZHIlgW7unzVHboJXrinp67UgpTA/w400-h244/Manufacturing%20AUTOMATION_INVESTMENT.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></span></u></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3.4.5 – Manufacturing map from the perspective of supply chains</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRVfn3euvz0qNgzNiLA87SSTqzcD_dAVA4iEVEduFNOR3TWtC4EIhnKwb9B4ChtOi_GW_ru0oBPQUjeaNMatzBIrr9Enbb7uUcqrQ98P1wDbxsQhXhXkFGCaBYJu_apuCAGTbKbx1HdMTTZiLOYCwMunArbQp2SKN61x28ZPAORACTgCEqONC1xA/s1266/Manufacturing%20UPPLY_CHAIN.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="775" data-original-width="1266" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRVfn3euvz0qNgzNiLA87SSTqzcD_dAVA4iEVEduFNOR3TWtC4EIhnKwb9B4ChtOi_GW_ru0oBPQUjeaNMatzBIrr9Enbb7uUcqrQ98P1wDbxsQhXhXkFGCaBYJu_apuCAGTbKbx1HdMTTZiLOYCwMunArbQp2SKN61x28ZPAORACTgCEqONC1xA/w400-h245/Manufacturing%20UPPLY_CHAIN.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><u><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Figure 3.4.6 – Investment map from the perspective of supply chains</span></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg29oddy3layS3KVFJuFKHnCwwL76wb614GnLLiunCMlRQxzf48yVtgjM7tjPS988VyE35fh7MBBS6ftxwAuXLcT1IkYFIm16n4R-TynZRkBqiFdcpV8WJ9e_1wG1STmr1fD-WZaoOIIwdetplnsKk5p62-zKbKv9EQdFRpNNKfdI-ZGiW76kjYcQ/s1379/Manufacturing%20SUPPLY_CHAIN_INVESTMENT.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="839" data-original-width="1379" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg29oddy3layS3KVFJuFKHnCwwL76wb614GnLLiunCMlRQxzf48yVtgjM7tjPS988VyE35fh7MBBS6ftxwAuXLcT1IkYFIm16n4R-TynZRkBqiFdcpV8WJ9e_1wG1STmr1fD-WZaoOIIwdetplnsKk5p62-zKbKv9EQdFRpNNKfdI-ZGiW76kjYcQ/w400-h244/Manufacturing%20SUPPLY_CHAIN_INVESTMENT.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><b>3.5 FINAL NOTES</b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The above maps were then consolidated to create the priority list in figure 2.1</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The priority list and the maps formed the basis of the discussion which led to the creation of the six box (figure 1.2)</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">All the work is licensed creative commons share alike. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The raw code for the maps is stored in github [33].<br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>4.0 REFERENCES</b><br /><i>[1]</i> <b>How Industry 4.0 technologies are changing manufacturing,</b> IBM, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://www.ibm.com/topics/industry-4-0<br /><i>[2]</i> <b>What are Industry 4.0, the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and 4IR?</b> McKinsey, August 2022 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/mckinsey-explainers/what-are-industry-4-0-the-fourth-industrial-revolution-and-4ir<br /><i>[3]</i> <b>Model to Synthesis</b>, Andrew White, Jun 2023 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) - https://twitter.com/andrewwhite01/status/1670794000398184451<br /><i>[4]</i><b> Industry 5.0, European Commission</b>, January 2022, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://research-and-innovation.ec.europa.eu/research-area/industrial-research-and-innovation/industry-50_en<br /><i>[5]</i> <b>From Industry 4.0 towards Industry 5.0</b>: A Review and Analysis of Paradigm Shift for the People, Organization and Technology, July 2022, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/14/5221<br /><i>[6]</i> <b>The Triumph of the Supply Chain</b>, James Amoah, Sept 2022 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/triumph-supply-chain-part-2-power-awareness-james-amoah<br /><i>[7]</i><b> How COVID-19 is reshaping supply chains</b>, McKinsey, Nov 2021 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/operations/our-insights/how-covid-19-is-reshaping-supply-chains<br /><i>[8]</i><b> International Material Database Systems</b> (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.mdsystem.com/imdsnt/startpage/index.jsp<br /><i>[9]</i><b> Compliance Data Exchange (CDX)</b>, DXC, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://public.cdxsystem.com/en/web/cdx/home<br /><i>[10] </i><b>Connex Kentucky</b>. https://kam.us.com/connexkentucky/ (RETRIEVED JULY 2023)<br /><i>[11]</i> <b>Evolving supply chain data</b>, Snowflake, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.snowflake.com/guides/evolving-supply-chain-management-data<br /><i>[12]</i> <b>Quantifying firm-level economic systemic risk from nation-wide supply networks,</b> MAY 2022, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-11522-z<br /><i>[13]</i> <b>Scrum: Disrupting the Automotive Industry</b>, Keynote REConf 2017 Joe Justice https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gqBQv4onhU<br /><i>[14]</i> <b>The Tesla Principle – Speed and Agility in the Automotive Industry</b>, FullyCharged Show (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://fullycharged.show/blog/the-tesla-principle-speed-and-agility-in-the-automotive-industry/<br /><i>[15]</i> <b>ASX Investor</b>, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.tiktok.com/@asxinvestortiktok/video/7246697318626495745 <br /><i>[16]</i> <b>Digitizing Government: Understanding and Implementing New Digital Business Models</b>, Fig 10.4, pp190, 2014, Brown, Thompson Fishenden, https://www.amazon.co.uk/Digitizing-Government-Understanding-Implementing-Business/dp/1137443626<br /><i>[17]</i> <b>The evolution of Project Management (PM): How Agile, Lean and Six Sigma are changing</b> <b>project management</b> Vittorio Cesarotti, Silvia Gubinelli and Vito Introna, Department of Enterprise Engineering, University of Rome, 2022, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://journalmodernpm.com/manuscript/index.php/jmpm/article/view/JMPM02108<br /><i>[18]</i><b> Tesla Digital Self Management</b> (DSM), JoeJustice, 2022, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOAI1uzZMU4<br /><i>[19]</i> <b>How manufacturers can reduce carbon emissions</b>, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://normative.io/insight/reduce-manufacturer-carbon-emissions/<br /><i>[20]</i> <b>USEEIO v2.0, The US Environmentally-Extended Input-Output Model v2.0</b>, Wesley W. Ingwersen, Mo Li, Ben Young, Jorge Vendries & Catherine Birney, 2022 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-022-01293-7<br /><i>[21]</i> <b>Estimating and Reporting the Comparative Emissions Impacts of Products</b>, WRI, MAR 2019 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://www.wri.org/research/estimating-and-reporting-comparative-emissions-impacts-products<br /><i>[22]</i> <b>Procurement and supply chain resilience in the face of global disruption</b>. Survey by Deloitte and CIPS, Oct 2022 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/uk/Documents/consultancy/deloitte-uk-procurement-and-supply-chain-resilience.pdf<br /><i>[23]</i> <b>What are the differences between Industry 4.0 and Industry 5.0? </b>(RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://industriall.ai/blog/what-are-the-differences-between-industry-4-0-and-industry-5-0<br /><i>[24]</i> <b>International Material Data System</b> (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Material_Data_System<br /><i>[25]</i> <b>Complexity Science Hub Vienna</b>, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://www.csh.ac.at/<br /><i>[26]</i> <b>FIT Alliance, International Federation of Freight Forwarders Associations</b>, https://fiata.org/fit-alliance/<br /><i>[27]</i><b> From mechanistic to system thinking</b>, Russell Ackoff, Nov 1993 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023), https://www.organism.earth/library/document/mechanistic-to-systemic-thinking<br /><i>[28]</i> <b>AD Maxdura tire tag</b>, Sept 2021, (RETRIEVED AUGUST 2023) https://www.labelsandlabeling.com/news/new-products/avery-dennison-smartrac-launches-ad-maxdura-tire-tag<br /><i>[29]</i> <b>Harvard Atlas of Economic Complexity</b> (RETRIEVED AUGUST 2023), https://atlas.cid.harvard.edu/explore<br /><i>[30]</i> <b>Carbon Aware Computing</b>, Episode 2 (RETRIEVED AUGUST 2023), https://podcasts.bcast.fm/e/28x5713n-carbon-aware-computing<br /><i>[31]</i><b> Can you reach net zero by 2050</b>, FT, (RETRIEVED AUGUST 2023) https://ig.ft.com/climate-game/<br /><i>[32]</i> <b>HS2 CIO James Findlay interview – Boats, trains and CIO reveals</b>, March 2015, https://www.cio.com/article/196143/hs2-cio-james-findlay-interview-boats-trains-and-cio-reveals.html (RETRIEVED AUGUST 2023)<br /><i>[33]</i> <b>Research 2022</b>, https://github.com/swardley/Research2022</span></p>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-8287209403261454012023-09-19T14:44:00.006+01:002023-09-19T14:58:17.369+01:00<div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>1. ARE VIRTUAL ROADS THE FUTURE?</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Autonomous vehicles, digital twins, last-mile delivery, ridesharing, micro-mobility, transport hubs, hyperloop, decarbonisation, flying taxis and informatics - the field of transportation is as electrified as the batteries that are supposed to power tomorrow's vehicles. Or maybe they won't? Maybe the future is hydrogen?</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Given all the excitement and areas competing for your attention, where should you invest in this space? In 2022, as part of my DXC Leading Edge research project, I brought together a group of 22 volunteers with experience and expertise in transportation to map out the sector. For their time given over the year, as promised, this initial report is all creative commons share alike.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">From the research exercise, a set of critical issues facing the transport industry emerged. These are: - increasing our understanding of transport supply chain, virtual as a transport system and public infrastructure matters.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><b>Increase awareness of the transport supply chain.</b></i></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">As was made clear in the UK GOV, Transport Data Strategy [1], transportation data is often highly siloed for reasons of legal and contractual barriers, lack of incentives for open data, lack of standardised format and lack of leadership. The transport supply chain is fragmented and poorly understood, which has impacts from the resilience of the system to consumer access. As highlighted by Deloitte in 2017, there also exists an opportunity in opening up transport data[2]. As of 2022, the key challenge remains[3] the lack of data sharing between different transport operators.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Virtual as a transport system.</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">When we talk about city functions (police, restaurants, banks, shops) then we often talk about the ways of getting there (road, rail, paths) and the mode of transport (car, train, cycle). However, this is constrained to a physical space. More of today’s city functions can now be provided within virtual space, from building inspections[4] to council meetings[5]. The ways of this virtual space are cable and air, the mode of transport is internet access. Virtual is a transport system and has a material impact on other transport systems. This includes a demand for resources to an impact on congestion (figure 1.1). City planning that ignores the impact of this virtual transport system, would be akin to a digital twin that ignores roads.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i>Public infrastructure matters.</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Whilst the 2023 UWE Bristol report[6] stated that “Road are the arteries of economic and social prosperity” and we are at a critical time for public investment, we should be mindful that virtual is a transport system. Public infrastructure is not just paths, roads and waterways but also cables and spectrum frequency. Iceland, Latvia and Estonia have all nationalised telecommunications infrastructure in order to improve quality of service and make them more accessible to consumers. Iceland regularly claims to have the world’s fastest and best-value internet[7] in Europe. Hence, whilst the group would agree with the UWE findings, it would also expand the idea of what should be public infrastructure.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 1.1 – The impact of virtual on congestion.</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi60xhF_04ZrawIUwM0A0XYcwvHkbMkO-PAWLuuOqryiBTb7Njgcwq8noYeZ78KEmyogK8DyRtPhhuFvPw8WNeI2k65pnxYIpx3V1kBbtWJWaQs0SdxKZkVnot5ZfjkHff6j-vgF5A-P9UMReQo36LMG5XXOXshNvMiu4ZLZ6rB93AFoF2i_fLSsA/s1305/Transport-Congestion.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="727" data-original-width="1305" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi60xhF_04ZrawIUwM0A0XYcwvHkbMkO-PAWLuuOqryiBTb7Njgcwq8noYeZ78KEmyogK8DyRtPhhuFvPw8WNeI2k65pnxYIpx3V1kBbtWJWaQs0SdxKZkVnot5ZfjkHff6j-vgF5A-P9UMReQo36LMG5XXOXshNvMiu4ZLZ6rB93AFoF2i_fLSsA/w400-h223/Transport-Congestion.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The findings from the mapping research group are summarised in the following six box (Figure 1.2)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 1.2 – The six boxes.</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3EKaN0rxG6rl3C069AE4mVjEl84PJHU-OgOM5c0jQfP_OT7vSaLf_hkuPH9qXm1tNdt9IFfCusY4Jt7t6aiRbELWLijVIvuF-Obq8icI4P2RqAjYGfPZJNxHw5B14KgEe3fyTfjoOB_Y82nDrvew5RLCC2RgDGXy5qq2FG6krOOjsbh_DeOy0iQ/s1475/transportation%20-%20synthesis.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="633" data-original-width="1475" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3EKaN0rxG6rl3C069AE4mVjEl84PJHU-OgOM5c0jQfP_OT7vSaLf_hkuPH9qXm1tNdt9IFfCusY4Jt7t6aiRbELWLijVIvuF-Obq8icI4P2RqAjYGfPZJNxHw5B14KgEe3fyTfjoOB_Y82nDrvew5RLCC2RgDGXy5qq2FG6krOOjsbh_DeOy0iQ/w400-h171/transportation%20-%20synthesis.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>2. ANALYSIS: A MINORITY REPORT?</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>2.1 Priority</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The process the research follows is detailed in section 3. One of the critical steps in this research is the creation of a priority list for investment. This priority list is shown in Figure 2.1 with a comparison to aggregated analyst reports, ordering of the list by ChatGPT and order of the list by BARD.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 2.1 – Priority list and comparison to Analysts, ChatGPT-4 and BARD.</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqEEcQbEFCcX3oyFPZXeYymBCrOETWvbp8VBN-jTBSaT39qZW4pcB6FfNqykGYpSw7oX3IiLcg5nrtyy3bL9WDNe55SE9tk5zOpRixFAj60QXeV5D_APyoCene4XBr_X8IYNBFsVas3bQSHbjrn7ky3CPtRIBdgmyJXHvJmB7UmLyZoM4O8Rr_eQ/s693/transportation%20-%20consolidation.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="679" data-original-width="693" height="314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqEEcQbEFCcX3oyFPZXeYymBCrOETWvbp8VBN-jTBSaT39qZW4pcB6FfNqykGYpSw7oX3IiLcg5nrtyy3bL9WDNe55SE9tk5zOpRixFAj60QXeV5D_APyoCene4XBr_X8IYNBFsVas3bQSHbjrn7ky3CPtRIBdgmyJXHvJmB7UmLyZoM4O8Rr_eQ/s320/transportation%20-%20consolidation.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>2.2 Discussion</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The mapping group focused on the adoption of virtual spaces as its single highest priority item when it came to transport planning. This item did not feature strongly in the twelve analyst reports that were examined. Those were primarily concerned with the role of autonomous vehicles. This disparity continued down the priority list, with the mapping group focused on supply chain awareness, public infrastructure, decision support systems and government policy while the analyst focused on decarbonisation, emerging tech and the use of big data. The one overlap is the area of charging infrastructure which bizarrely the mapping group rated of higher priority (due to the connection with public infrastructure) than the analyst reports (despite their focus on autonomous vehicles). As an observer, it seems reasonable to conclude that the mapping group’s results represent a minority report which is against the consensus of analyst opinion.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>2.3 What does this mean for me?</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The process used has surfaced a different view on what we should be investing in, whether that view is more accurate than simply listening to analysts remains unanswered. Any investment will be highly contextual, as in there many types of organisations within the transportation field and Government is not the same as a commercial logistics company. Those caveats said, the priority list given in figure 2.1 can be used as a guide to asking questions of your context.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">For example, if you are investing in building a digital twin of a city, you should be asking how the virtual world itself is modelled within the digital twin? If your organisation contains significant amounts of transport data, you should be asking how you are making this more open and exploring opportunities in that space? If you create policy that impacts the transport system, you should be asking how well do we understand the system? If you currently run a spoke and hub model of logistics, you should be asking whether you can distribute more to the edge?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>2.4 Noteworthy</b></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">During the research, several noteworthy examples and papers were highlighted by the research team. These include: -</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">GITLAB, What is remote work / working from home[8]. A how-to guide for remote work.</span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><i>House of Lords. Public transport in towns and cities[9]</i>. Considered exemplary in its discussion of access and funding, including greater awareness of the transport supply chain and the use of digital advancements to allow consumers to plan journeys. However, in equal measure, the report fails to discuss ways of avoiding journeys altogether and the impact of virtual as a transport system.</div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Portugal, Digital Nomad Visas[10]</i>. The first digital nomad visa in Europe which allows people to live in Portugal but work remotely. Seen by the group as a clear sign of Portugal embracing the changes and removing obstacles to virtual.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Isttelkom AS, common infrastructure is a must for savings in fiber optics[11]</i>. Fibre / Cable are as much of a way of transport as roads and paths and hence require co-ordinated effort for the common good.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Zenobē Energy and TransGrid, Australia’s biggest electric bus depot offers solar and battery blueprint for future[12]</i>. There are numerous complications in charging infrastructure including the capability of national grids built on AGC models. This use of solar, regenerative breaking and batteries was highlighted by group as a model to be copied.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i style="font-family: courier;">France, the banning of short-haul flights[13]</i><span style="font-family: courier;">. Highlighted by the group as an example of active Government policy in encouraging alternative transport and change of consumer behaviour.</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>UK GOV, Transport Data Strategy[14]</i>. Highlighted by the group as exemplary in its focus on poor awareness of the transport supply chain and the introduction of metrics to examine this sharing.</span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>3 PROCESS</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><br />3.1 The Research Process</b></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The complete process of determining the six box (figure 1.2), starting with the collection of words to categorisation to mapping to analysis to consolidation and finally synthesis is shown in Figure 3.1</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 3.1 – The Research Process</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFPbQiyPk1IIZ-bkcC12U2VqsT-b_akNJ2B3ipmv6zpjKaTc6B_NmrpIllTZhmU3daHuwOC-IPufze3JsPwLK3RSxrf_2mtzI-hdx42JzZMthV48gMcuecmcBU2wn9rRkl6Q7gOMq60Q2OdhFRVTci8xe6kRagNVT6PqwUNjB2iKa8aonOFXH8lA/s1748/Transportation%20-%20PROCESS.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="436" data-original-width="1748" height="100" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFPbQiyPk1IIZ-bkcC12U2VqsT-b_akNJ2B3ipmv6zpjKaTc6B_NmrpIllTZhmU3daHuwOC-IPufze3JsPwLK3RSxrf_2mtzI-hdx42JzZMthV48gMcuecmcBU2wn9rRkl6Q7gOMq60Q2OdhFRVTci8xe6kRagNVT6PqwUNjB2iKa8aonOFXH8lA/w400-h100/Transportation%20-%20PROCESS.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Whilst the method enabled us to determine a different view for transportation, it is likely affected by the number of perspectives used. In this case, three were used – Changing Consumer Behaviour, Coherent City Transport and Logistics. Hence the result can only be considered relevant to those three perspectives.</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The process is also relatively time-consuming: -<br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">* Collection of words: 1 hour<br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">* Categorisation of words and selection of perspectives: 1 hour<br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">* Mapping of perspectives: 6 – 14 hours per map.<br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">* Analysis of map and selection of priority areas: 2-3 hours.<br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">* Consolidation and comparison: 2-3 hours<br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">* Synthesis: 3-4 hours.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Should the reader wish to repeat this effort, then the entire process can take 15-26 hours for a single industry or topic, assuming any mapping work is done in parallel. For each map, a diverse group of people with a wide range of experience for the chosen topic are ideal. You should aim for at least 8 people per map.</div></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>3.2 COLLECTION</b></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The first step of the process is the group’s collection of words that matter for the future of transportation. This can be simply achieved by post-it notes on a miro or whiteboard (Figure 3.2).</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 3.2 – the cloud of words related to the future of transportation.<br /><br /></i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIxSMkPR9csWNW-dPrnbgRgUjn3Sq3Jrc-8LuK0MgQf6D1zFOCMz8OrPILb-TEU9Vz2P9sPNOy9ltXWiIyf6JizEWfEBsY4E6BcafvBmvLvt-ETpp0hfMmtafEwBN504caMP7FvhBTUtjad6CNdA6_Vq32v4WWpR1TmAuPIZ5cnX4uEvhJ6ZmiIg/s1165/transportation%20-%20collection.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="784" data-original-width="1165" height="269" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIxSMkPR9csWNW-dPrnbgRgUjn3Sq3Jrc-8LuK0MgQf6D1zFOCMz8OrPILb-TEU9Vz2P9sPNOy9ltXWiIyf6JizEWfEBsY4E6BcafvBmvLvt-ETpp0hfMmtafEwBN504caMP7FvhBTUtjad6CNdA6_Vq32v4WWpR1TmAuPIZ5cnX4uEvhJ6ZmiIg/w400-h269/transportation%20-%20collection.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><i><b>Notes</b></i></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">It should be noted that in the collection, the group placed significant emphasis on common words discussing impacts on traditional transport systems – smart infrastructure, road safety, connected and autonomous vehicles, EVs and charging and sharing schemes. As an observer, it would be reasonable to say that the group initially started with relatively high degrees of alignment to the analyst reports with a focus on autonomous vehicles, ESG, emerging tech and data analytics.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>3.3. CATEGORISATION</b></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The next step of the research process is to categorise the words into themes (highlighted in grey) and then, through a process of group voting select three themes as perspectives to map (highlighted in purple). This categorisation is shown in figure 3.3</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 3.3 – the categorisation of words into themes.</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1KOOA3kFz453Gu8siq_z0LTP530F-AcrgYRsMP3P1OAVfNT9Og6BxQM5-HihDTv4Hi08IYd2KGtG1lDdKhVeLaCeVRYmkHbL1E3Z25RwHeTQcDEfmDHpGSDg9RsvCy_NumLs9-Ku8HQjB2wp9r6fEsuJts8TzEjN-h7L0CJyxYyRAVM3Ory9c2A/s1026/transportation%20-%20category.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="648" data-original-width="1026" height="253" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1KOOA3kFz453Gu8siq_z0LTP530F-AcrgYRsMP3P1OAVfNT9Og6BxQM5-HihDTv4Hi08IYd2KGtG1lDdKhVeLaCeVRYmkHbL1E3Z25RwHeTQcDEfmDHpGSDg9RsvCy_NumLs9-Ku8HQjB2wp9r6fEsuJts8TzEjN-h7L0CJyxYyRAVM3Ory9c2A/w400-h253/transportation%20-%20category.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><b><br /><br /><br />Notes</b></i></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">As an observer, I will note that at this stage, the only appearance of virtual was in terms of the metaverse (in relation to alternative transport) and remote working (in terms of changing consumer behaviours and demand). Virtual was not considered a major function of city planning but instead an outside technological impact with the focus remaining on concepts such as mobility hubs, sharing schemes and autonomous vehicles.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>3.4. MAPPING AND ANALYSIS</b></span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Each perspective was then mapped by the group until a consensus was achieved that the map was a useful representation of the space. Onto the maps were added areas of importance for investment. These were then subdivided into areas of highest priority.</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 3.4.1 – Transport Map from the perspective of coherent city transport.<br /><br /></i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiS7u7olI7RrZeOTN5L2KZp44gFapybMTHqkj2laEFhfXTJV9KQaFg9VxWen-_AzhXg5hdqVqwpda6OzHCNexJwjr_kaPlSVA1pZRIhzUPqr9bJ7322PgZd_BjBn6_lPuz2zSnjMCVLIkJJdE-IUv3J7dc7ngNxz90YqmcRwHPICx16kPZ1-sr90w/s1266/Transportation-Coherent%20City%20Transport.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="780" data-original-width="1266" height="246" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiS7u7olI7RrZeOTN5L2KZp44gFapybMTHqkj2laEFhfXTJV9KQaFg9VxWen-_AzhXg5hdqVqwpda6OzHCNexJwjr_kaPlSVA1pZRIhzUPqr9bJ7322PgZd_BjBn6_lPuz2zSnjMCVLIkJJdE-IUv3J7dc7ngNxz90YqmcRwHPICx16kPZ1-sr90w/w400-h246/Transportation-Coherent%20City%20Transport.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b><i><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Notes</i></b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">As an observer, I want to highlight the significance of the map above. It was during the creation of this map that the group described how city functions had spaces they existed within, ways of getting to those spaces and modes of transportation. During the subsequent conversation, it was suggested that since city functions could exist not only in physical but virtual space, then there must be equivalent ways and modes of transport to those virtual spaces. The idea that virtual was itself a transport system was then raised. This was an entirely novel concept for the city planners who were part of the group and quickly led to the realisation that as a transport system then virtual has an impact on all other transport systems from resource usage to congestion (Figure 1.2).</span></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Even though we don’t discuss virtual miles travelled, it has an impact. This realisation directly influenced the investment choices the group made, concentrating on the importance of virtual city function. This is shown in the investment map (Figure 3.4.2)</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 3.4.2 – Investment Map from the perspective of coherent city transport.<br /><br /></i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8UIabiBGrOcrsK4fKbF9i6JgqQAYVWChJPNjXImzAh9GYZN3C8fs_0wEt140bpphM_Q9YNZUa_kYYW5NLrIoUsVKlgjeAryc_GXrmPlRu-JXAnYkmbg0Byg7CQEvaAvtmvEvwfZc5gC_G_JNBecReJn5B_bPgmkajU8iGtHkt_1Onind7CQk9bQ/s1264/Transportation-Coherent%20City%20Transport_INVEST.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="772" data-original-width="1264" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8UIabiBGrOcrsK4fKbF9i6JgqQAYVWChJPNjXImzAh9GYZN3C8fs_0wEt140bpphM_Q9YNZUa_kYYW5NLrIoUsVKlgjeAryc_GXrmPlRu-JXAnYkmbg0Byg7CQEvaAvtmvEvwfZc5gC_G_JNBecReJn5B_bPgmkajU8iGtHkt_1Onind7CQk9bQ/w400-h244/Transportation-Coherent%20City%20Transport_INVEST.png" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The other maps created are also provided for reference.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 3.4.3 – Transport map from the perspective of logistics</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjP_eijpXwmMSzmSEl0TDGteGqMIdOXPD1UIW1EOcfKMPMWGNMoFVFUPDrrfCnzuR7ocR4EqpDZLu-pdweuEuqQOGe73x4aDl1C_smNHSBADsDJxpFvH8fIpXOoAKZlXsy6dckHoJMV_YbUjx0vGSacpOMc8oSnLZy0IOpMKG-VvzTbuzJ-8io8CA/s1267/Transportation-Logistics.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="775" data-original-width="1267" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjP_eijpXwmMSzmSEl0TDGteGqMIdOXPD1UIW1EOcfKMPMWGNMoFVFUPDrrfCnzuR7ocR4EqpDZLu-pdweuEuqQOGe73x4aDl1C_smNHSBADsDJxpFvH8fIpXOoAKZlXsy6dckHoJMV_YbUjx0vGSacpOMc8oSnLZy0IOpMKG-VvzTbuzJ-8io8CA/w400-h245/Transportation-Logistics.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 3.4.4 – Investment Map from the perspective of logistics</i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7YiFcGcKYloXMpC5khG-FN2rLh7zuDKEJO8Wp0iq_IlP4zGru2UpRyG0hzpZ6zgwlesW2TaPmrExeNB37jk9w7nL7z3EPJzbBPF3bTQ8zQMjgmqCbI3UQIayWuouLL7g1sJl6y-cldZAgNq6dGpnmpQJHA3mJxzNGHmB2kHSVw3bj-49SkpCuoA/s1260/Transportation-Logistics_invest.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="769" data-original-width="1260" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7YiFcGcKYloXMpC5khG-FN2rLh7zuDKEJO8Wp0iq_IlP4zGru2UpRyG0hzpZ6zgwlesW2TaPmrExeNB37jk9w7nL7z3EPJzbBPF3bTQ8zQMjgmqCbI3UQIayWuouLL7g1sJl6y-cldZAgNq6dGpnmpQJHA3mJxzNGHmB2kHSVw3bj-49SkpCuoA/w400-h244/Transportation-Logistics_invest.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>Figure 3.4.5 – Transport map from the perspective of consumer behaviour<br /><br /></i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwttktJCnkyIJbF0Ndic3Vtb_AYxTJ9AO4oWtFTF9SVAgdLPxV5kvhN7R7O4MV55QIfH3UHngpWkdou5VuKnQLGnRyxiF5gubOplhqQGIlz_NtDgR65aKRRQLNG5hYHFJDKUaSb8ZJYstPSU9pFIlj2_JKh13UiSq9tAX13VxZKSc68j5lIsBZvQ/s1265/Transportation-Changing%20Consumer%20Behaviour.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="769" data-original-width="1265" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwttktJCnkyIJbF0Ndic3Vtb_AYxTJ9AO4oWtFTF9SVAgdLPxV5kvhN7R7O4MV55QIfH3UHngpWkdou5VuKnQLGnRyxiF5gubOplhqQGIlz_NtDgR65aKRRQLNG5hYHFJDKUaSb8ZJYstPSU9pFIlj2_JKh13UiSq9tAX13VxZKSc68j5lIsBZvQ/w400-h244/Transportation-Changing%20Consumer%20Behaviour.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><i><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Figure 3.4.6 – Investment map from the perspective of consumer behaviour<br /><br /></i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFRfwkbgRybZ960DhOVMJK5oAfyFk9huxbJuZGVH12UTVE7WH-bpteEF68aZRMlCpqACb7ewS8dsnUMfzdSeTP8ece1moXXrmI27j0TG4irvivQlu20eQGQ8v2Z2VuWgd4KXkIPpN3LPyVvYme_UHZOEoN4aYpBPmyirKM4W4S1qcHrWY9I5JyPw/s1262/Transportation-Changing%20Consumer%20Behaviour_INVEST.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1262" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFRfwkbgRybZ960DhOVMJK5oAfyFk9huxbJuZGVH12UTVE7WH-bpteEF68aZRMlCpqACb7ewS8dsnUMfzdSeTP8ece1moXXrmI27j0TG4irvivQlu20eQGQ8v2Z2VuWgd4KXkIPpN3LPyVvYme_UHZOEoN4aYpBPmyirKM4W4S1qcHrWY9I5JyPw/w400-h244/Transportation-Changing%20Consumer%20Behaviour_INVEST.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>3.5 FINAL NOTES</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The above maps were then consolidated to create the priority list in figure 2.1</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The priority list and the maps formed the basis of the discussion which led to the creation of the six box (figure 1.2)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">All the work is licensed creative commons share alike.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The raw code for the maps is stored in github[15].</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>REFERENCES</b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[1] UK GOV, TRANSPORT DATA STRATEGY, MARCH 2023, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/transport-data-strategy-innovation-through-data</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[2] DELOITTE, OPEN DATA, JUNE 2012 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/uk/Documents/deloitte-analytics/open-data-driving-growth-ingenuity-and-innovation.pdf</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[3] TRANSPORT CATAPULT, INNOVATING FOR A PANDEMIC RESILIENT PUBLIC TRANSPORT SYSTEM, NOV 2022 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://cp.catapult.org.uk/report/innovating-for-a-pandemic-resilient-public-transport-system/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[4] OPEN GOV, VIRTUAL INSPECTION 101, 2023 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://opengov.com/virtual-inspection/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[5] LGA, VIRTUAL COUNCIL MEETING SURVEY, 2023, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.local.gov.uk/publications/virtual-council-meeting-survey-2023</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[6] UWE BRISTOL, KEY QUESTIONS FOR ROAD INVESTMENT, JANUARY 2023,(RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/10295773</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[7]DIGITAL TV, ICELAND TOPS EUROPEAN INTERNET VALUE SURVEY, JULY 2023 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.digitaltveurope.com/2023/07/17/iceland-tops-european-internet-value-survey/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[8] GITLAB, WHAT IS REMOTE WORK, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/remote-work-starter-guide/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[9] HOUSE OF LORDS, UK, PUBLIC TRANSPORT IN TOWN AND CITIES, NOV 2022, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld5803/ldselect/ldbuiltenv/89/89.pdf</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[10] PORTUGAL DIGITAL NOMAD VISAS, 2023, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.portugal.com/travel/portugal-digital-nomad-visa-2023/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[11] ISTTELKOM, COMMON INFRASTRUCTURE IS A MUST FOR SAVINGS IN FIBER OPTICS, 2021, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://isttelkom.istanbul/en/common-infrastructure-is-a-must-for-savings-in-fiber-optics/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[12] THE DRIVEN, BUS DEPOT OFFERS SOLAR AND BATTERY BLUEPRINT, JANUARY 2023, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://thedriven.io/2023/01/10/australias-biggest-electric-bus-depot-offers-solar-and-battery-blueprint-for-future/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[13] SAVE A TRAIN, HOW RAIL OUSTED SHORT HAUL FLIGHTS, FEB 2023 (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.saveatrain.com/blog/how-rail-ousted-short-haul-flights-in-europe/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[14] UK GOV, TRANSPORT DATA STRATEGY, MARCH 2023, (RETRIEVED JULY 2023) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/transport-data-strategy-innovation-through-data</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: xx-small;">[15] Research 2022, https://github.com/swardley/Research2022</span></div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-39810621171670415722023-06-29T15:19:00.004+01:002023-06-29T18:33:20.449+01:00<div><b><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: medium;">INTRODUCTION</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Over the last 15 months, I've been working on a research project with many volunteers to map different industries. This has been an exercise in exploration.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Most of us are familiar with using maps to apply appropriate methods, whether project management o finance. We're equally familiar with how to challenge what is being done or to find areas where we need to concentrate on efficiency or innovation or customer focus. But how do you map an industry? Which maps right? How do you find what is or maybe important?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The research has covered twelve industries and two technology sectors so far with over 300 volunteers (including 220+ involved in the primary research). Those volunteers have been from across the globe all working openly using zoom, miro and maps. I'm incredibly grateful for the effort that has been put in, and I thank you for all that was done.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">In the next series of posts, I'm going to share the raw reports that we've written, including the maps and the process used. If you use online wardley maps then you'll also find the code in my github - https://github.com/swardley/Research2022</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">A more polished version of these reports will be available on the DXC Leading Edge site and I'll provide a link to that when they are completed.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The industries covered include retail, manufacturing, construction, defence, transportation, healthcare, government, education, finance, agriculture, energy and telecoms.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The technology sectors include AI and Cybersecurity. Though we have new sessions coming up on sustainability, gaming, the future of workplace and even quantum computing. This project is very much ongoing.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: medium;">REPORT - RETAIL</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">1. THE FUTURE OF RETAIL IS AT A CROSSROADS</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">On one hand, retail faces several challenges including the rise of e-commerce, the need to improve sustainability, and the increasing demands of consumers for transparency. On the other hand, there are also several opportunities for retailers to thrive, such as the growth of omnichannel retailing and the increasing use of data analytics to refine customer journeys. Given this, where should we focus our investment?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">In this evolving landscape, one set of emerging and critical issues facing the retail industry are integrity and transparency. In recent years, there have been several high-profile scandals involving retailers, such as the use of child or slave labour and the sale of counterfeit goods[1]. These scandals have eroded consumer trust[2] and made it clear that retailers need to do more to ensure that their supply chains and their practices are ethical and sustainable. Unfortunately, we have future potential scandals heading our way, from low pay to misuse of BNPL[3] (buy-now-pay-later) and EWA[4] (earned-wages-access). One area we should focus on is the need to act with integrity and transparency, avoiding spin and admitting mistakes when they happen.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Another issue facing the retail industry concerns collaboration. To meet the demands of consumers and stay ahead of the competition, retailers need to share information and work together. However, despite early efforts such as Open Supply Hub[5], there is often a reluctance to share information, as retailers fear their competitors will benefit from it. Our second area of focus is the need to dare to share and as RILA[6] states “collaboration makes retailers better competitors”.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Finally, the industry requires metrics that drive sustainable choices. That’s not to say we don’t have metrics; we have lots of them. Unfortunately, due to the complexity of supply chains and a lack of transparency, there is a heavy reliance on estimation. The industry is “woefully behind on scope three targets”[7] which can account for 90% of emissions. Our third area of focus for retailers is the need to make use of meaningful metrics that reflect the true impact of their operations on the environment and society, including using more scientific and data-driven metrics that can accurately measure things like carbon emissions, water use, and waste production. Unfortunately, according to a 2022 CDP study[8], less than 35% of companies’ emission reduction targets are credible.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Whilst integrity, sharing and meaningful metrics might sound a bit soft in the rough and tumble of commerce, a 2021 study[9] by Avery Dennison suggests that consumers want transparency in their supply chain, and a 2019[10] study by the World Economic Forum highlighted that leaders are often operating blind and less capable of managing shocks to the system. These “soft” issues have material impacts. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The three key messages, challenges and actions are summarised in the following 6-box. The rest of this report will discuss how they were determined and why they are considered priorities.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 1 – The six boxes.</span></i></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNxQHKF1GuPxrKLAMbT6cz8N6jv9CaHcZgx-ruFHGNPkxU3EpY-EXpKpSDDLasG1aRtsR8LNhJjJEYYB1uCnM2a35_EyjDM3WoB79LnUjvmPxp84DuISwPRuh-o927IAw57P7yDc00_j1XASzlc4LNxoIgt6jW20UAnDOoS8Ia49KHvBlo5a5OMA/s774/Retail%20Synthesis.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="413" data-original-width="774" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNxQHKF1GuPxrKLAMbT6cz8N6jv9CaHcZgx-ruFHGNPkxU3EpY-EXpKpSDDLasG1aRtsR8LNhJjJEYYB1uCnM2a35_EyjDM3WoB79LnUjvmPxp84DuISwPRuh-o927IAw57P7yDc00_j1XASzlc4LNxoIgt6jW20UAnDOoS8Ia49KHvBlo5a5OMA/w400-h214/Retail%20Synthesis.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: medium;">2. EXPLORING THE WORLD OF RETAIL</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">In 2022, DXC Leading Edge brought together a team of 226 volunteers to explore 12 different industries. Thirteen of the group chose to explore what mattered for the future of retail. This “retail” team had a wide variety of experience in the retail sector, from senior leadership of large global conglomerates to startup founders. Our initial problem, as with all the groups, is that we started with no agreed method to explore the future. The exploration process emerged during the research project through the interactions of all the teams. That process involved the following steps.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">2.1 Collect words.</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">To begin with, the group created a cloud of words that they felt were important to the future of retail. This varied from loyalty programs to last-mile delivery, from virtualisation of goods to influencers (see Figure 2.1). There was no initial consensus.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2.1 – the cloud of words related to the future of retail.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4PvbrDM2aIL9FEBE1lPBUSGEbZ4XWpli5ZGcZT4CBZnNW1VNNxscnmJ906noblrsHruyU_z46OZQM8r6fjluJsCCfYfqsSzKLH2txdnWUx8qqErgK3fhtoAeKNRFCmJR0RgiHOYhPe66ALQtJTvnfhqDhlQ5maTwUu-P0qAdoG5_O1L4NBhBhYg/s1187/Retail%20Collection.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="874" data-original-width="1187" height="295" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4PvbrDM2aIL9FEBE1lPBUSGEbZ4XWpli5ZGcZT4CBZnNW1VNNxscnmJ906noblrsHruyU_z46OZQM8r6fjluJsCCfYfqsSzKLH2txdnWUx8qqErgK3fhtoAeKNRFCmJR0RgiHOYhPe66ALQtJTvnfhqDhlQ5maTwUu-P0qAdoG5_O1L4NBhBhYg/w400-h295/Retail%20Collection.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">2.2. Categorise.</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The words the group created were often connected with each other. Consumer transportation, driverless cars and electric scooters have a relationship around mobility. The team explored those relationships and created a graph of the space connecting each word to a theme (see Figure 2.2).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2.2 – the categorisation of words into themes.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5hYqK0r14gE2EKKTZrAPfJBJRLoCCpARlTzkB6Y-Eg73Dl6TmZYNr-5vb2rpyvpKovqaBv_VqwZXt68VaGhwFtHDCORuUeO9_d8oGz3C33At6rNyiK3z92q2dT6cwR1sW43kh-pNhqufzWz9ND19qCitjqec7Bz1QuTtO26hxeehY3wdEUfpZGQ/s1682/Retail%20CATEGORISATION.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="842" data-original-width="1682" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5hYqK0r14gE2EKKTZrAPfJBJRLoCCpARlTzkB6Y-Eg73Dl6TmZYNr-5vb2rpyvpKovqaBv_VqwZXt68VaGhwFtHDCORuUeO9_d8oGz3C33At6rNyiK3z92q2dT6cwR1sW43kh-pNhqufzWz9ND19qCitjqec7Bz1QuTtO26hxeehY3wdEUfpZGQ/w400-h200/Retail%20CATEGORISATION.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The team then chose three themes they wished to explore: sustainability, shopping (an expansion on virtual shopping) and logistics. The chosen themes would become our perspectives from which to map retail.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">2.3 – Mapping</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The group mapped[11] each of the three chosen perspectives of retail, starting with concepts of user need, the components involved, and how evolved the components were. The maps were continually refined until the group considered the map was good enough to describe the space. On average this would take 6-14 hours per map. For illustrative purposes, one map on the perspective of shopping is given in Figure 2.3. The remaining maps on sustainability and logistics are provided in the appendix.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2.3 – Retail Map from the Perspective of Shopping.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXZz0emTO8RnUYsXax8cE5dk9b1EgSA2EEqxvCQSrrkpCQihmU5uxD4qyjqXVMTVWsyCvHhxlRGIC6AQojbF8GBgZVrvb4hMcIZGZOVRUTXo3uKcg8wsMkFRx_oQdGpA8peD1aBqdsTY4kUXavI4BnNtWdc-P13wKGQRA-wOL_xLNkMg_hZCOr2Q/s1263/Retail%20-%20Shopping.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="775" data-original-width="1263" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXZz0emTO8RnUYsXax8cE5dk9b1EgSA2EEqxvCQSrrkpCQihmU5uxD4qyjqXVMTVWsyCvHhxlRGIC6AQojbF8GBgZVrvb4hMcIZGZOVRUTXo3uKcg8wsMkFRx_oQdGpA8peD1aBqdsTY4kUXavI4BnNtWdc-P13wKGQRA-wOL_xLNkMg_hZCOr2Q/w400-h245/Retail%20-%20Shopping.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Several aspects of the map were highlighted, including:-</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">1) how virtual stores allowed for a much greater industrialisation than physical stores.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">2) how channels depend upon the choice of spaces (physical, virtual or both) and the experience that we create with them.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">3) how space is connected to social practices, i.e., we’ve learned how to operate and interact with others in different physical spaces, but many are just learning the techniques required in the virtual space.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">2.4 Analysis</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">For each of the three maps, areas where an organisation may choose to invest were highlighted. Once the list was considered reasonably exhaustive, the group identified for each map a few high-priority areas (see Figure 2.4). In the case of shopping, the high-priority areas were data analytics (specifically associated with the customer journey), emerging virtual practices (the social practices by which we interact with others) and integrity.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">As one of the retail team commented, “mapping out the space helped us [the retail team] to think deeply about the chosen perspective and what needed to change in ways we hadn’t considered before”.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2.4 – Retail Map from the perspective of shopping, including investment areas.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiX7yjJL7kj1RGuJ9LWHsdullFysWFOlwvHZhJ6A4ma4aqZm_DRgA9dQK2kOcWjeMHe-1P-3l8sN-rYiTb71jvJL9raIXO2_UhgKWC4nn4cOqgI6FMcmvJoqNPgs3lr0bj45nTved4t9hjCv0YkkErO-t1L8US0GQf2P4nhUkavLKHkl7imjac9bw/s1455/Retail%20-%20Shopping%20-%20INVEST.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="889" data-original-width="1455" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiX7yjJL7kj1RGuJ9LWHsdullFysWFOlwvHZhJ6A4ma4aqZm_DRgA9dQK2kOcWjeMHe-1P-3l8sN-rYiTb71jvJL9raIXO2_UhgKWC4nn4cOqgI6FMcmvJoqNPgs3lr0bj45nTved4t9hjCv0YkkErO-t1L8US0GQf2P4nhUkavLKHkl7imjac9bw/w400-h245/Retail%20-%20Shopping%20-%20INVEST.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The reason for using multiple perspectives is that it would enable us to aggregate importance across various maps. This is the real magic of the technique. For the reader, imagine a world where no previous maps exist. You’ve just received the first-ever maps of Paris created by three different groups. How do you know which map is correct? How do you know what landmarks are important? You look at a single map and it highlights the Eiffel Tower and Pierre’s Pizza Parlour but which is more important? You’ve never been to Paris.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">By asking multiple cartographers to highlight essential features on their maps and then aggregating across them then you are more likely to find the important landmarks regardless of perspective. In the Paris example, you’ll quickly find that the Eiffel Tower is a familiar landmark across many maps compared to Pierre’s Pizza Parlour which may only appear on one.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">This is precisely what we are doing: creating three perspectives and consolidating across them in an attempt to find the landmarks that matter.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">2.5 Consolidation to important landmarks.</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">First, we aggregate across the maps , creating a priority order based on the frequency at which an area (for example “virtual goods”) is highlighted and any priority given. In the case of retail, those areas of highest priority across all maps included: - awareness of the supply chain (high), integrity (high), data analytics (focused on customer journeys), sustainability, measurement, emerging virtual practices and distribution (of storage and inventory). This order was then compared against the aggregated results of 14 analyst reports as well as comparison to ChatGPT-4 and BARD. See figure 2.5</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2.5 – Consolidation and comparison to Analysts, ChatGPT-4 and BARD.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgstTA9g96K4ePdIAf90nxFzsifyHvTde2v9GPhdOaJKQhyeVhZoDdbOWh2Jkuh4bUbfsumuqWQ8AVOTmJoRtFFYeIuQnjHc7gBfpYhgcoQmjrSbzlbgCUafrYMIQH-bZbg99gW4hP4dF6WTGenc1Q1EXhDKXYNVzt_SvCc7N18K8ecrPBs2fugqw/s884/Retail%20CONSOLIDATION.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="884" data-original-width="867" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgstTA9g96K4ePdIAf90nxFzsifyHvTde2v9GPhdOaJKQhyeVhZoDdbOWh2Jkuh4bUbfsumuqWQ8AVOTmJoRtFFYeIuQnjHc7gBfpYhgcoQmjrSbzlbgCUafrYMIQH-bZbg99gW4hP4dF6WTGenc1Q1EXhDKXYNVzt_SvCc7N18K8ecrPBs2fugqw/w393-h400/Retail%20CONSOLIDATION.png" width="393" /></span></a></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">2.6 Discussion</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">By examination of Figure 2.5, a number of observations are made.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">1) The difference between the views of analysts and those of the retail team are so wide that you can say that retail is standing at a crossroad. On one hand the analysts would have you follow a path focused on personalisation (high) and data analytics (high). The retail team would have you follow a path of awareness of the supply chain (high) and integrity (high).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">2) ChatGPT and BARD had high levels of agreement between themselves along with a tendency to agree with the analysts. As large language models trained on relatively recent text, the priority order created by ChatGPT-4 and BARD should statistically reflect how common the terms appeared in common text i.e. whether analysts and others were writing about it. Hence, you would expect some level of consensus. Volatility between ChatGPT-4, BARD and the analysts would imply high levels of uncertainty in the field. Care must be taken to use prompts that forced both LLMs (large language models) to stick to sorting the given list rather than answering the question of what matters. One notable variation is the LLMS tended to agree more with the retail team on the issue of supply chain awareness.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">3) The retail team’s priority order tended to have words that were implied from (rather than being identical) to those that the team originally collected (figure 2.1.) For example, the phrases “carbon footprint of global supply chains”, “resilience versus robustness of supply chains” and “Who in the supply chain is held to account” implies an “awareness of supply chain” which emerged during the mapping process as being the highest priority focus. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">4) The priority order represents a general consensus between the team. Obviously, the actual priority order for a retail company will depend upon its context. Two areas with strong consensus for the retail team were how poorly understood supply chains were and integrity. Poor awareness of the supply chain has an impact on other topics from resilience to crisis management to sustainability. A lack of integrity in the industry creates a history of scandals, from the use of slave labour to fraud to poor wages. Two current trends that were highlighted and felt likely to cause future scandals were BNPL (Buy Now Pay Later) and EWA (Earned Wages Access). The former, which allows retail to arrange bank loans for purchases seems to be a very positive change on the surface, with retailers increasing revenue (any loan interest paid as the product discount), banks receiving interest (the loans are packaged into collateralised obligations which are sold to other markets) and consumers receiving products they want (with interest-free loans). Unfortunately, such schemes have been used to buy staple goods, and the concern is the creation of a new debt bubble with retail at heart. The latter, EWA, again seems optimistic, allowing employees to gain access to earned wages and avoid using payday loans. In effect, however, this is an interest-free payday loan, and the group highlighted how this was not solving the fundamental problem of low wages and could instead create entrapment.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Based upon the maps created, the areas highlighted for investment, the consolidation of these areas to form a priority list and comparison to analysts, and the subsequent discussion, the following six boxes were created (a repetition of the previous Figure 1)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2.6 – Six Box.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghPxJ2t1-oIgiYvQzX5zeYVB2E7vbQ9CjjiWEkfpX4zOiQlPnEPkeB8upefeSOs4TgMIrb1sPpg4BnIkZYgb5Nlb_Srm2NneG8gqasn3vkxQNnLHCU1-kqP27aB-Y-QEqOxzZqEEnfaLNcGvisHy52nQktPR6DvRO1TLzl8DbJMRWfOobH9WLSpA/s774/Retail%20Synthesis.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="413" data-original-width="774" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghPxJ2t1-oIgiYvQzX5zeYVB2E7vbQ9CjjiWEkfpX4zOiQlPnEPkeB8upefeSOs4TgMIrb1sPpg4BnIkZYgb5Nlb_Srm2NneG8gqasn3vkxQNnLHCU1-kqP27aB-Y-QEqOxzZqEEnfaLNcGvisHy52nQktPR6DvRO1TLzl8DbJMRWfOobH9WLSpA/w400-h214/Retail%20Synthesis.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">2.7 Leading practice</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">During the research process, several companies were highlighted for what the group considered leading practice. A selection is provided as a guide for the reader.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Deforestation-free supply chain by Unilver[12]. In particular the focus on using crowdsourcing</span></li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: courier;">B Corp certification[13]. For completeness of the entire process.<br /><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">100% slave free the norm in chocolate by Chocolonely[14]. For clarity of purpose and focus on awareness.<br /><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">A coalition for collective action by Sustainable Apparel Coalition[15]. For collective action and sharing<br /><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Explore global supply chain data by Open Supply Hub[16]. For collective action and sharing<br /><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Supply chain: going beyond compliance by Levis Strauss & Co[17]. For exceptional honesty and transparency in the complexity of supply chains<br /><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">AWS Supply Chain Features by AWS[18]. For breadth of vision and provision of core components.<br /><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Provenance[19]. For provision of mechanisms to clarify claims made by retailers.<br /><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Retail Net Zero action plan by WRAP and WWF[20]. For collective action and focus on standardising measures.<br /><br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Activism by Patagonia[21]. For direct action and integrity.</span></li></ul></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: medium;">3 PROCESS</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The complete process of determining the six box, starting with the collection of words to categorisation to mapping to analysis to consolidation and finally synthesis is shown in Figure 3.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 3 – the complete method.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIdqS1v1P9iNXrhK2tFOVUXbeYSc73-do4o1YxhXD0NxXGXsvrOnE_4vd2AcPLnnU0i2prYeFnT-_Z-xf5uNfL-H813hXK56zQ5pDTP3mX8WA0vOieSX8kXv_NIZPDZg4grsRqJmsabKqW4dsS9E4GjDrYjmnojQIjScWvUg8iTVe2Zr5PNXCo9A/s1810/Retai%20Overall.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="429" data-original-width="1810" height="95" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIdqS1v1P9iNXrhK2tFOVUXbeYSc73-do4o1YxhXD0NxXGXsvrOnE_4vd2AcPLnnU0i2prYeFnT-_Z-xf5uNfL-H813hXK56zQ5pDTP3mX8WA0vOieSX8kXv_NIZPDZg4grsRqJmsabKqW4dsS9E4GjDrYjmnojQIjScWvUg8iTVe2Zr5PNXCo9A/w400-h95/Retai%20Overall.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Whilst the method enabled us to determine a different view for retail, it is likely affected by the number of perspectives used. In this case, three were used and hence and the result can only be considered relevant to those three perspectives. As more perspectives are added, a more accurate picture of what matters in an industry should be generated.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The process is relatively time-consuming: -</span></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Collection of words: 1 hour</span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Categorisation of words and selection of perspectives: 1 hour</span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Mapping of perspectives: 6 – 14 hours per map.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Analysis of map and selection of priority areas: 2-3 hours.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Consolidation and comparison: 2-3 hours</span></li><li><span style="font-family: courier;">Synthesis: 3-4 hours.</span></li></ul></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The entire process can take 15-26 hours, assuming any mapping work is done in parallel.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">Further studies intend to examine the validity of this process. Whilst it enables us to find a different view on what we should be investing in, whether that view is more accurate than simply listening to analysts remained unanswered.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: medium;">4 NOTES</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;">The research was completed with the aid of over 226 volunteers and hence all maps and analysis are provided as creative commons share alike. This includes the research process itself.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: medium;">5 APPENDIX</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 5.1 – Retail Map from the perspective of logistics</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFA10FgqboTw8wsbE-n2WoK2lTy8OtUC7_3Uy23kPOZKGvpsRkje3UG-9Vr_z7uUzwqJzGKWsTvzKwPPXdPtXbeQ_82FZyu2e-9b1_ikXNpjoE0TaPD6VMC1GiuGxsR-_AhVQpgsNWssCfnO4Tl3FHZ_CVcfKuGSCFkH4V-kcSeFAySo-WHiHOJQ/s1264/Retail%20-%20LOGISTICS.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="774" data-original-width="1264" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFA10FgqboTw8wsbE-n2WoK2lTy8OtUC7_3Uy23kPOZKGvpsRkje3UG-9Vr_z7uUzwqJzGKWsTvzKwPPXdPtXbeQ_82FZyu2e-9b1_ikXNpjoE0TaPD6VMC1GiuGxsR-_AhVQpgsNWssCfnO4Tl3FHZ_CVcfKuGSCFkH4V-kcSeFAySo-WHiHOJQ/w400-h245/Retail%20-%20LOGISTICS.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 5.2 – Retail Map from the perspective of logistics, including investment areas.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtaxFCldyeXBtZ6vbmhq9iDjNga8jGN_4BLEd1_MJU6VneXKKlc9cnQyAtP4XZnpV7LjSEtn4otDsiv0Kz-ziPpJreZ70mqDAYzSF8Dv01XrIq-n_WTJ7UEAJgRa1fgHK6SpXDH8nGzeIQEA2IRp1HX8oLl4TYKEYemRCwwHhTz8Rr9NYIsWasPw/s1415/Retail%20-%20LOGISTICS%20-%20INVEST.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="862" data-original-width="1415" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtaxFCldyeXBtZ6vbmhq9iDjNga8jGN_4BLEd1_MJU6VneXKKlc9cnQyAtP4XZnpV7LjSEtn4otDsiv0Kz-ziPpJreZ70mqDAYzSF8Dv01XrIq-n_WTJ7UEAJgRa1fgHK6SpXDH8nGzeIQEA2IRp1HX8oLl4TYKEYemRCwwHhTz8Rr9NYIsWasPw/w400-h244/Retail%20-%20LOGISTICS%20-%20INVEST.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 5.3 – Retail Map from the perspective of sustainability</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> </span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhT6K5R810O4-ow0ASqvrD6oIKnuAs4jc82JnGQv2E5ns6AxJ80ucRKvF2b6KL7MEg6724P07GNMwoh9td6DrCqtiFnbyfnOt2ejmvx2HDUlFyt8j2-1AJ1i3TYo-0NXA5Psfq_sVpMikrNO9zncmyZPbvX5t4ematbSCdH7r-dN-mGo2EoTtfgBw/s1263/Retail%20-%20Sustainability.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="773" data-original-width="1263" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhT6K5R810O4-ow0ASqvrD6oIKnuAs4jc82JnGQv2E5ns6AxJ80ucRKvF2b6KL7MEg6724P07GNMwoh9td6DrCqtiFnbyfnOt2ejmvx2HDUlFyt8j2-1AJ1i3TYo-0NXA5Psfq_sVpMikrNO9zncmyZPbvX5t4ematbSCdH7r-dN-mGo2EoTtfgBw/w400-h245/Retail%20-%20Sustainability.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><i><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 5.4 – Retail Map from the perspective of sustainability, including investment areas.</span></i></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNCa-AUmBiQBiQgM0Uwsdusuv_ktyAItAYjgrzIyG2nB9uyzi2FJFSxRBkpbgHF2twmwPJBuf4THwb9j7VKU4lsz520fOjgCb0oipOlBKzW33zPQtt9ucatw1SkkLJhDny_zf0ln8Qrj849wt93UelIcO0XCy0cuJP0WBXvNyet1rtJJT1LsFvTQ/s1447/Retail%20-%20Sustainability%20-%20INVEST.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><img border="0" data-original-height="885" data-original-width="1447" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNCa-AUmBiQBiQgM0Uwsdusuv_ktyAItAYjgrzIyG2nB9uyzi2FJFSxRBkpbgHF2twmwPJBuf4THwb9j7VKU4lsz520fOjgCb0oipOlBKzW33zPQtt9ucatw1SkkLJhDny_zf0ln8Qrj849wt93UelIcO0XCy0cuJP0WBXvNyet1rtJJT1LsFvTQ/w400-h245/Retail%20-%20Sustainability%20-%20INVEST.png" width="400" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="font-family: courier;">6 REFERENCES</span></b></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier;"> <span style="font-size: x-small;">[1] "We have lost a lot of control", Guardian UK, 16/04/03, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/16/uk-at-risk-of-food-safety-expert-warns [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [2] Retail has a customer trust problem. RetailWire, 22/02/03, https://retailwire.com/discussion/retail-has-a-customer-trust-problem/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [3] Buy now, pay later schemes increasingly an avenue for financial abuse, Guardian UK, 15/11/22, https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/nov/15/buy-now-pay-later-bnpl-schemes-financial-abuse-report [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [4] EARNED WAGE ACCESS AND THE END OF PAYDAY LENDING, Boston University Law Review, Vol 101:705, https://www.bu.edu/bulawreview/files/2021/04/HAWKINS.pdf [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [5] Explore global supply chain data, https://opensupplyhub.org/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [6] HOW ONE TRADE ASSOCIATION IS HELPING RETAILERS COLLABORATE, https://www.rila.org/focus-areas/public-policy/how-one-trade-association-is-helping-retailers-col [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [7] 'We have to do something', RetailDive, 18/07/22, https://www.retaildive.com/news/retail-scope-3-supply-chain-carbon-emissions/626973/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [8] Climate Transition Plans, CDP, https://www.cdp.net/en/guidance/guidance-for-companies/climate-transition-plans [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [9] Shoppers want transparency in the supply chain, Supply Chain, 13/12/21, https://supplychaindigital.com/sustainability/report-shows-shoppers-want-transparency-supply-chain [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [10] How supply chain transparency can help businesses make the right calls, WEF, 19/06/20, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/06/supply-chain-transparency-can-pre-risk/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [11] Topographical intelligence in business, https://medium.com/wardleymaps [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [12] Deforestation-free supply chain, Unilever, https://www.unilever.com/planet-and-society/protect-and-regenerate-nature/deforestation-free-supply-chain/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [13] Measuring a company’s entire social and environmental impact, B CORP cetification, https://www.bcorporation.net/en-us/certification/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [14] 100% slave free the norm in chocolate , TonysChocolonely, https://tonyschocolonely.com/uk/en/our-mission [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [15] A Coalition for collective action, Sustainable Apparel Coalition, https://apparelcoalition.org/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [16] Explore global supply chain data, OpenSupplyHub, https://opensupplyhub.org/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [17] Supply Chain: Going Beyond Compliance, LEVI STRAUSS & CO, 2021 https://www.levistrauss.com/sustainability-report/community/supply-chain/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [18] AWS Supply Chain Features, AWS, https://aws.amazon.com/aws-supply-chain/features/#Supply_chain_data_lake [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [19]Shop your Values, Provenance, https://www.provenance.org/directory [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [20] Retailer Net Zero Collaboration Action Programme, WRAP, https://wrap.org.uk/taking-action/food-drink/initiatives/courtauld-commitment/scope-3-GHG-Emissions/retailer-net-zero-collaboration-action-programme [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div><div><span style="font-family: courier; font-size: x-small;"> [21] Take Action, Patagonia, https://eu.patagonia.com/gb/en/activism/ [RETRIEVED 29/06/23]</span></div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-91768787378587173972023-06-08T15:28:00.003+01:002023-06-08T15:28:44.595+01:00What do I use maps for?<p>It's an interesting question. </p><p>There are some that use maps to challenge what they're doing i.e. "Why are those racks custom-built?"</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ2X2Dw3RwwaUXRp9254Q5TbHUx1WfRYIMFYNeNCgvfY4ATA1J2zksX3fOAmVgXAs7pivkHyTPaoQN_fdeFtuNOZH5YFdxtMwJJTPlY_NmXsA_s6eS3pB5PbWgdu-RzcnINZrAQBxnV-amy2NPbXfmotT7aatr0BHFjvfKdaNBFfmDzQjb9pY/s1533/Challenge01.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="885" data-original-width="1533" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJ2X2Dw3RwwaUXRp9254Q5TbHUx1WfRYIMFYNeNCgvfY4ATA1J2zksX3fOAmVgXAs7pivkHyTPaoQN_fdeFtuNOZH5YFdxtMwJJTPlY_NmXsA_s6eS3pB5PbWgdu-RzcnINZrAQBxnV-amy2NPbXfmotT7aatr0BHFjvfKdaNBFfmDzQjb9pY/s320/Challenge01.png" width="320" /></a></div><p>There are others who use maps to apply the right methods - whether project management or purchasing or finance.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiepQCXjvRPCkbVzG5BwQFQ4SYZbwONHVl7y3w570QnU1ZrJgiI1qdSWn_LgNXa9zvie_CVYQp-unQNWDCdpwTNv9G3A1QW1EQkqmjV-msyPv35Ni63H8SYcpOXVDvfhyrSO1AJnhMoPFzpQmkSYw2OeHrOyJuoJYRavTN4COmAUR_rMWi5V2U/s1537/Challenge02.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="892" data-original-width="1537" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiepQCXjvRPCkbVzG5BwQFQ4SYZbwONHVl7y3w570QnU1ZrJgiI1qdSWn_LgNXa9zvie_CVYQp-unQNWDCdpwTNv9G3A1QW1EQkqmjV-msyPv35Ni63H8SYcpOXVDvfhyrSO1AJnhMoPFzpQmkSYw2OeHrOyJuoJYRavTN4COmAUR_rMWi5V2U/s320/Challenge02.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p>Then, there are those who use maps to anticipate change for reasons of investment or managing inertia or both</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaVYwnjYj_w08sGYT2s1mXJ8Yz4zliqXaB_9BvRtN9IIi6Qww2ZQrdvlYLzZ2GMv-rv1U3Y9PWUZLl9qUB8cIe33hr0hmD_QI5L-WKK_uo0DEnSGBicxn7HX1hIONW_ilAA-OyU6R_1mmQ7rX_lR9iwdjhLnjRXc-xzghct7yo2CdFg25PPz8/s1515/Challenge03.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="893" data-original-width="1515" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaVYwnjYj_w08sGYT2s1mXJ8Yz4zliqXaB_9BvRtN9IIi6Qww2ZQrdvlYLzZ2GMv-rv1U3Y9PWUZLl9qUB8cIe33hr0hmD_QI5L-WKK_uo0DEnSGBicxn7HX1hIONW_ilAA-OyU6R_1mmQ7rX_lR9iwdjhLnjRXc-xzghct7yo2CdFg25PPz8/s320/Challenge03.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p>Whilst others use maps to convey complicated spaces, either to focus on user needs or innovation or efficiency or even just to discover that one space that people are missing (i.e. virtual is a transport system)<br /> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO0tOJUyuGv9YzK_GNbbWhm6hCJCJRDmN0fgo6GI58QvwhR_N9F76Vcx39PZLdqauU5RQkI9-eRayBW0ZkDGes6NSlighjAIIHIZkYEA2yeqvcfzBZGjVvMZdOuMGbvjfB2LI3lpQBUoQS3IDgg0nWpWB2OWKByVf3NsbE-5UfPEsxp1grE0c/s1669/Challenge04.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="893" data-original-width="1669" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO0tOJUyuGv9YzK_GNbbWhm6hCJCJRDmN0fgo6GI58QvwhR_N9F76Vcx39PZLdqauU5RQkI9-eRayBW0ZkDGes6NSlighjAIIHIZkYEA2yeqvcfzBZGjVvMZdOuMGbvjfB2LI3lpQBUoQS3IDgg0nWpWB2OWKByVf3NsbE-5UfPEsxp1grE0c/s320/Challenge04.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div>We also have people using maps for strategic play e.g. thinking about ecosystems and where to build to them (one of over 100 different forms of gameplay)</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB5CEIa6j0yQ0yBTOmapIItfgWdrojqiLVQBfMWjyGgklw3O8De6yl-XNPh59PVuc4Vp8k4QSbpNZPoBxoZE7pTJHjZoI7EaJGutTI00iUQ0IdnwaPfpjy5JZYaf6GbAPbbeSgN276KNHbo7GCUJMlGtqlRdoMP0veffaYTnWwxvHAvNOhoGg/s1546/Challenge05.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="893" data-original-width="1546" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB5CEIa6j0yQ0yBTOmapIItfgWdrojqiLVQBfMWjyGgklw3O8De6yl-XNPh59PVuc4Vp8k4QSbpNZPoBxoZE7pTJHjZoI7EaJGutTI00iUQ0IdnwaPfpjy5JZYaf6GbAPbbeSgN276KNHbo7GCUJMlGtqlRdoMP0veffaYTnWwxvHAvNOhoGg/s320/Challenge05.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div>At the same time, others use maps to think about issues of sovereignty beyond territorial and into all the landscapes we compete in (economic, technological, political and cultural) i.e. where should our borders be in a technolocial / economic space, where do we colloborate and where to conflict?</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDJTOIc_FeoOD8cX7h6q4rJikYzRJnWw0GKJw7Hj8C2Z0pl9zrF5YCAuHRF7llMRQ0lE6Ll6rA4jXqTi_8EL6f46pEtvuIIoGMklZdqDQwtMrpa3km31k8twlxg_RPbXSI3jdLVKwqJMo6Ly4XoGva99YcHcuSZOZww2FpmA996GcS49EbvE0/s1533/Challenge06.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="887" data-original-width="1533" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDJTOIc_FeoOD8cX7h6q4rJikYzRJnWw0GKJw7Hj8C2Z0pl9zrF5YCAuHRF7llMRQ0lE6Ll6rA4jXqTi_8EL6f46pEtvuIIoGMklZdqDQwtMrpa3km31k8twlxg_RPbXSI3jdLVKwqJMo6Ly4XoGva99YcHcuSZOZww2FpmA996GcS49EbvE0/s320/Challenge06.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div>Whilst others use those principles developed from those maps to look at their organisation or those of competitors.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAFwIOpSTp2jw3H5_JDYpUSSaHXKrQlAtIyYkqtxlqkEcXC04htp_d-fakA1IGnFvOUxWhnBCsEc58FYBXSU_JlBBjHVDuZSqMRgmFIBTMKcf33-k7iSIX-WZhbsOgVSZ6meBeef0VG-tODgByq6XOC4-7T_Sj3kxJy_VDIktzrtqRMj8AhvI/s1912/Challenge07.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1074" data-original-width="1912" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAFwIOpSTp2jw3H5_JDYpUSSaHXKrQlAtIyYkqtxlqkEcXC04htp_d-fakA1IGnFvOUxWhnBCsEc58FYBXSU_JlBBjHVDuZSqMRgmFIBTMKcf33-k7iSIX-WZhbsOgVSZ6meBeef0VG-tODgByq6XOC4-7T_Sj3kxJy_VDIktzrtqRMj8AhvI/s320/Challenge07.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div>And the list goes on and on. We haven't even talked about the use of maps in contracts or organisational structure or risk assessment or financial flow or removal of duplication or analysis of culture or finding weakness in supply chains or ... well, fortunately the question wasn't "Where can maps be used" but "What do I use maps for"?</div><div><br /></div><div>Fundamentally, I use them as a means of communication. A way of escaping the tyranny of stories, story tellers, syntax, rules and styles and into a world of objects, relationships, patterns, consensus and context. There isn't a right use of maps, there are many uses and a lot depends upon what a group of people need at the time.</div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-9658359921655590672023-05-14T16:33:00.020+01:002023-05-14T22:49:52.813+01:00Why the fuss about conversational programming - Part II<p><span style="font-family: courier;">In my last post on <a href="https://swardley.medium.com/why-the-fuss-about-conversational-programming-60c8d1908237">conversational programming</a> I asked the reader to "<span style="background-color: white; color: #292929; letter-spacing: -0.06px;">get yourself ready for a world of conversational programming" but I wasn't willing to call it for ChatGPT or the existing crop of LLMs. My advice was one of preparation and not nailing any colours to a mast. There is a reason.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">I think GPT4 and systems like Github CoPilot are admirable but probably in the wrong space. I think the breathless horde of consultants prognasticating the replacement of programmers with LLMs have fallen into a trap, not disimillar to their claims in 2011 of cloud saving you money (it doesn't, you end up doing more stuff - see Jevons Paradox) or cloud needing less engineers (see above) or cloud just being for startups. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">In this case, I think the problem is to do with the medium iself.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">Don't get me wrong, we're on a path to conversational programming as highlighted by Nicholas Negroponte and his paper <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/563274.563290">"Architecture by yourself"</a>. As the paper noted, design is the process of a conversation between two or more pespectives in the minds of one or more designers. In today's case, one of the designers is becoming the machine. That conversation is the heart of conversational programming. But, what we're missing is the graphical conversational part of what is needed. This is the bit that Yona Friedman explored in <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Toward-Scientific-Architecture-Y-Friedman/dp/0262560194">"Towards a Scientific Architecture"</a>.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">To explain, I'm going to use a map of coherent city transport. It was created through a discussion between a group of people (from Turkey to Germany to UK to the US) all involved in the transport industry. I've provided the "map" and the code use to create the map in figure 1.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Figure 1 - Coherent City Transport.</b></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9T2DKQPNfiEago4Fbphy7SLTTg0_HFFxUPxCko7_4D0HTWNwxLwqpKzQR0DbV7w9Ohvoi15IsgJrZROjTGwRiGbWBO2rci-a2SYwjkNFPDZOsCNGhWvKvR-aXruVUHAF8ueZmwLK-IhjMB6Spnx9neiQqFbUhOdf2IwiMLLQqwApu0AteS2Y/s1901/Code3.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="782" data-original-width="1901" height="165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9T2DKQPNfiEago4Fbphy7SLTTg0_HFFxUPxCko7_4D0HTWNwxLwqpKzQR0DbV7w9Ohvoi15IsgJrZROjTGwRiGbWBO2rci-a2SYwjkNFPDZOsCNGhWvKvR-aXruVUHAF8ueZmwLK-IhjMB6Spnx9neiQqFbUhOdf2IwiMLLQqwApu0AteS2Y/w400-h165/Code3.png" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">The discussion around the map highlighted that in transport planning we often failed to consider one of the major transportation systems effecting the world - that of virtual transport. Every virtual conference, every zoom chat involves a number of "virtual" miles travelled which has an impact on other transportation systems. Unfortunately, we often don't recognise this or even count the virtual miles. We've even built digital twins of cities that have ignored virtual as a transport system. It's a bit like ignoring roads. <br /><br />If the idea of virtual as a transport system seems odd to you then consider the impact of different modes of transport on road congestion. Figure 2 should bring the message home.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Figure 2 - Congestion on roads by mode of transport.</b></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1XO6a60Hx6cgx_blT19I1lLnE4Z0Rb5NfPH2EdSPuZ5jWdVGxiLZLJWMxHF-g4797-c_oR9qgl_jVB5Jd8gWembOtiMHjSm2ISlKMn6jFgnfwXdbed-OeqmDNXhPQHY__Lnl2ILNB6fq5ErQ5nycZll2kN3BU-yvPh-06zzDZzZra5IF19Iw/s1571/virtual.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="849" data-original-width="1571" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1XO6a60Hx6cgx_blT19I1lLnE4Z0Rb5NfPH2EdSPuZ5jWdVGxiLZLJWMxHF-g4797-c_oR9qgl_jVB5Jd8gWembOtiMHjSm2ISlKMn6jFgnfwXdbed-OeqmDNXhPQHY__Lnl2ILNB6fq5ErQ5nycZll2kN3BU-yvPh-06zzDZzZra5IF19Iw/w400-h216/virtual.png" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">This realisation of the importance of virtual as a transport system itself occurred through discussion as we explored the things on the map, their relationships with each other and the context they existed in. Now take a look at the code in figure 1. It would be difficult to make that realisation in a medium that is dominated by syntax, style and rules. In reality, the code was only ever the means to make the map. The conversation happened around the map.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">Of course, both the text and the map are ways of "coding" the problem space of coherent city travel. One is simply code as text where syntax, styles and rules dominate. The other is simply code as a map where things, relationships and context dominate.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;">With this in mind, think about where we are with conversational programming today. We're mostly trapped in syntax, style and rules around code as text. We're not really having that conversation with the machine but instead giving it instructions - write this piece of code for me, check my code, improve my code - and being amazed at what it gives back. <br /></span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: courier;">A fabulous examples of this was in the NewStack article on <a href="https://thenewstack.io/developers-put-ai-bots-to-the-test-of-writing-code/">"</a></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><a href="https://thenewstack.io/developers-put-ai-bots-to-the-test-of-writing-code/" style="font-family: courier;">Developers Put AI Bots to the Test of Writing Code"</a><span style="font-family: courier;">. The conversation often veers towards completeness or accuracy of written code but </span></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #142640; letter-spacing: 0.3px;">Villegas hits the nail on the head with a verdict that "AI-generated code lacks context-awareness".</span></span></div><p></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><span style="font-family: courier;">That's not a problem with AI but instead the medium via which we are having the conversation. It doesn't matter if it's written or spoken, the medium is still the word, it is text. The power of conversational programming will only be truly unleashed if we can escape from the confines of text (where syntax, styles and rules dominate) and into a world of maps (where things, relationships and context matters).<br /><br /></span></span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Before you say "but we can create maps with words" - well, that's exactly what we used to do for navigation. Early forms of navigation were based upon epic sagas that people would learn. These were the written and spoken words for navigation. I probably sound no different from the Viking standing there pointing at squiggles on a parchment and a sun-stone to another group of bemused Vikings who had spent years learning epic sagas word for word. </span></span><span style="font-family: courier;">They probably thought that Viking was <em class="markup--em markup--p-em">“off his rocker”</em> and this map thing will never take off. But it did and it will again.</span></div><p></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Words themselves are a poor medium to transmit quickly the key information needed in any significant journey. This is why we have used maps in military history as methods of communication and learning. The code for the map in figure 1 is a simplified and constrained language provided through <a href="https://onlinewardleymaps.com/">online wardley maps</a>. However, the code for that map contains over 1,700 different words (some hidden as digits, others hidden as links). That is pages of text in which it is hard to see the relationships between things. When we're coding our maps, the only thing that matters is the syntax and completeness of the code to produce the map. The real discussion happens over the map.</span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><span style="font-family: courier;">That's the world we need to get to, code as maps. At which we point we can have conversations over things, relationships and context (the real substance of a discussion) with the machines as a designer. That's when conversational programming will truly explode onto the scene. Today is just the foretaste of what is to happen.<br /><br /></span></span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--blue-gray-900); margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; text-align: left; word-break: break-word;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Yes, I understand that LLMs might replace a lot of writing code itself but if you think that programming was just about writing code then you're missing the bigger picture. The world of writing code as text might diminish but the world of programming has yet to reach its golden age.</span></span><span style="font-family: courier;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><br /><br />I strongly believe that the world of serverless which has already become about stitching components (or gluing things) together and thinking about the context will lend itself more naturally to the world of conversational programming. </span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">I suspect the </span><span style="font-family: courier;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">techniques for conversational programming which were first hinted at by </span><span style="color: #3c3c3c;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.7px;">Aleksander Simovic and </span></span><span style="color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">Slobodan Stojanovic in the AWS 2018 presentation on </span><a href="https://www.slideshare.net/AmazonWebServices/alexa-ask-jarvis-to-create-a-serverless-app-for-me-srv315-aws-reinvent-2018"><span style="color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">"</span>Ask Jarvis to Create a Serverless App for Me"</a> <span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">will come out of the rapidly developing open source space around multi-modal systems. </span></span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--blue-gray-900); margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; text-align: left; word-break: break-word;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><br /></span></span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--blue-gray-900); margin: 0px; min-width: 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; text-align: left; word-break: break-word;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">Don't get me wrong, I admire the work of Bard, GPT4 and Github's Copilot but as engineers we are still stuck in a model of code as text.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"> </span><span style="font-family: courier;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">Our early entrants might have the foresight to declare <a href="https://simonwillison.net/2023/May/4/no-moat/">"We have no moats"</a> but to make things worse, they will already have inertia created by commercial interests.</span></span></p><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><span style="font-family: courier;">So, keep exploring. Just remember, this battle for the future of AI through industrialisation of fundamental components is only at the beginning and we maybe in the "Sun Cloud" moment and barking up the wrong tree. That's where I suspect we are and there is much more to come. </span></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><span style="font-family: courier;">For interest, this is not a unique situation in business or IT. This is no different to the current situation with military organisations around the world slowly realising there are at least five landscapes of sovereignty which matter for the defence of the nation - territorial, economic, technological, political and cultural - and most of us only have maps for one of those landscapes. <br /><br />Four of the other landscapes are still dominated by text - whether written or spoken. As we've learned in the territorial landscape in <a href="https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/citations/ADA057970#:~:text=This%20study%20analyzes%20the%20organizational%20approaches%20to%20meet,impact%20on%20Federal%20operations%20early%20in%20the%20war.">the American Civil war, topographical intelligence and situational awareness is critical</a>. For that, we need conversations around maps not better text. <br /><br />Same with code, same with conversational programming.<br /><b><br />ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS</b></span></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier;"><span style="background-color: white; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><b>Q. Does that mean all code will be maps?<br /></b></span></span><span style="font-family: courier;">Of course not. It simply means that much our programming is likely to head in that direction to enable conversations. There will always be a need for the novel and new, the need for optimisations and the deeper you go the more likely you are to meet code as text i.e. maps might be high level but as you dig into a concept you’ll increasingly find graphs and then text alone. This should not surprise you as a graph normally contains some elements of text and a map contains a graph (of the value chain) and associated text. Each level inherits from what it is built upon.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier;"><span style="background-color: white; letter-spacing: 0.7px;"><b>Q. Why not just graphs?</b><br />Graphs are a fine tool but remember we're talking about conversions with context which implies some form of landscape. The difference between a graph and a map is that in a map, space has meaning. Which is why they are good for representing landscapes. See figure 3.<br /><br /><b>Figure 3 - Graphs vs Maps. In a map, space has meaning.<br /></b><br /><br /></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwMl-5Au5Dh7xXC9jM4uFDhbNlAAHr0h4Q0Ej8A5RI2mNkAnZ07cf2RQoMdm6JPaSdtgTjjUZpLzqKWJXPLXTv1qyvu2mhBO1pZ_ehMTHKx8Jd0wMkXq2rRX_XpvEWH4q5nTrf0dFtYxW8Zh31hPi3kX1uJi4KzchTHl09WALxJkHHGmRTuGk/s1584/Graphs%20vs%20maps.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="862" data-original-width="1584" height="217" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwMl-5Au5Dh7xXC9jM4uFDhbNlAAHr0h4Q0Ej8A5RI2mNkAnZ07cf2RQoMdm6JPaSdtgTjjUZpLzqKWJXPLXTv1qyvu2mhBO1pZ_ehMTHKx8Jd0wMkXq2rRX_XpvEWH4q5nTrf0dFtYxW8Zh31hPi3kX1uJi4KzchTHl09WALxJkHHGmRTuGk/w400-h217/Graphs%20vs%20maps.png" width="400" /></a></span></div><span style="color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier;"><br /></span><b style="color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">Q. Do you mean your form of maps?</b><br style="color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier; letter-spacing: 0.7px;" /><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; font-family: courier; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">All maps are imperfect representations of a space, they are also models and hence wrong. We use them because they are useful tools of communication but they represent a lossy trade-off between being able to discuss the context and fidelity of detail. It took our geographical brethren thousands of years to get that balance right, we've only be doing this for 18 years. We're more at the Babylonian Clay Tablet stage rather than ordinance survey maps. So, no ... I'm hoping we can create better maps than we h</span><span style="font-family: courier;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3c3c3c; letter-spacing: 0.7px;">ave. </span>I simply use my maps as an example — think odd looking Viking muttering about scribbles on parchments and sun-stones<br /><br /><b>Q. If your maps are wrong and imperfect, why use them?</b><br />Our geographical brethren didn't magically create </span><span style="font-family: courier;">1:10,000 scale representations of the landscapes with notable features overnight. These are a starting point for conversation. <br /><p class="graf graf--p" name="9a9d"><strong class="markup--strong markup--p-strong">Q. Where would you look for inspiration of this change?</strong><br />Two places — the open source world and the gaming world, especially the large and still vibrant community around Skyrim SE where both seem to happen. Hence keep an eye on reddit and discord groups. There’s an awful lot of work going into bringing LLMs into Skyrim SE. It’ll be interesting to see what tools they develop.<span style="background-color: white; color: #292929; font-weight: 700; letter-spacing: -0.003em;"><br /></span></p><p class="graf graf--p" name="9a9d"><span style="background-color: white; color: #292929; font-weight: 700; letter-spacing: -0.003em;">Q. Is it possible to map this landscape in any meaningful way? It’s a complex adaptive system.<br /></span><span style="letter-spacing: -0.003em;"><span style="color: #292929;"><span style="background-color: white;">Just because something is a complex adaptive system doesn’t mean everything is unpredictable and that meaningful representations can’t be created. It used to be said that you couldn’t meaningfully graph out an economy until a group in Hungary went and did that using sales tax data (figure 4) and discovered numerous chokepoints in the economy. It’s often a question of finding the right perspective and right data.<br /></span></span></span><span style="color: #292929;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span><a class="af ms" href="https://phys.org/news/2022-05-country-entire-economy-predictand-forthe.html" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit; letter-spacing: -0.003em;" target="_blank">Figure 4 — Graph of the Hungarian economy. Source : https://phys.org/news/2022-05-country-entire-economy-predictand-forthe.html</a><br /><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgr9a8RW0WQfFb-1Cfh8372cgasNevJBiI2x3LLG5gqMn__JvSlC_gSSSoGY3qYYMsv6TYl-UvNWsZB77L_UTpQjIzKgBO_JbbPcjP0uveVtLZxdvybX4mL2CldtytTDGzkIw2lFKrEBmp5R6BehGLgd7uC_GO4aUvDlA3qS-2DldAXUma9fck/s1024/prepare-for-the-next-s.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="1024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgr9a8RW0WQfFb-1Cfh8372cgasNevJBiI2x3LLG5gqMn__JvSlC_gSSSoGY3qYYMsv6TYl-UvNWsZB77L_UTpQjIzKgBO_JbbPcjP0uveVtLZxdvybX4mL2CldtytTDGzkIw2lFKrEBmp5R6BehGLgd7uC_GO4aUvDlA3qS-2DldAXUma9fck/w400-h400/prepare-for-the-next-s.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr></tbody></table><p class="graf graf--p" name="553f"><strong class="markup--strong markup--p-strong">Q. We are moving from “describe the code” to “describe the app”?<br /></strong>That’s a nice idea but it’s slightly more than that. Describing the app still evokes concepts of commands and instructions i.e. build me this thing, I’d like buttons in cornflour blue. The future of conversational programming is more likely to start with the question of “describe your need”. In many cases, conversational programming may never need a single line of code written.</p></span></div><p></p>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-51630579511967573762023-01-30T14:55:00.021+00:002023-01-30T19:31:09.315+00:00<h2 style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;">Why the fuss about conversational programming?</span></b></h2><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><i>(a slightly more upto date version is on <a href="https://swardley.medium.com/why-the-fuss-about-conversational-programming-60c8d1908237">medium</a> - I keep these as my original first drafts).</i><br /><br />First, there isn't much fuss ... yet. But there will be.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">To understand why, I'm going to build on my previous HackerNoon post on <a href="https://hackernoon.com/why-the-fuss-about-serverless-4370b1596da0">"Why the fuss about serverless"</a>. That post discussed the historical rise of DevOps associated with changing characteristics of compute (the shift from high to low MTTR), the rise of serverless and the development of an emerging practice built upon serverless. I called that practice FinDev in 2016. In the end we finally got a moniker of FinOps (2018) and subsequently a <a href="https://www.finops.org/introduction/what-is-finops/">foundation</a>, a book (O'Reilly Cloud FinOps) and several conferences built around those concepts of visibility into financial value and gluing together component services. This is all good but it's not the end of the story.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">One of the questions that I was asked back in 2016 was "What comes after serverless"? I responded "Conversational programming". It's about time that I make clear what I mean and what its impact is going to be. At the same time, it's probably worth discussing platform engineering which is a combination of the useful with the downright harmful. However, before we can get started, you'll need some background information.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><h4 style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">BACKGROUND</span></h4><p></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">For this post, I'm going to assume that you have a passing familiarity with </span><a href="http://medium.com/wardleymaps" style="font-family: courier;">mapping</a><span style="font-family: courier;">, you have read the </span><a href="https://hackernoon.com/why-the-fuss-about-serverless-4370b1596da0" style="font-family: courier;">previous post on serverless</a><span style="font-family: courier;"> and concepts like co-evolution are not alien to you. I'm also going to use the current popular terms like composable architecture (old skool was componentisation, they are the same thing) which are all derived from the ideas of compositionality - the ability to break down into and build with components. Just in case, I'll re-emphasise that :-</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">1) <b>co-evolution</b> refers to the change of practice with the underlying evolution of the technology due to its changing characteristics. For example, as compute evolved from product to a utility (nee cloud) then the change of characteristic from high to low MTTR (mean time to recovery) enabled a new set of practices to form which later became known as DevOps.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">2) <b>Red Queen</b> refers to how we have no choice over evolution. As a technology evolves to more of a utility, we gain operational efficiency plus speed (due to the co-evolved practices) plus new sources of value as the combination of efficiency and speed allows us to create new things which we previously only dreamed of. These "new" things exist in the adjacent unexplored, the space of options that was previously too costly for us but evolution of technology has now enabled. As a competitor adapts they gain efficiency, speed and value which creates pressure on all others to adapt. This pressure mounts as more competitors adapt until all are eventually forced to change. It's why guns replaced spears or electric lamps replaced gas lamps.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">3) <b>Inertia </b>refers to our reluctance to adapt to this new world. There are 16 different forms of inertia including pre-existing capital, pre-existing business model, loss of political capital and so forth. In general terms, it's our past success with an existing model of technology that creates inertia to adapting to the new world. </div></span><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">With these basics in place, let us draw a map of the existing landscape.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><h3 style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">THE MAP</span></h3><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Let us start with a basic map of technology, see figure 1.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Figure 1 - A basic map of technology</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"></span></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj3hInJeXpFPG8tAmhSYfDYQiaKbBRho34j-Tebc1vIwUaCOFfpOgp9Gd4OEmKOF_X_01laoB5DquX8OqsKF15EF79QgPboHN0xLj8Be1d3l4uw_fkeak7AWJvw4N28lhzV1bjprKsJCOrKCHVMCZ0iQuGWwwcdxrASHQn6WT3ighaq8u0Dowo" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="756" data-original-width="1269" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj3hInJeXpFPG8tAmhSYfDYQiaKbBRho34j-Tebc1vIwUaCOFfpOgp9Gd4OEmKOF_X_01laoB5DquX8OqsKF15EF79QgPboHN0xLj8Be1d3l4uw_fkeak7AWJvw4N28lhzV1bjprKsJCOrKCHVMCZ0iQuGWwwcdxrASHQn6WT3ighaq8u0Dowo=w400-h239" width="400" /></a></span></b></div><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /><br /></span></b><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">In the map above, a user has some need which is normally met by an application running on a device. The application is coded in some form of IDE which is built upon some concept of coding practice. That coding practice requires a run-time (e.g. Lamp or .Net) which has composable elements (e.g. libraries) which in turn run in some form of container (whether a virtual container or operating system). These containers runs on some form of compute provided through a concept of architectural practice (e.g enterprise class machines).</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">A number of components are shown as squares. These represent a pipeline of choice i.e. for applications we have a choice from novel apps to common place apps. Pipelines are used in maps when we have mutliple things with a common meaning i.e. power can mean renewable or fossil fuel or nuclear. </span><span style="font-family: courier;">Each of the choices that we can make are often independently evolving things. We can also use a pipeline to represent a choice in the evolution of a thing for example when discussing TV series we can talk about the first ever example for a particular format (X Factor) or a more evolved and repeated format (X Factor USA, x Factor UK, X Factor etc).</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">To explain this more clearly, let us expand out the map to discuss the serverless space.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;">Figure 2 - The Serverless Map.</span></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrM-_mEevzyH6ofDXCLO1xoRXOn-HMq75xu6eJeCy7PqC0bZN9_RAJQNk7ps9jmpaK_tiNnMJEPUaELwTUaJLL6_TsxVUPyipR8ipA6gAdM2TXcdeGtkAPmDAA9Pfhr1mnKA3RZHqk7PGdmYyO7bm88qBnzBiTg7ptFZ7yYdnjck3R2Q8nl_s/s1264/Tech_02.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="756" data-original-width="1264" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrM-_mEevzyH6ofDXCLO1xoRXOn-HMq75xu6eJeCy7PqC0bZN9_RAJQNk7ps9jmpaK_tiNnMJEPUaELwTUaJLL6_TsxVUPyipR8ipA6gAdM2TXcdeGtkAPmDAA9Pfhr1mnKA3RZHqk7PGdmYyO7bm88qBnzBiTg7ptFZ7yYdnjck3R2Q8nl_s/w400-h239/Tech_02.png" width="400" /></a></b></div><b><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></b><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">In the map above, I've expanded out a number of the pipelines. For example, in compute we had the choice to use servers or cloud circa 2006 and onwards. For architectural practice we had developed best practice for use of servers (capacity planning, scale up, N+1, disaster recovery test) and we developed emerging architectural practices for compute as a utility (cloud). That practice evolved, was given a name DevOps and is currently good practice (there is a convergence in terms of what DevOps means). The "best" practice for compute as a product is these days called Legacy.<br /><br />Equally, from 2014, the run-time has the option of Lamp / .Net or serverless environment such as Lambda or Azure. The coding practice itself has changed (the subject of the earlier post) with greater use of financial metrics and component services with the code acting more as a glue.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Now, all of these components are evolving, so let us bring it upto date by marking on the evolution and actually date the map. Given we're already discussing discrete components in the pipelines, we can simply remove the surrounding pipelines. This give us figure 3.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><b>Figure 3 - Serverless Map, 2023.</b></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsEEspK3iS8nQ7S7vbWlzlzQYCRE2iYKg2E6yoGLBU1x6Bx1V5gA3kvAiEIy6OvamF4tPicN2CQqm9oFwBinSjEQbWcz5mk_oxlEEB4slucCdoiOWy7EFjE87KWH2Mjy2gOuNIbmdt-q9S8aJgt9JEYzoSZnp8SkUcbEuTEuEBr3PHWW29vEI/s1264/Tech_03.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="753" data-original-width="1264" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsEEspK3iS8nQ7S7vbWlzlzQYCRE2iYKg2E6yoGLBU1x6Bx1V5gA3kvAiEIy6OvamF4tPicN2CQqm9oFwBinSjEQbWcz5mk_oxlEEB4slucCdoiOWy7EFjE87KWH2Mjy2gOuNIbmdt-q9S8aJgt9JEYzoSZnp8SkUcbEuTEuEBr3PHWW29vEI/w400-h239/Tech_03.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">From the map, servers shifted to cloud and enabled a practice called DevOps which is rapidly evolving heading towards best architectural practice for cloud. The legacy practice is actually best architectural practice for compute as a product (i.e. servers) but we call it legacy because it's on the way out. Common libraries are evolving to more component services in the FinOps world of serverless whereas best coding practice for use of Lamp / .Net is built upon the concept of common libraries. It too is destined for a moniker of legacy. The Lamp / .Net world is tightly linked to underlying orchestration tools and containers whereas in the serverless world the underlying architecture is abstracted away. In other words, in the serverless world you don't care about underlying infrastructure.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Of course, there will always be exceptions such as being a major scale provider of a component i.e. AWS worries about racks and physical servers because it provides EC2. It worries about infrastructure because it provides Lambda. However, most of us do not operate at this hyperscale and resistance to using such services is not normally based upon positive ideas of a better service but fear i.e. fear of lock-in, fear of loss of control. In other words, it's normally inertia to change or in some cases a percieved regulatory barrier to adoption. I say perceived because in almost every single instance where I've been told "the regulators won't allow us" - the regulators weren't actually the problem.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">This is not to say that lock-in is not a concern but our lack of understanding of physical and digital supply chains including how evolved the components are, the excludability of components, their substitutability and rivalrousness means that we have little to no visibility of the risk in our supply chains. Even the<a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/05/12/executive-order-on-improving-the-nations-cybersecurity/"> US executive order for SBOMs</a> is only a starting point on a very long journey. The blunt truth is that Microsoft, Google and AWS will almost certainly have a far better understanding (as exhibited by their ability to provide some embedded carbon information) of their supply chains along with greater resilience than your home grown operation. In a global shortage for silicon chips, these hyperscalers are more likely to secure supplies than your "mom and pop" investment bank operation serving a few million customers or your "corner shop" University with a few tens of thousands of students. Anyone in <a href="https://uis.georgetown.edu/uis-announcement/global-chip-supply-chain-issues-delay-delivery-of-computer-purchases/">purchasing will tell you tales</a> of how difficult it has been to get hold of computers and peripherals.</span></p><h4 style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">WHAT IS CONVERSATIONAL PROGRAMMING?</span></h4><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">When you think about the act of writing an application today, it is often an act of gluing together a few discrete component services with some code in a utility run-time environment such as Lambda. Well ... at least, it should be. There are an awful lot of organisation dealing with much lower order components such as racking machines or worrying about container orchestration than there needs to be. That's normal, the Red Queen effect doesn't mean everyone changes at the same time. It's a non linear shift (often called a punctuated equilibrium) and companies will get there eventually. However, if you want to read about what good looks like then I'd suggest <a href="https://itrevolution.com/product/the-value-flywheel-effect/">"The Value Flywheel Effect"</a>.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Even in this serverless world, the act of programming still requires you to think about what component services need to be glued together. That means you have to break down the problem into components, find component services that match, determine what is missing and hence what you will need to build, then build it and glue it all together. That is still a lot of work to be done and to be blunt, it's work that can mostly be automated and achieved through some form of intelligent compiler. This leads us to conversational programming.<br /><br />Let us think about our IDE (integrated development environment). Today, they are very human centric i.e. built upon an expectation that humans will write the code. </span><span style="font-family: courier;">In a conversational programming world you tell the system what you want, or least provide it prompts for that. The IDE will be more built around the concept of Human + AI rather than just human. Let us map that out in figure 4.<br /><br /></span><b style="font-family: courier;">Figure 4 - Conversational Programming, 2022</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFyk42NXLGgvZFLJljTntwIX8hP9gM1guERafNEofI95wXYuG4VrSXGPIJB_jIG3jcAe2207JM5mwqf0p-mso4pmgYrucwzf3ClS7T8p7xZ1Oz7hPxTyy3dW_wf0I8pKc3Ml1zJfP-PBEqcwNX4FJw2VkTPHvEeXZPOxuUqYF1Gwq0R2H3Auo/s1268/Tech_04.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="753" data-original-width="1268" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFyk42NXLGgvZFLJljTntwIX8hP9gM1guERafNEofI95wXYuG4VrSXGPIJB_jIG3jcAe2207JM5mwqf0p-mso4pmgYrucwzf3ClS7T8p7xZ1Oz7hPxTyy3dW_wf0I8pKc3Ml1zJfP-PBEqcwNX4FJw2VkTPHvEeXZPOxuUqYF1Gwq0R2H3Auo/w400-h238/Tech_04.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The rapid evolution of large language models towards more of a commodity service will enable more conversational styles of programming. </span><span style="font-family: courier;">If you think this is science fiction then an </span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMrtHQ6ohcg" style="font-family: courier;">example of this</a><span style="font-family: courier;"> was provided at AWS RE:Invent in 2019 by Alex. This doesn't mean that the system will build everything for you, there will always be edges that need to be crafted but the majority of what is built today is repetition of code that has already been done. </span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">The modern description of conversational programming is prompt engineering. Examples of which can be seen using large language models such as OpenAI. It's only a matter of time before OpenAI is tightly coupled into Azure's development environment and programming will start to look more like a conversation between an engineer with an AI making recommendations for changes and addition of services. If you wish to see the future then a wondeful example of conversational programming can be found in the marvellous StarTrek Voyager and the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNCybqmKugA">"Delete the wife"</a> scene. <br /><br />Of course, much of this will start with text based system but it's a small jump to voice from there. What is relevant is the conversation itself and not the medium (text or voice). One thing you might note in the map is how I've linked FinOps to conversational programming. Serverless has brought remarkable changes such as refactoring having financial value to the focus on financial visibility within code (including carbon cost of code) and these are unlikely to be lost in a conversational programming world. Again, those decisions are ones which an AI can help with. It's not just the code itself (and reducing duplication) that will matter in these IDEs but the meta data suchy as the cost per function and capital flow within an application whether carbon or dollar or yuan.<br /><br />We're still waiting for those conversational programming environments to fully form but we're getting close. The technology is there (i.e. large language models), the concept is there (i.e. conversational programming) and the attitude is there (i.e engineers getting swamped by complexity). All the factors needed are in place, it's only a question of how quickly this evolves and which actor launches first - Microsoft or AWS? Of course, whomever launches first and drives this to more of a utility will gain the advantage of the meta data for applications built on top. This is a huge strategic advantage which in the past AWS has thoroughly enjoyed and made use of (see<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Reaching-Cloud-Velocity-Leaders-Success/dp/B086PTDP51"> Reaching Cloud Velocity</a>) and it's at the heart of the ILC model (described in that book). Which is why I can't see AWS doing an IBM and letting Microsoft walk away with this show. It'll be an interesting battle.</span></p><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">I want you take a moment to think about this. The speed of one company with engineers building systems through conversational programming (i.e. a discussion with the system) versus the speed of a company whose engineers are messing around with containers and orchestration systems (such as kubernetes clusters) versus the speed of a company whose engineers are still wiring servers in racks. I want you to think about the Red Queen effect and realise that you will have no choice over this evolution.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></div><h3 style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">SO WHEN WILL THIS HAPPEN?</span></h3><p></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">Back in 2019, I put together a rough timeline for when this would all start to kick off, see figure 5. I put a stake in the ground around 2020 to 2023 which means sometime this year. However, it depends upon actors actions which are notoriously difficult to predict and we've had a number of shocks to the economic system. That said, with systems like <a href="https://github.com/features/copilot">GitHub's CoPilot</a>, you could argue we've already started.</span></div><span style="font-family: courier;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><b><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Figure 5 - Timeline, 2019.</b></div></b><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixBhz2jyAMXjLYS4ZRN7uCy4LrHIqVwwz10cQnPVYxj1WIL1PxaFP6oFOQKTrm8g2sZEzpqLiBN6zwFYmFDSfm_h5BT-MgM79TRhP3t_cggsNXxxufDMb8uu984euT4cJ-C_wNV11AK0bPdJbTcxt8xOzy6Xj06z2psSkmnrCGWVTqkPxSqOs/s1920/E-7qEGUWEAE9pc7.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixBhz2jyAMXjLYS4ZRN7uCy4LrHIqVwwz10cQnPVYxj1WIL1PxaFP6oFOQKTrm8g2sZEzpqLiBN6zwFYmFDSfm_h5BT-MgM79TRhP3t_cggsNXxxufDMb8uu984euT4cJ-C_wNV11AK0bPdJbTcxt8xOzy6Xj06z2psSkmnrCGWVTqkPxSqOs/w400-h225/E-7qEGUWEAE9pc7.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></span><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">As with all these changes (cloud plus devops, serverless plus finops, conversational programming plus any new moniker for the practice to built on top), there will be the usual gains in efficiency, speed and new sources of value. It will be a punctuated equilibirum (non linear change) which means it will seem to be growing slowly but the doubling rate will catch out most analysts. There will be the usual inertia, the usual crowd of CxOs dismissing it as a fad followed by the usual panic and scramble for skills. There will also be the usual nonsense peddled by large management consultants. It's probably worth listing these :-</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">1) <b>You'll need less engineers</b>. Nope. See Jevon's paradox. You'll need to retrain to a new world but you'll end up doing more stuff. You'll need those engineers.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">2) <b>It'll reduce IT budgets</b>. Nope. See Jevon's paradox again. You'll end up doing more stuff, more cost efficiently.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">3) <b>You have choice</b>. Nope. See Red Queen Effect. This is only a question of "when" not "if".</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">4) <b>It's only for startups</b>. Nope. Startups have less past success and hence lower inertia barriers to change. Large enterprises will resist the change due to the pre-installed capital. Eventually, they will have no choice. See Red Queen Effect.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">5) <b>We can build our own</b>. Nope. Well, technically you can but you'll regret it. Doesn't mean that want stop hordes of self interested vendors trying to persuade you to do so for reasons of "security", "lock-in" and "customisation to your needs".</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">6) <b>I can make a more efficient application by hand crafting the code</b>. Nope. Well, technically you can but the time taken to hand craft it all will be vast (especially if you decide to go down to the level of containers or even worse hardware) compared to the speed at which competitors will move. I'd also suggest reading into Centaur Chess if you think even the most gifted engineer will outcompete an average engineer with an average AI.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">7)<b> It'll be the death of DevOps / FinOPs etc</b>. Nope. Well, technically it will be but that takes a very long time. Never underestimate how long legacy (i.e. toxic) IT sticks around. So whilst it'll take 5-8 years to see who the winners and losers in this conversational programming world are, it'll take 10-15 years to become seen as the new norm and anywhere from 30 to 45 years for the old world to truly disappear into very small niches.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: courier;"><br /></span></p><h4 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: courier;">A NOTE ON PLATFORM ENGINEERING</span></h4><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">If I look at the map above, then all those components on the right hand side can be discussed as building a platform - a cloud platform of utility infrastructure, a serverless platform, a platform of component services and eventually a conversational programming platform etc. In general, it's not a good idea to provide components as services exposed through APIs to others unless those components have become industrialised which is why conversational programming requires large language models to become more industrialised.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">There are a number of discrete skills - code respository, toolsets, monitoring - around those "platforms" but in general the main platform principles needed are build discrete components, build WITH discrete components and shift as much of the platform to utility providers. Unfortunately, the term platform engineering seems to have got wrapped up with the idea of building your own platform. This is downright harmful if there are utility providers out there. I've even listened to people talk about their data centres as a platform. I'm afraid, those companies are going to struggle in a world of conversational programming particularly as the training for some of these large language models can run into the hundreds of millions of dollars. I'm sure there will be vendors willing to sell you this but I would pause before spending and think about all those large data lakes you were sold and how much ROI you actually got or think about those private cloud efforts or how much return you're getting on a kubernetes cluster in a world of serverless? Caveat Emptor.<br /><br /></span></p><h4><span style="font-family: courier;">WHAT COMES NEXT?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: normal;">Oh, that's where the fun really starts. If you look further up the map (figure 4) around the area of application and device this is where we get into the world of Spimes and <a href="https://blog.gardeviance.org/2007/02/spime-script.html">SpimeScript</a>. Though I suspect we're going to call that CyberPhysical. Anyway, that's another post for another year, we're quite some way from that at the moment.</span></span></h4><div><span style="font-family: courier;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></span></span></div><h4 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: courier;">SUMMARY</span></h4><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: courier;">In summary, get yourself ready for a world of conversational programming. We're not quite there yet but we should be there soon. When it arrives, embrace it and thank me later.</span></p></div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-43956222003106100092022-04-22T19:08:00.011+01:002022-04-22T19:34:02.623+01:00 Look before you leap.<h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>The different types of situational awareness.</b></h3><p>I’m a bit of a stuck record when it comes to supply chains, situational awareness and mapping. In order to get myself off the subject, I thought I’d have a bit of a rant about this bugbear of a topic. I’m going to do this with the aid of multi-domain defence.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Setting the scene.</b></h3>Why do we need defence? Let us start with Government.<p></p><p>Government needs a society i.e. something to govern. This doesn’t mean society needs government, however that’s a conversation for another time. A society also needs citizens otherwise you’re governing the society of yourself.</p><p>Beyond a society to govern, it also needs legitimacy in governing. That legitimacy can take many forms but if some other Government can exert its percieved legitimacy more than yours then you won’t be governing — they will.</p><p>Legitimacy implies something to be sovereign over such as a physical territory. Sovereignty implies some sort of theatre to act within. For example, land or sea or air. To operate in that theatre assumes there is actually a landscape to operate within, that you have the capability to do so and some way of operating (an operating model). Finally, a theatre does imply that you are aware of the existence of the landscape. This will be our basic scene for discussing defence and I’ve drawn it up in a map.</p><p><b><i>Step 1 — the basic scene.</i></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirs9SRGHQZ58_mo6BhjD4EQcpM4O6XGgB1gwfgWqVdxC4qmjN_NhB9UiRr2W_7XNNicbXYvJZTaO42_ioT5UrMOFahDjpUadcNelbg7wEIZUM9__b8vqZ-zv_9EDFevyAxKs0MPNd8Fjq2vCnKQTRPpeLFxnWupW-2zmU24wwx0_twf-dMrxA/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%200.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="684" data-original-width="1264" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirs9SRGHQZ58_mo6BhjD4EQcpM4O6XGgB1gwfgWqVdxC4qmjN_NhB9UiRr2W_7XNNicbXYvJZTaO42_ioT5UrMOFahDjpUadcNelbg7wEIZUM9__b8vqZ-zv_9EDFevyAxKs0MPNd8Fjq2vCnKQTRPpeLFxnWupW-2zmU24wwx0_twf-dMrxA/w400-h216/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%200.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></h3><div><b><br /></b></div><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Belonging and success.</b></h3><p>Societies have norms of behaviour — a combination of principles of operating (or heuristics) with the beliefs (or values) of that society. But having those norms is not enough, a society must be successful in spreading or at least maintaining its norms. Citizens also require a sense of belonging which in turn requires some element of trust and an appearance of success. A key thing to note, appearance of success is not the same as actual success i.e. it’s perfectly possible to convince a population that we’ve “won this war” when the opposite is happening.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxK6E1CZgK75pY-nsHzrcDRrA7gVk0F7yQpx_NZ5WL4ntK89WMcN1oF9gwcIbSbiS4EBuuLGfpgrjv58ZbVflYg9J713vyVSkISuCX9q38ChHAO959sE_jUfgCkZ6QCKAk-GCVeQf4dYGV1CQ3QiQKPCqP_tup7BrD1JcGjN7_m8kefX-FtM0/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%202.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="741" data-original-width="1264" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxK6E1CZgK75pY-nsHzrcDRrA7gVk0F7yQpx_NZ5WL4ntK89WMcN1oF9gwcIbSbiS4EBuuLGfpgrjv58ZbVflYg9J713vyVSkISuCX9q38ChHAO959sE_jUfgCkZ6QCKAk-GCVeQf4dYGV1CQ3QiQKPCqP_tup7BrD1JcGjN7_m8kefX-FtM0/w400-h235/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%202.png" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Trust</b></h3><p>On the map we have several pipelines (those rectangular blocks). Whilst most of a map represents statements of logical AND such as this needs this AND that. A pipeline represents a non exclusive OR. For example, trust consists of many components which share a meaning of “trust”. This includes integrity (I trust you to do what you say), benevolence (I trust you to work for my benefit) and competence (I trust you have the skill). You can choose to be competent but lack benevolence or integrity, you can choose to have all these components or you can choose to be weak at all. The level of trust will depend upon how much of each you invoke.</p><p>Our understanding of what these components mean is also evolving. It should be noted that all components evolve, the arrow in the pipeline doesn’t mean one evolves to the other but that they are all evolving independently.</p><p>Naturally, the components of trust are connected to other components — competence is tied to success, norms of behaviour are tied to integrity, benevolence is a key part of belonging. Benevolence doesn’t mean it won’t cause you harm, abusive arrangements can be based upon a “greater” threat i.e. you sacrifice rights to be protected against a perceived “greater” threat.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic54Jo2Ryqt6gfVI0VKqqwZ9_gmFJPDMHqyYDLLFNSNPQKsbmrdPjcnRPHKm6ylQ3rZpvhVJbXO1y925nKPaIcSu51njcfuZNuhT6HcfdtRifT0lTTYCB567Blnf6c0wNORp5t_EOSYW53ghb22k0RWi6YIZy8NiEtn4d0xpOX5X6d0NUhHgM/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%203%5D.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="741" data-original-width="1264" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic54Jo2Ryqt6gfVI0VKqqwZ9_gmFJPDMHqyYDLLFNSNPQKsbmrdPjcnRPHKm6ylQ3rZpvhVJbXO1y925nKPaIcSu51njcfuZNuhT6HcfdtRifT0lTTYCB567Blnf6c0wNORp5t_EOSYW53ghb22k0RWi6YIZy8NiEtn4d0xpOX5X6d0NUhHgM/w400-h235/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%203%5D.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></h3><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Sovereignty</b></h3><p>Moving down the map, we can now flesh out the concepts of sovereignty. Typically we think of this as territorial sovereignty (i.e. protecting our land) but there are many elements to sovereignty — protecting our culture, our political systems, our economy and even our technology (i.e. digital). For a Government to have legitimacy it requires control over the political system rather than being appointed by someone else (i.e. a puppet government of others). If it is a puppet then the others are exerting their legitimacy to determine how the political system works.</p><p>Success is often tied to protecting “our” land along with our economic and technological progress. Integrity and benevolence is often tied to our cultural systems and the stories we tell — the myths of great deeds or tales on the balance of conflict i.e. robbing the rich to help the poor (Robin Hood) versus robbing the poor to pay the rich (Sheriff of Nottingham). The “appearance” of success and integrity is also tied to our political systems. The society might be failing but we can still build belonging if our political system has the social capital to tell a few fibs.</p><p>One thing to note is that all maps are imperfect representations of a space. What I’m showing you are my assumptions and my biases on the subject. Hence, all maps are open to challenge and improvement.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBLfiO3XhXeRkJV1zdGhKRunVFzCczUARxWsjJFe2T1HmAJIJlMEmCdXHah6uZ4TpZk72-XGL4Ja9xQfqbl1fOelnBCb7uhoydDw0o7QWGYtBv0rtxvdM795ap8gbC5Quu3kARZiXMbxOQddZR411W7p2r8gfQRI5Cf0zZ7IYItJD_Ty-RhYc/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%204%5D.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="741" data-original-width="1264" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBLfiO3XhXeRkJV1zdGhKRunVFzCczUARxWsjJFe2T1HmAJIJlMEmCdXHah6uZ4TpZk72-XGL4Ja9xQfqbl1fOelnBCb7uhoydDw0o7QWGYtBv0rtxvdM795ap8gbC5Quu3kARZiXMbxOQddZR411W7p2r8gfQRI5Cf0zZ7IYItJD_Ty-RhYc/w400-h235/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%204%5D.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></h3><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Theatre</b></h3><p>Sovereignty applies to a theatre. For example physical sovereignty applies to land, sea, air and space. Digital sovereignty applies to the area of cyber including technology and social media. Culture applies to the theatre of art. These theatres are where we compete with others. There are many forms of competition including conflict (fighting others), co-operation (helping others) and collaboration (working with others).</p><p>Let us take the theatre of art. Hollywood was historically used to spread Western culture through the medium of film. Today, the most significant theatre of art is immersive video games hence organisations like Hezbollah produce video games. These might seem unusual theatres of competition but we shouldn’t limit ourselves to land and sea. Areas such as social media can be used to enhance or undermine (through radicalisation) our political systems. The economy itself is a theatre of war from sanctions to exclusions such as the recent use of SWIFT protocol.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOLTR_fDXr71FArP4iW8eRPRMM-y01ct3Ef3bTzNmy58nB1KTpIplPlcQQ9FZ5bluf7bs_zDKgfHnjnYVJeIx8S9E6sggm2s5PnsQAf51QirsHS8uR75I-7cDyLgo_JankMpA3BpK7CdDVc1RDt5RnF3hJQWKUzsMDTJIxMZZm5gV-gIkIRY4/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%205%5D.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="684" data-original-width="1264" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOLTR_fDXr71FArP4iW8eRPRMM-y01ct3Ef3bTzNmy58nB1KTpIplPlcQQ9FZ5bluf7bs_zDKgfHnjnYVJeIx8S9E6sggm2s5PnsQAf51QirsHS8uR75I-7cDyLgo_JankMpA3BpK7CdDVc1RDt5RnF3hJQWKUzsMDTJIxMZZm5gV-gIkIRY4/w400-h216/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%205%5D.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></h3><div><b><br /></b></div><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Critical national infrastructure (CNI)</b></h3><p>Another theatre is CNI. This covers many areas from food to water to energy to telecoms. I’m going to expand this one out because it is tied to the appearance of success. It’s hard to use political capital to convince people within the society which you govern that things are going well when they are starving or lack access to fresh water or heating for their homes.</p><p>Other theatres are also tied to elements of CNI. You can’t manage the theatre of cyber if you’ve lost control of telecoms. It’s hard to have an economy if you’ve lost control of finance.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge85QfROE3VwwFC6C0Hpe-LK8X6GFWibN11OdTE8j4lc0pCDu7QwjqlgAIfs65PALGen9jBzLOhRr-TrMBS3BH0VIBEqdiBNXScbIc9h4AYnFmaCi4bHWNotRf8qi9YJXJ0FMgdmEof-XhMe1lHxgr4vUtPQwxeFvjduAfnPo-IpJo0MdU3S8/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%206%5D.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="741" data-original-width="1264" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge85QfROE3VwwFC6C0Hpe-LK8X6GFWibN11OdTE8j4lc0pCDu7QwjqlgAIfs65PALGen9jBzLOhRr-TrMBS3BH0VIBEqdiBNXScbIc9h4AYnFmaCi4bHWNotRf8qi9YJXJ0FMgdmEof-XhMe1lHxgr4vUtPQwxeFvjduAfnPo-IpJo0MdU3S8/w400-h235/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%206%5D.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></h3><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Landscapes (Territory)</b></h3><p>These theatres apply to landscapes. The one we are most familiar is concerned with physical sovereignty i.e. our land, our borders, our territory. Of course, territory itself varies a lot i.e. France is not UK which is not Germany. Understanding your landscape and the elements within it (situational awareness of the physical landscape) is critically important. If you don’t know where your resources are or where an attacker is or the type of land then you will be at a severe disadvantage. Sending tanks to defend against an invader might sound sensible but quickly degenerates into farce when you discover that the land you’ve sent the tanks to is a swamp, the invader has significantly more numbers and they’re not even at the swamp you’ve sent the tanks to.</p><p>Fortunately, we’ve learned these lessons over time and are are pretty good at physical awareness. We have built a host of systems to enable this from radar to accurate maps.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh33gh8UzJ9mnqMnPuwEAih89PqEwK9RIB-Cta1nHNRMIELH3twYWyKd31WuDmqPRqEOgQpKRV0G4Ksk_x8r91iNXJ_XnqdtrstnibtamS5G-r_qQLheqh_P9GduHSnKCUAVw4NVaeBs6b8BjajkUgBT_iHjFQRoyKUzEYGWtZKwP5UWIqgO4I/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%207%5D.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="741" data-original-width="1264" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh33gh8UzJ9mnqMnPuwEAih89PqEwK9RIB-Cta1nHNRMIELH3twYWyKd31WuDmqPRqEOgQpKRV0G4Ksk_x8r91iNXJ_XnqdtrstnibtamS5G-r_qQLheqh_P9GduHSnKCUAVw4NVaeBs6b8BjajkUgBT_iHjFQRoyKUzEYGWtZKwP5UWIqgO4I/w400-h235/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%207%5D.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></h3><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Landscapes (Supply chain)</b></h3><p>Whilst some of our theatres operate over landscapes we are familiar with, not all of them do. For example economic and cyber theatres and elements of CNI operate over supply chains. Even our capabilities are built on supply chains.</p><p>Supply chains themselves are more uniform than territory — there are only so many ways to build a bullet or to make a window. Unfortunately our awareness of those supply chains is in general … atrocious. The UK has been through a number of shocks from brexit to covid in which a better understanding of our supply chains would have helped. Today, we have conflict related to Ukraine and shocks such as climate change facing us. The problem with acting in theatres (such as the use of sanctions) is that if you don’t understand the supply chain landscape then … well, it’s a bit like dropping a bomb on a physical landscape without looking at where you are dropping the bomb. Targetted approaches do require you to look at the space.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXG_zZXi-b1gvMK0sJpWfP6Z9zNVfbL_Slu74NOigD84N9ow00kgVdICtny9MUqJSZ8MVWdvfgtjugEzLFdY2V25doHRctr_Y4YJx_2e2PM19YWZim8MJots8d3qgQ925BYx20NPtBoWiDuc3npQ3R4csSA5K5kDUxIkPvy_5WQVVmytFNxcs/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%208%5D.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="741" data-original-width="1264" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXG_zZXi-b1gvMK0sJpWfP6Z9zNVfbL_Slu74NOigD84N9ow00kgVdICtny9MUqJSZ8MVWdvfgtjugEzLFdY2V25doHRctr_Y4YJx_2e2PM19YWZim8MJots8d3qgQ925BYx20NPtBoWiDuc3npQ3R4csSA5K5kDUxIkPvy_5WQVVmytFNxcs/w400-h235/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%208%5D.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></h3><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>A note to the future</b></h3><p>Across these theatres, our ability to defend ourselves and others (whether from shocks or conflict) and our ability to effectively co-operate and collaborate with others depends upon our awareness of these landscapes. Supply chain attacks across software, across physical goods, across CNI, across our political systems (in a future of AI generated video content when you can’t tell whether the person speaking to you is real or not), across our cultural systems (the use of radicalisation, the alteration of history) will become more common over time. Kinetic warfare (throwing deadly stuff at others) is expensive and opponents will look for asymmetric advantages.</p><p>For the last decade, I have repeatedly watched the executive functions of government and corporations ignore these issues and be outplayed by others. Let me be clear, our weakness is in our lack of situational awareness over our supply chains from digital to physical. These spaces are dominated by stories and graphs with rarely a map to be seen</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA4u2w5dvmhZWvXNJkg8NCRl9cYky7FMzm3s-Yu08hyAlQXEGDB0sVeDC1sm0kXOlcjh5Ib4u0Sk5fV9_slRTaBqk7EEwK7OtxUrboaViN0dQhtiZxAgh_L75510xpDjbvwo7FN89sIMy6_hI9rjwwZr6XnTLW9FZhlroyKjpBCxHbEZE_ty4/s1264/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%208%5D.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="741" data-original-width="1264" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA4u2w5dvmhZWvXNJkg8NCRl9cYky7FMzm3s-Yu08hyAlQXEGDB0sVeDC1sm0kXOlcjh5Ib4u0Sk5fV9_slRTaBqk7EEwK7OtxUrboaViN0dQhtiZxAgh_L75510xpDjbvwo7FN89sIMy6_hI9rjwwZr6XnTLW9FZhlroyKjpBCxHbEZE_ty4/w400-h235/defence%20-%20multi%20domain%20%5BIteration%208%5D.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>I’m hoping that in the future we embrace a concept of defence far beyond land, sea, air, space and cyber which is built upon the ideas of situational awareness of not just territory but the landscape of supply chains.</p><p>Feel free to take the map and modify it yourself. I’d like to see someone improve the map. As I said, it comes complete with my own biases, inertia and assumptions and should be challenged — <a href="https://github.com/swardley/Research2022/tree/main/defence/additions">https://github.com/swardley/Research2022/tree/main/defence/additions</a></p><p><b><i>Rant over.</i></b></p>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-52101911520430077342021-11-16T15:52:00.002+00:002021-11-16T15:52:29.420+00:00Mountains matter in digital sovereingty<p>I'm going to explain a few things that don't matter in order to explain one thing that does. So let us start.</p><p>First, I <a href="http://medium.com/wardleymaps">invented a method of mapping competitive landscapes</a>. This not only includes physical activities but practices, data, knowledge and even ethical values. I used such a map to map culture.</p><p><u><i>A map of culture</i></u></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-dLQ2V0N3b8-NnKMe2TAZYoyhlT4QbWKxKrKVLrKnBtu7BVa_Y1-ZFuHL2K-io948zmPu9tQZaBXfNOFlt-cartHs_G-1pTWlZ1XALF2k6e-BLskLFFUWvHWuCJItN3huV4F1dw/s1828/imag01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1050" data-original-width="1828" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-dLQ2V0N3b8-NnKMe2TAZYoyhlT4QbWKxKrKVLrKnBtu7BVa_Y1-ZFuHL2K-io948zmPu9tQZaBXfNOFlt-cartHs_G-1pTWlZ1XALF2k6e-BLskLFFUWvHWuCJItN3huV4F1dw/w400-h230/imag01.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The map of culture is not important except I'll note that collectives (groupings of people) are differentiated by our values (i.e. beliefs) and the behaviours we exhibit. Those collectives are in competition with each other and that competition (the act of "seeking together" whether seeking some knowledge or some resource) can take many forms including co-operation ("working together"), collaboration ("labouring together") or even conflict ("fighting together").</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">When we talk about <i>physical </i>sovereignty (I italicise as we rarely mention the physical word) then we tend to use a map of the territory and mark out where our collective (and our values and our behaviours) exist surrounded by a border which demarcates the "outside".</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><u><i>Physical sovereignty</i></u></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigQAPwHFmqkn_VPxBpQldNAHJDCHsr3Qb9mHuHu39ZQflKRZvzt95KXPT_EYzZZglplI3rX875c72UiIb2luChqGxMZl3WJqHOFUIhV-7aD3BlVu1-cqtLoE-AcMGGc9Jn7jqUAg/s1892/imag02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1064" data-original-width="1892" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigQAPwHFmqkn_VPxBpQldNAHJDCHsr3Qb9mHuHu39ZQflKRZvzt95KXPT_EYzZZglplI3rX875c72UiIb2luChqGxMZl3WJqHOFUIhV-7aD3BlVu1-cqtLoE-AcMGGc9Jn7jqUAg/w400-h225/imag02.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We can create a map of competitive spaces (see the above mention that I invented a way of doing this) then we can apply patterns (discovered through mapping) to anticipate potential future states. For example, this was a map created in the DVLA around 2014 of the future automotive industry. A number of its anticipations have already started to happen but that's not interesting for this discussion nor is the map itself.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i><u>Future of the automotive industry</u></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaoVUe2UxkJP1l1zjiemVZloAQhAdCLmauC7Q-oWlF8AgHYaRWBA45iQRu-4rH5-Jv1tKTwFr5_aF9ACAEwq8B1BFIA4DLrfne5b2zni8tk3MKOEEYwyqvPby74JcFVXmAIINDtg/s1815/imag03.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1052" data-original-width="1815" height="231" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaoVUe2UxkJP1l1zjiemVZloAQhAdCLmauC7Q-oWlF8AgHYaRWBA45iQRu-4rH5-Jv1tKTwFr5_aF9ACAEwq8B1BFIA4DLrfne5b2zni8tk3MKOEEYwyqvPby74JcFVXmAIINDtg/w400-h231/imag03.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">What is mildly interesting is that we can bring elements of the culture map onto our competitive spaces. For example, we can show how a collective can embed their values in simulation systems for intelligent agents (AI). When we export products based upon this, we're also exporting our values to other collectives but then we've been doing this with film, music, games and art in general for a long time. It's a form of non kinetic warfare.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i><u>Embedding values within commercial systems.</u></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLkG2BPCuBDNYiMpJLIED2RASm3UVLIaziccaF2WHGHM5jWkjHfiCQfURH9UxiHnBpsl37sE8bC3QkS8HDQKU49Pacp3uT72TndKhDTXIWeEuyZOGv7uz6VSFoCeYL_LqYjjcbeA/s1825/imag04.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1051" data-original-width="1825" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLkG2BPCuBDNYiMpJLIED2RASm3UVLIaziccaF2WHGHM5jWkjHfiCQfURH9UxiHnBpsl37sE8bC3QkS8HDQKU49Pacp3uT72TndKhDTXIWeEuyZOGv7uz6VSFoCeYL_LqYjjcbeA/w400-h230/imag04.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">As I said, most of this stuff in unimportant. What does matter and what I want you to think about is when we discuss digital sovereignty then we should be talking about where our borders are on those maps i.e. what are the bits we wish to protect for our collective, our behaviours and our values?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><u><i>Digital sovereignty</i></u></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7nTa7Vqsj2PYoxADpU2Q9y9DNG03QF1DTuqEneQpya5ScNPlCYS6RxNfCBbOABTElvCwz5vZO-HOjZdoY3E0dn4XZWGu0lNifHbe2Ih_i46uDMpIAW4W2UTnk-Uk81NpTPlQOSg/s1808/imag05.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1070" data-original-width="1808" height="236" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7nTa7Vqsj2PYoxADpU2Q9y9DNG03QF1DTuqEneQpya5ScNPlCYS6RxNfCBbOABTElvCwz5vZO-HOjZdoY3E0dn4XZWGu0lNifHbe2Ih_i46uDMpIAW4W2UTnk-Uk81NpTPlQOSg/w400-h236/imag05.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>So, why does this matter?</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Imagine listening to a conversation on physical sovereignty where no-one has any maps and therefore no-one can discuss borders but everyone wants to talk about the importance of mountains or hills or lakes or forests or roads. You would probably think it's gibberish or at the least utterly hopless. Those are simply components that exist in a landscape and are mostly irrelevant on their own to the discussion at hand.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Well, this is exactly the conversation that is happening today in digital sovereignty. Few (in western Governments it seems) have maps of their competitive landscapes and as a consequence we not only poorly understand our supply chains but we have no idea where our borders should be in the competitive space. So, instead of trying to map the environment, we've replaced it with an entire conversation on the importance of mountains (clouds) or hills (cybersecurity) or lakes (data) or forests (AI) or roads (networks). It is utterly hopeless bordering on gibberish.</div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-80850207740119319072021-09-08T17:11:00.003+01:002021-09-08T20:14:55.517+01:00 Those virtual battlegrounds ...<p>In this post I'd like to discuss why I believe video games will become a new battleground for the soul of a country. Before I start, I will need to cover some basics. However, I'm also going to have to make a few assumptions including :-</p><p>a) that you<a href="https://medium.com/wardleymaps"> know how to map</a></p><p>b) that you've read my posts on <a href="https://swardley.medium.com/me-versus-we-975f518b8219">mapping culture </a></p><p>c) you're familiar with my discussion on the<a href="https://swardley.medium.com/digital-sovereignty-17853157e40a"> issue of digital sovereignty</a>. </p><p>If not, well you might struggle with this but let us try it anyway. I'm going to start with the latest version of the culture map and dig a little bit more into several parts. I'm going to do this through a lens of power.</p><p><b>The basics</b></p><p><i>figure 1 - the culture map.</i></p><p><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_sUgssAXXXN51qF6rXcXYNuGm_O7wO_pSZtFBtgA7EngZOZRtKN5DBhI3Bp7yDUDdNM88IYVLjcYAjhWUdVPi7NUV_BMoiJ1mvNgNrHHukDMzny45yGvIW5G19uUIfDxZQ2JpVg/" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1048" data-original-width="1830" height="229" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_sUgssAXXXN51qF6rXcXYNuGm_O7wO_pSZtFBtgA7EngZOZRtKN5DBhI3Bp7yDUDdNM88IYVLjcYAjhWUdVPi7NUV_BMoiJ1mvNgNrHHukDMzny45yGvIW5G19uUIfDxZQ2JpVg/w400-h229/figure01.jpg" width="400" /></a></b></div><b><br /><br /></b><p></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>The map is an imperfect representation of the concept of culture itself including the components that make it. At the top of the map are the two anchors of "Me" and "We". How much do we focus on ourselves and how much do we focus on others and the wider society. Each of us have a bit of both. In some collectives (i.e. some nations) there is a stronger "We" focus, in others it's more about the individual. You can see some of this in the nation state responses to COVID.</p><p>When we focus on the "We", we're focused on our collectives ability to control our environment (see figure 2 below). It's all about <b>power with others</b> i.e. we can defend or build a new land, we can create freedoms for everyone. Often this is represented through concepts like co-operation, labour unions and in our social contract to each other. As MLK pointed out "the freedom of collective bargaining” has been critical to many of our most cherished rights.</p><p><i>figure 2 - the culture map and collective power.</i></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCgfDFNjoqn8Jw0Ib6YkBDyUx7Mq95HfLKjZFLp5lFEIsPzDYHw-2xNlM4V3WyuBygVtYnErz3jjhcGMgzAWMG60nk1f7fkAMUWOJbbhM_gVWbKfHqiGOnrdgvDliuBB6trttEAw/" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1055" data-original-width="1832" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCgfDFNjoqn8Jw0Ib6YkBDyUx7Mq95HfLKjZFLp5lFEIsPzDYHw-2xNlM4V3WyuBygVtYnErz3jjhcGMgzAWMG60nk1f7fkAMUWOJbbhM_gVWbKfHqiGOnrdgvDliuBB6trttEAw/w400-h230/figure+02.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>When we focus on the "Me", we're focused on our individuality and our agency i.e. our ability to make choices, to change things and to exploit the environment to suit ourselves. Not everyone has the same agency. In the West, the wealthy have more agency than the poor. As the Adventures of Stevie V would say "money talks". That agency requires us to have some power over the collectives that we belong to and hence <b>power over </b>others. Often this is represented through concepts like hierachy, ownership and exclusion. I've show this in figure 3.</p><p><b><i>figure 3 - the culture map and agency</i></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1iCU-WhFQ_aymi88oFmG31L3ItjCc_u7W93qybCP3SWKQqPpA909PHkAg2CUX5x5T0a4Y2AvnlW6SsBOlg15OhS3PSuH0V3t_eAfmvHz8wDunl_BqAGS-G1ynwvQJCnShnq6Ufw/" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1058" data-original-width="1832" height="231" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1iCU-WhFQ_aymi88oFmG31L3ItjCc_u7W93qybCP3SWKQqPpA909PHkAg2CUX5x5T0a4Y2AvnlW6SsBOlg15OhS3PSuH0V3t_eAfmvHz8wDunl_BqAGS-G1ynwvQJCnShnq6Ufw/w400-h231/figure03.jpg" width="400" /></a></i></b></div><b><i><br /></i></b><p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>But there is another form of power worth noting. That is the power that I have but which I gift to others. The behaviour of gifting often appears in collectives that have strong beliefs (i.e. values) on sharing. For example, many sections of the open source movement are based upon these beliefs. Not all mind you, some collectives (and companies are collectives, same as nations, families, churches and any group of people) view open source as more of a marketing tool or as a means to accelerate the diffusion of their products or as a form of gameplay to undermine competitors. What they tend to believe in is diffusion of their product which is not necessarily the same as sharing. Hence you can often see a different set of behaviours with such open source companies changing licensing rules because others in their communities are being more successful. Yes, it's "open" but they want to retain power over others rather than it's open and we've gifted <b>power to</b> others. I've represented this in figure 4 and the link from power through behaviours (i.e. sharing of power) to values (i.e. we believe in sharing).</p><p><i>figure 4 - the culture map and gifting power to others.</i></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigMAsneThNGi3gNmJYRHXtjmZSHIBzBwANb-m-OrSpXGYateE3hir_hB1rFoWQ3x_RD83X70SxwdM4BtAdjVgORuGMwp6ulOko82f0Jh5BFa5fqcaerTSMXj_rgXGhLf7l4Wb3NA/" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1059" data-original-width="1848" height="229" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigMAsneThNGi3gNmJYRHXtjmZSHIBzBwANb-m-OrSpXGYateE3hir_hB1rFoWQ3x_RD83X70SxwdM4BtAdjVgORuGMwp6ulOko82f0Jh5BFa5fqcaerTSMXj_rgXGhLf7l4Wb3NA/w400-h229/figure04.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>In the above there are three basic types of power - with, over and to. Now, why the connection to the Adventures of Stevie V? </p><p>Well, there are many ways to adjust the beliefs (i.e. values) of a collective. You could nudge behaviour (encouraging more of this, less of that) or create new threats (i.e. new collectives we're competing against). As an aside, it's worth noting that when we are in competition, there are many forms of gameplay that can be deployed e.g. direct conflict, co-operation, alliance and collaboration. Your choice of gameplay maybe limited by your values i.e. direct conflict does not suit a collective that is focused on the "We" and sharing. However, we can use that threat of conflict to change our own values and hence enable other forms of gameplay. You can also influence values by embedding them in technology but we covered that in the <a href="https://swardley.medium.com/digital-sovereignty-17853157e40a">"Digital Sovereignty" discussion</a>. Another way to change values is to alter memories i.e. rituals, symbols and heroes. The most effective way to do this is with Art. <br /><br />Art is a powerful means of changing values and hence behaviour in others. Hollywood and Walt Disney was used to promote Western values, Bob Dylan became the bard that crystallised the values of the 1960s, even a song like "Money talks" can have some influence.</p><p><b>So what about video games?</b><br /><br />Video games are art. </p><p>Let us first skip past the tendency of the industry to try and turn children into addicts with cheap psychological tricks in return for money. Yes, it's abhorrent. Ignoring that, the games themselves have values embedded within them whether it's belief in property (the hoarding of gold coins) or fairness or sharing or whatever the creator wishes. The very act of creating a video game will embed our values within it whether the action to add them was conscious or not. Video games are now so widespread and immersive that they must be considered a powerful channel for spreading values and they rival radio, television and film. These are all enablement systems for values, allowing our values to diffuse to other collectives. Unfortunately as with digital sovereignty, as with Brexit, as with COVID and as with most aspects of life then we don't map or even understand the basic components of the supply chain. That doesn't mean others can't or won't exploit this space.</p><p>If you think China is simply<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/china/china-rolls-out-new-rules-minors-online-gaming-xinhua-2021-08-30/"> reducing video game usage in children for reasons of addiction</a>, I would suggest you consider that it is also limiting exposure to unfavourable beliefs. In the battle between nations, kinetic warfare occurs when all other means have failed i.e. direct conflict is the lowest form of warfare. Whilst alliances, collaboration and co-operation are far better, the most powerful forms are when you simply persuade others to just become you by altering their behaviours, values, memories, rituals ... you get the picture ... or <a href="https://etheses.bham.ac.uk/id/eprint/3376/1/Langley12PhD.pdf">was that the Hollywood blockbuster</a>?</p><p>Others are starting to explore these areas i.e. <a href="https://sugargamers.com/project-violacea/">sugar games and project violacea</a>, These forms of play will no doubt intensify with the development of progammable video (with systems like Synthesia) as the virtual and real worlds blur. You'll not only have to face the prospect of artifical collectives radicalising people in social media (something which has to some extent become industrialised) but also the programming of values into children through the games they play. </p><p>Well, it's happening already even if it is accidental. Fortunately, people are starting to talk more about this subject i.e. Tyler Cowen on <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-09-04/how-gaming-will-change-humanity-as-we-know-it ">How Gaming Will Change Humanity as We Know It</a>.<br /><br />The new battleground will be video games and I don't just mean running around fragging some newbie.</p>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-67654730549073531702020-10-22T15:11:00.009+01:002021-05-15T02:10:55.108+01:00Digital Sovereignty.<p style="text-align: justify;">It has been a long time since I've posted and there is so much to discuss. The continued industrialisation of the technology stack, the automation of radicalisaton online, the impacts of physical isolation in accelerating adoption, the ethics of choice against the ethics of care or the entire question of how to balance "Me" vs "We" in a modern society? There is so much to choose from that it's difficult to know where to start. <span style="text-align: left;">But start I will and I suppose a bugbear is as good a place as any. My bugbear for today is digital sovereignty.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;">I'll need to explain what digital sovereignty is and that task is about as easy as explaining what culture is, something that anthropoligist have failed to do in over one hundred years of concerted effort. To make matters worse, I'm going to have to use culture to explain digital sovereignty. I'm already starting to regret my decision to leave my self imposed exile on twitter to return to a bit of blogging.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Anyway, enough dallying. Let us begin with the culture map (see figure 1). Now, you might not have seen this before but that's ok. The map itself is simply a representation of what culture is and the details are not important. What matters is to realise that culture consists of many components including values, behaviours, memory and other concepts linked to our collective. We belong to many collectives from nation state to church to family.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><u>Figure 1 - The Culture Map</u></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjm5SjDA6vg6IxBlOuVX_wYOGOPHhl3xyJEFt9_dlzeLa9_ye4G0hJXs4qvKtRAZKWNRtHiA-0CoilUKPjjIAzcG2P1QH4HKYd2adLihSzoP50VcYZwtQuGoHkHaiz_9GvhICHrw/s1920/ITARC4.001.jpeg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjm5SjDA6vg6IxBlOuVX_wYOGOPHhl3xyJEFt9_dlzeLa9_ye4G0hJXs4qvKtRAZKWNRtHiA-0CoilUKPjjIAzcG2P1QH4HKYd2adLihSzoP50VcYZwtQuGoHkHaiz_9GvhICHrw/w400-h225/ITARC4.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Within the map, there can be found numerous feedback loops. These loops can be both stabilising and destabilising (see figure 2) for the collective. For example, it's the visible success of our collective in spreading its values through our behaviour that makes us feel safe with a strong sense of belonging to our collective. For example, our economic success in the West and our values of democracy are intertwinned with our fervent belonging to our collective (notions of the West is Best etc) and the sense of safety that we gain for being "right" or at least more powerful than those other collectives which we might fear. Of course, if our economic success stumbles or other collectives become seen as more successful than us (in whatever pursuit) then our sense of safety and belonging might decline. We might put up barriers to those dangerous "others".</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><u>Figure 2 - Feedback loops</u></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiacStv8zaW9EVrRYcSM10mA0ji6jQE951MGGnRTfEzDhuz1QSLKQDT_D2Rcy_981ke4EQwIJqRUIjdyv0ZUIO093z0icoaGs21MF6P_14CKT6rVrfHhtmTtrSDwD0CSwe0tqTL-A/s1920/ITARC4.002.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiacStv8zaW9EVrRYcSM10mA0ji6jQE951MGGnRTfEzDhuz1QSLKQDT_D2Rcy_981ke4EQwIJqRUIjdyv0ZUIO093z0icoaGs21MF6P_14CKT6rVrfHhtmTtrSDwD0CSwe0tqTL-A/w400-h225/ITARC4.002.jpeg" width="400" /></a></b></div><b><br /><u><br /></u></b><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><u><br /></u></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><u><br /></u></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><u><br /></u></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><u><br /></u></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><u><br /></u></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><u><br /></u></b></p><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>Again the mechanics of this are not important, well not for now. What matters is that the major feedback loops are connected to landscape (see figure 3). <br /><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Figure 3 - Landscape</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGtg42DYS7cCeTqJODyiP7bmNQT_mLbLWSwvshz1f7wCGd6EP8ez4gPHJ6pAzmnvhNdIXuQgVbrc6IEUniM-C64NoQwbZ-xxMdZ_MBNguX9M_CeibirxcIeOZiRtYPibshkEVppg/s1920/ITARC4.003.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGtg42DYS7cCeTqJODyiP7bmNQT_mLbLWSwvshz1f7wCGd6EP8ez4gPHJ6pAzmnvhNdIXuQgVbrc6IEUniM-C64NoQwbZ-xxMdZ_MBNguX9M_CeibirxcIeOZiRtYPibshkEVppg/w400-h225/ITARC4.003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"> </p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">So, what do I mean by this? Well, we live in a context i.e. a physical landsdape that we live within. We use maps to describe this context, "our land", "our borders" and the bit that "our collective" occupies (my nation, my home, my church etc) and where we impose our values, behaviours and even have collective memory. It could be UK, it could be France (see figure 4), it doesn't matter. The collective memories include heroes and rituals, for example <i>"Remember, Remember the 5th of November"</i> really only has meaning within the context of Great Britain. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Anyway, in the land that my collective rules then we have physical sovereignty. </p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Figure 4 - Map</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWfU8OiiwX0srGwEp3CL028zQWfWZiVvMArdPTb757oV2LZngFQPY9wdHBUKZ67VAYkV85dXxgLMlxofiKRhJMTJ3Pv50W5Hqm5SvmXHtZFBWXcL2fV0i-lVA2WlSvKrEwfKHj0g/s1920/ITARC4.004.jpeg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWfU8OiiwX0srGwEp3CL028zQWfWZiVvMArdPTb757oV2LZngFQPY9wdHBUKZ67VAYkV85dXxgLMlxofiKRhJMTJ3Pv50W5Hqm5SvmXHtZFBWXcL2fV0i-lVA2WlSvKrEwfKHj0g/w400-h225/ITARC4.004.jpeg" width="400" /></a></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Now, we don't just live and compete in a physical landscape. There are other landscapes that we and our collectives are involved in. For the example, the competitive landscape of business. This can also be mapped. However, we need to be careful here. Most of the things that we call maps in business have one thing in common - they're not maps, they're graphs. To understand the distincton (see figure 5), in a map space has meaning i.e. if you move things it changes your representation of the space. In other words, take an altlas, shift Australia next to the UK and you've got a "different" atlas. The same is not true for most business "maps" - mind maps, business process maps, system maps - because they're "graphs".</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Figure 5 - Graph vs Map</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNnO8v5kl1POJwV9S7sEG3CsPtyGjX-vHi7wQhGSR9H5QaxlvaDrQUsrT0GtmS2V_DvGoh3nvt7HSqZS1PTjBmgBxWlAwjmUEB140V5jEDooSvUgLufoUkhlnXYATtj8XySbc4Eg/s1893/Maps.png" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1027" data-original-width="1893" height="217" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNnO8v5kl1POJwV9S7sEG3CsPtyGjX-vHi7wQhGSR9H5QaxlvaDrQUsrT0GtmS2V_DvGoh3nvt7HSqZS1PTjBmgBxWlAwjmUEB140V5jEDooSvUgLufoUkhlnXYATtj8XySbc4Eg/w400-h217/Maps.png" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p style="text-align: justify;">In order to create a map, you need three basic characteristics - an anchor (i.e. north), position of pieces relative to that anchor (this is north or east of that) and consistency of movement (i.e. south means south). For reference I have provided a map of an industry that has those characteristics in figure 6. The map was produced over five years ago and was a projection of the future of the automotive industry from its current state at that time to 2025. Maps are often used for anticipation of change and other areas that are beyond the scope of this discussion.<br /><br /><b>Figure 6 - A Map of Business</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRD5ES8AHOH1LTUaoATFyatbGtrEMP7oHQI-_IPA_CjRu2nDFDeAk4A8zuR2LyW3MtvyyjRzltw3_8CVChmLn24bDB5hIgwSWPKxAoP402fIAik12uSfKt9zA_LQfz9tyR1StN3Q/s1920/ITARC4.005.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRD5ES8AHOH1LTUaoATFyatbGtrEMP7oHQI-_IPA_CjRu2nDFDeAk4A8zuR2LyW3MtvyyjRzltw3_8CVChmLn24bDB5hIgwSWPKxAoP402fIAik12uSfKt9zA_LQfz9tyR1StN3Q/w400-h225/ITARC4.005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Well, the map has many components most of which are becoming commodity-like according to this projection. Firstly you need to know that all maps are projections. They are imperfect representations of a space (they have to be in order to be useful) and being models they're all wrong. But despite being imperfect and wrong, they happen to be useful. Secondly, maps are excellent forms of communication, challenge and learning. According to the map which was produced in UK Government around 2014 then much of the industry would start to head towards utility like models with self driving cars and little differentiation. Hence there would be pressure in the market to find new models to recreate difference and status. The possible options included digital subscription models linked to route management (see figure 7) and sure enough, four years later, BMW was talking in such terms. There are a lot of negative consequences of this path including embedding social inequality into transportation system but that's another discussion.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Figure 7 - Anticipating with Maps.</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR6Hq6Lmvz9FLlOpEyBzWHDhGPO6tYWlDBz8ZYshqHSSNCnmto9eneiHSscEqdPJuZvNseYA_nSkvwEZ55t3G0BlZJVso0IPJEeN2ehdkq2JNNe8xmMfEmFZCR9LnPLMUkSQF0gQ/s1920/ITARC4.006.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR6Hq6Lmvz9FLlOpEyBzWHDhGPO6tYWlDBz8ZYshqHSSNCnmto9eneiHSscEqdPJuZvNseYA_nSkvwEZ55t3G0BlZJVso0IPJEeN2ehdkq2JNNe8xmMfEmFZCR9LnPLMUkSQF0gQ/w400-h225/ITARC4.006.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p> </p><p><br /></p><p>If you look closely at the map, the anchor which it is based around is the user. However, users are members of collectives (nation, family and otherwise). Those collectives have value and we embed those values in our technology systems and choices. In this case, through training data used in AI and simulation models (see figure 8)</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Figure 8 - Collectives, Automotives and Simulation</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA7ahAjn-47o7b_3swfs2rQaWN1n13ThvdRESpefIfPVhTlwWsCX_sgIfFQAc8L_uBo5JVUT57Vb54XGNYRi20OJmMF5F-AVGRF1r-KAK7rLucV88KfkjOmnUnYc5wdwroSvsx7Q/s1920/ITARC4.007.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA7ahAjn-47o7b_3swfs2rQaWN1n13ThvdRESpefIfPVhTlwWsCX_sgIfFQAc8L_uBo5JVUT57Vb54XGNYRi20OJmMF5F-AVGRF1r-KAK7rLucV88KfkjOmnUnYc5wdwroSvsx7Q/w400-h225/ITARC4.007.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"> </p><p style="text-align: justify;"> </p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">You can see this yourself by asking the Trolley Question. If the self driving car has to kill someone would it be the impoverished family of four or the wealthy industrialist? The answer will depend upon what you value in your collective and those answers will vary between collectives. Regardless of your answer, self driving cars will have values embedded in them through training data and those values may well not be our own if we don't produce the vehicles. This is already becoming clear through the <a href="https://www.baai.ac.cn/news/beijing-ai-principles-en.html">Beijing AI Principles</a>. There are many principles within that declaration that other collectives might not agree with, for example "be designed to benefit as many people as possible" might not chime well with those looking to sell exclusive products to a select few.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Digital sovereignty is all about us (as a collective) deciding which parts of this competitive space that we want to own, compete, defend, dominate and represent our values and our behaviours in. It's all about where are our borders in this space. It's no different to physical sovereignty (see figure 9)</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b>Figure 9 - Digital Sovereignty</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdZBGMHtduWPTuDkOuhvpuy5SnCWLT2hFHUlRfNfaK7YniJwW03REdNqZgC59EYjbqEi9WhJ5Bor7ZjR4Gv3qyiKJwIwLWpGKUBP7pAz-Pi-5iRe75eA2f3DYsi21uLVrQmKWYEQ/s1920/ITARC4.008.jpeg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdZBGMHtduWPTuDkOuhvpuy5SnCWLT2hFHUlRfNfaK7YniJwW03REdNqZgC59EYjbqEi9WhJ5Bor7ZjR4Gv3qyiKJwIwLWpGKUBP7pAz-Pi-5iRe75eA2f3DYsi21uLVrQmKWYEQ/w400-h225/ITARC4.008.jpeg" width="400" /></a></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Unfortunately, the field (in the West) seems to be dominated by management consultants and other gurus telling stories and trying to define what "digital sovereignty" is as though the general who wins the war is the one who comes up with the best name for it. Our repsonses all seem to include a slide into protectionism with claims that we need to build our own cloud industries. We seem to have decided to forget that we don't produce all our own food and cross border trade is an important part of life. Lastly we do like a good moonshot and yes, an artillery barrage can do wonders but it's a really good idea to look at the landscape before you press fire.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">China's play on the other hand remains sublime as they go from strength to strength building on the work of Deng Xiaoping in the 1970s. The remarkable feat of constantly climbing up the more industrialised components of the value chain (something that Amazon has also done) from luggage to high end technology (or books to everything) has been spectacular to watch in both in its skill and co-ordination of directed investment (see figure 10). Obviously as China's industries have succeeded and brought their values into areas once dominated by the West it has created tensions particularly as our own collective slowly start to question our success. It's hard to maintain our fervent value that "our form of democracy is the answer" when you're losing ground to others even if we can't see the ground that we're losing. It's a bit like that moment in 2014 when IBM and others had finally started to realise what dreadful mistakes they had made in 2007 by letting Amazon run freely.<br /><br /><b>Figure 10 - China</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3UCxFQKW2FDQjDqk9E5WfvzdAeWp7G-bCfiJtY6PLE9KPjo7uT0smnBoOFscoOAM6gPStLbzEgFs12RmVDKTTmC04h2r9LTbVZnIfY7wzIZu0Ob3qoFwAUvZj3nwB16q2oWALZw/s1920/ITARC4.009.jpeg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3UCxFQKW2FDQjDqk9E5WfvzdAeWp7G-bCfiJtY6PLE9KPjo7uT0smnBoOFscoOAM6gPStLbzEgFs12RmVDKTTmC04h2r9LTbVZnIfY7wzIZu0Ob3qoFwAUvZj3nwB16q2oWALZw/w400-h225/ITARC4.009.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><b><br /></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>Anyway, that's what Digital Sovereignty is all about and yes, you need a map if you want any chance of playing in this game. <div><br /></div><div>So why a bugbear? These games take time, China has been operating its play for 40+ years but we are rushing to be seen to do stuff, powered by storytelling, cheered along by management consultants and without a map in sight. </div><div><br /></div><div>We're not in a good place and we're doing little to help ourselves.</div>swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-28645863901039115442019-10-02T13:27:00.001+01:002019-10-02T13:27:21.976+01:00Embedded in memory<div style="text-align: justify;">
From the earlier sections, I hope we have a basic grasp of concepts like values, principles, enablement systems and the general map of culture. Of course, it's quite a lot of ground to cover, so how much you understand probably depends upon how much you remember and when it comes to culture, nothing matters more than memory.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Within any collective, the values we espouse and the principles we hold are embodied in the written history and the living memory of its members (see point 1, figure 1)</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 1 - Memory</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_1g6SxLG4nx_bUr6P9lJnpSgxFxh3jeqK0ie4W5ONs5Yj-PA7zlfJ4evGytBFyH9kyXw9dsuoGEIWOHiKHC-B-YzwLKyBWWtHP7L7sg6sH79LRPkfvptoUsC1TR2MYx6sp_emqg/s1600/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_1g6SxLG4nx_bUr6P9lJnpSgxFxh3jeqK0ie4W5ONs5Yj-PA7zlfJ4evGytBFyH9kyXw9dsuoGEIWOHiKHC-B-YzwLKyBWWtHP7L7sg6sH79LRPkfvptoUsC1TR2MYx6sp_emqg/s400/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
This is why, if you wish to change the culture of any organisation then you need to change the experience of its member and that experience means dealing with past memory. It's not enough to simply say words but instead action and the memory of action is required. Memory unfortunately is very fickle thing, it's a faulty but incredibly useful system. In the seven sins of memory Daniel Schacter highlighted known areas of failure which include :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<ul>
<li>transience - forgetting with the passage of time.</li>
<li>absent-mindedness - where event details are overlooked which can lead to change-blindness (failing to see differences unfolding over time) and shallow encoding (encoding only at a superficial level).</li>
<li>blocking - where information is encoded in memory but we can't recall (i.e. someone's name)</li>
<li>misattribution - where we do remember but what we remember is wrong or even not a memory of our own but manufactured.</li>
<li>suggestibility - the tendency to incorporate misleading information from external sources into personal recollections.</li>
<li>bias - distorting influences of our present knowledge, beliefs, feelings on new experiences, or our later memories of them</li>
<li>persistence - negative memories tend to persist a lot longer than positive ones.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Those things which become perceived as negative values and principles can persist for a long time often becoming embedded in myths, legends, symbols and even rituals within an organisation. The story of that person who "got fired for making a call home" or the "sales executive who squandered millions on lavish parties" might not be reality but it can become embedded in the collective's faulty memory. To overcome this memory you need not only action but repeated action i.e. it has to become the "experience" of members.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The problem with memory is that it affects our sense of psychological safety within the collective (point 2, figure 1 above). A failure to allow challenge (part of our doctrine of universal useful principles) or an action to discourage challenge (i.e. a senior member of the collective dismissing without good cause a more junior members view) can become remembered and in cases impact the members ability to challenge or communicate in the future. It can also undermine our sense of belonging to the collective (point 3).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
At this point, we should highlight our first culture cycle (see figure 2). You can consider this a flywheel (in its positive sense) or a doom loop when things start going wrong.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 2 - The flywheel or doom loop?</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-44jbLX1VzCI8mGY6016eJhmXHEQp7Tw7BEc0EmjzATxyuN9NIIj_7cJOKjc_dME8z3M1E8CQZ8djhVp6CjRNCX5TFf44fEWrvqoWfoNKF9X-MPhaDyutdZ67eSxx43voOs2U8Q/s1600/Culture+Res.002.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-44jbLX1VzCI8mGY6016eJhmXHEQp7Tw7BEc0EmjzATxyuN9NIIj_7cJOKjc_dME8z3M1E8CQZ8djhVp6CjRNCX5TFf44fEWrvqoWfoNKF9X-MPhaDyutdZ67eSxx43voOs2U8Q/s400/Culture+Res.002.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
For a collective to succeed it needs to diffuse its values to others (point 1). That collective however is in competition with other collectives and that competition causes values to evolve. The success at which we can diffuse values depends upon both the effectiveness of the enablement systems (i.e. mechanism of diffusion) and the effectiveness of the collective itself (i.e. the use of universally useful principles) - see point 2. Those values and principles will change over time but will also be embedded in the memory (point 3) of the organisation through stories, rituals and symbols. That remembered history will impact the psychological safety of members of the collective which will in turn impact the sense of belonging to the collective (point 4).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The <b>flywheel</b> is where we exploit this loop to reinforce positive memories through experience to encourage psychological safety and hence a sense of belonging within the collective allowing for not only confirmation of values but also encouraging their diffusion in a wider society. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The <b>doom loop</b> is where some experience (i.e. a failure to allow challenge) embeds in the collective's memory undermining the psychological safety of the group which in turn undermines belonging to the collective. This can impact the ability of the collective to succeed, to diffuse its values and if we allow the situation to continue (i.e. failing to communicate, failing to allow challenge, failing to think big and inspire others) or even exacerbate the situation through some misguided action then the collective can fall apart over time.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
But what do I mean by exploitation or misguided action? How do we achieve that? This is the point where I bring in my favourite topic - that of strategy and gameplay.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Gameplay and culture</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Gameplay consists of those patterns which are not :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Climatic</b> - patterns which will occur in an economic systems regardless of your choice such as components evolving due to competition or more evolved components enabling higher order systems.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Doctrine</b> - patterns which you have a choice over whether to use but are universally useful.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Gameplay patterns are hence context specific and ones you have choice over whether to use. They work in certain landscapes i.e. open source is a fabulous mechanism for industrialising a product space but it makes little difference in the genesis of components. Depending upon your experience with mapping then some of these forms of gameplay, such as "open approach" or "talent raid" will be familiar to people whilst others, such as "ambush" or "signal distortion" will be less so. What is not obvious is that some of these forms of gameplay come with a cost. In homage to the game of Dungeon and Dragons, I've personally labelled these as Lawful Good, Neutral, Lawful Evil and Chaotic Evil.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In figure 3, I've provided a list of gameplay and highlighted the more "Lawful Evil" plays from my perspective. Things like sweating an acquired asset for revenue whilst intending to dump it or creating a confusion of choice in consumers in order to increase price or adding a little fear, uncertainty and doubt over a competitor's product line. They're not in the outright "evil" category of deliberately creating a community in order to fail and poison a market but instead they're in the more "naughty" but "nice" category. Of course, depending upon whether you perceive these as evil or not is very much wrapped in your own values.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 3 - Gameplay</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuzE-qbdRf3YVopWd_iQ9mv2FZhPQT5u0BkyeNJlu-Z02ahDCpyTEs2SDSRTrd9kD0fljmC9ZMwgR4mAxoqVsyqmtoaAADhQ-gHNh0tYBk6u9zBlsWShzggyVgb2yvbRFkq3hjDA/s1600/Culture+Res.003.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuzE-qbdRf3YVopWd_iQ9mv2FZhPQT5u0BkyeNJlu-Z02ahDCpyTEs2SDSRTrd9kD0fljmC9ZMwgR4mAxoqVsyqmtoaAADhQ-gHNh0tYBk6u9zBlsWShzggyVgb2yvbRFkq3hjDA/s400/Culture+Res.003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The problem with these forms of gameplay is whilst useful in competition with others they can end up becoming embedded in the memory of the organisation and may run counter to the values of the organisation. A bit of "misdirection", "talent raiding", "creating artificial constraints" and poison pill "insertion" into more community efforts might do wonders for you against a competitive collective but if your core values are "we believe in fair play" then the memory of your organisation is not going to quickly forget, nor is the questioning of members whether they belong or feel safe in your collective. Keep it up and you can quickly find yourself on the doom loop despite some early success. Of course, if your collective values "A Machiavellian attitude" then you might see these forms of gameplay as positive and reinforcing. This goes back to the issue of labelling the gameplays and why I said "from my perspective". You need to think about the gameplays in terms of the collective itself which is why you need to understand what it actually values.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In figure 4 (point 1), I've highlighted the issue of gameplay (which itself is a pipeline of constantly evolving techniques) and its connection to values, memory and success.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 4 - Gameplay, Values and Memory.</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUTN686xsXN5UiKHzuMgsnI38iV5yKrERAqVKh9V86mS4rhsO0S_MOEfSVQThKkkd8qraCzPpr55WdgiAZDkKJNnD27povyhVkuce64r5iulOQN4CVld13dNCCBPtxH7lpi0Sefg/s1600/Culture+Res.004.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUTN686xsXN5UiKHzuMgsnI38iV5yKrERAqVKh9V86mS4rhsO0S_MOEfSVQThKkkd8qraCzPpr55WdgiAZDkKJNnD27povyhVkuce64r5iulOQN4CVld13dNCCBPtxH7lpi0Sefg/s400/Culture+Res.004.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
It is important to understand that whilst your choice of gameplay is not limited by the culture, you can always override this by executive fiat, it can certainly impact the culture and that can have long term effects which if they become embedded in the memory (i.e. the stories, rituals and symbols) of the collective can become difficult to overcome. This is not again a negative, you might wish to deliberately do this but the point of mapping is to think about how you're going to impact a space before you take action.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
For this reason, when considering gameplay in a competitive space it is important to be mindful of both the landscape (i.e. gameplay is context specific) but also the culture (i.e. the values, principles, enablement systems, memory, sense of belonging, psychological safety) of the collective and any long term effects you might have. This is also another reason why sharing strategic play in mapping form is useful because it enables people to challenge the play including whether it fits with our values without the inevitable people politics of a story.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
It's also why statements like "culture eats strategy for breakfast" are frankly daft. It's part of the same thing. Whilst your culture might constrain your strategic choices today, those strategic choices that you make will impact your future culture.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Gameplay, Doctrine and Landscape</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Your choice of gameplay and the implementation of doctrine (universally useful principles such as "focus on user needs") is influenced by the competitive landscape you are operating in. However, whilst doctrine is directly part of the flywheel (or doom loop) in our culture map, the gameplay is more indirect in terms of influence. Landscape is even further removed from the loop. It should therefore be possible to provide generic advice on how to improve the culture of any organisation irrespective of the landscape it is operating within. I've marked this all up in figure 5 with the loop and doctrines impact within it (point 1), the impact of strategy and gameplay (point 2) and landscape (point 3).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 5 - Landscape and culture</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikPp75YZNTwr0PUI5wDvb8WtDvLf7SOojvmS1xKnfab7do96izIBzLiscrZuLwZR7-3s2wCH-Df904zjqXAs0wV_hqezeDKbL_Fongg_ulskHDm6qcOBurM8uJSeRUET0oX6rYpA/s1600/Culture+Res.005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikPp75YZNTwr0PUI5wDvb8WtDvLf7SOojvmS1xKnfab7do96izIBzLiscrZuLwZR7-3s2wCH-Df904zjqXAs0wV_hqezeDKbL_Fongg_ulskHDm6qcOBurM8uJSeRUET0oX6rYpA/s400/Culture+Res.005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Of all the culture self help books that I've had the misfortune to read, one particular book stands out in terms of providing such advice. This is "The Joy of Work" by Bruce Daisley. The book is broken into three sections of recharge, sync and buzz each with a list of concrete steps that can be taken regardless of the landscape you are operating in. Many of these steps support basic concepts in our doctrine list (e.g. encouraging communication and challenge through use of pre-mortems) as well as reinforcing basic elements of belonging and psychological safety. I cannot recommend it enough. I would summarise the book here except, I want you to go and read it as it's a worthwhile investment of your time.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Summary</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
There are a number of basic concepts I wished to get across in the section. These include :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<ul>
<li>The collective has a memory and that memory is part of culture.</li>
<li>Your choices and actions, from your use of universally useful principles to gameplay, will affect that memory.</li>
<li>Within culture there are loops, some of which are positive (flywheel) and some of which can be negative (doom loop).</li>
<li>Not all gameplay is equal, some is more "evil" than others depending upon your perspective and values.</li>
<li>Gameplay can impact culture and also can be constrained by it since it's part of the same thing.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In the next section, I will continue to look at how to distort an existing culture whether your own or someone else's</div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-91700974675750360562019-10-01T13:08:00.003+01:002019-10-01T13:08:43.807+01:00Exploring value in the culture map<div style="text-align: justify;">
In this section, I'm going to explore a bit more into our map of culture in order to shed some light on the question of what should I do now? As with mapping in general, there are no right answers, there is simply a way of discussing the environment to find a better path.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Values</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
To begin with, I'm going to re-examine that concept of pipelines when it came to values. In figure 1, I provided a very basic map of values and how they were connected from public holiday to workers' rights to abolition of slavery to the concepts of equality in front of the law. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 1 - A Map of Values</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGo0fONKfOHSz6cKeAiA4baNFuXOA3_DqmFXLu9EK6XbTZL4pE_Oecehkk19pCeewjgWWZmw6O0NvY7OmxJuI0SqvOobQaXzk8eCKBUElRFTniiDgaCQ1EZVW3wUT1LLkB5PPKuQ/s1600/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGo0fONKfOHSz6cKeAiA4baNFuXOA3_DqmFXLu9EK6XbTZL4pE_Oecehkk19pCeewjgWWZmw6O0NvY7OmxJuI0SqvOobQaXzk8eCKBUElRFTniiDgaCQ1EZVW3wUT1LLkB5PPKuQ/s400/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
None of these values appeared fully formed but instead they evolved over time. It might surprise you but as recently as the 1750s, a group of notable laissez faire economists, for example Vincent de Gournay, that were arguing for deregulation of markets often cited the slave trade as an example of a well functioning economic market. As Blake Smith noted - "the birth of modern capitalism depended not only on the labour of enslaved people and the profits of the slave trade, but also on the example of slavery as a deregulated global enterprise" [https://aeon.co/essays/why-the-original-laissez-faire-economists-loved-slavery]</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Today, whilst the trade still unfortunately exists, the general population would consider the "abolition of slavery" as an accepted value. The idea itself has evolved from concept to accepted. In figure 1 above, I've highlighted in bold several of these values because when we examine a collective of some form - an organisation, a family, a nation state - then we are usually concerned with their most visible values. We rarely see the components which underpin them especially when they are broadly accepted and taken as a norm.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In figure 2 (see below), I've provided these highlighted values in the form of a pipeline (point 1). Any collective will have a set of evolving and visible values that will distinguish it from other collectives i.e what makes one company or one political organisation different from another are the values that it holds. When examining culture for any social group, we need to note that members of that group can belong to many collectives i.e. an international company has members that hopefully subscribe to the values of the company but also to many others collectives i.e. the nation they reside within. Those values may be different and in some cases can be in conflict.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 2 - Success, Competition and Values</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9VsEJlTiF5i2QGnAYfM5QEq166Lg1eRIyEDFnPRVp825FgcCLmeqn9be4nRKB-VLWl7ZaAcsTILPSEOJPxrBlbdGfA7qSc_CCcYG9JhIAO08c6wOZNB0pWJTaPrhcaAuy3YBfNA/s1600/Culture+Res.002.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9VsEJlTiF5i2QGnAYfM5QEq166Lg1eRIyEDFnPRVp825FgcCLmeqn9be4nRKB-VLWl7ZaAcsTILPSEOJPxrBlbdGfA7qSc_CCcYG9JhIAO08c6wOZNB0pWJTaPrhcaAuy3YBfNA/s400/Culture+Res.002.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
For example, direct conflict and confrontation over issues are frowned upon within China as more value is placed upon respect, honouring the person and collective action rather than individualism. The US on the other hand assigns greater value to notions of individualism and of confrontation on matters where individuals decide on what is the "Truth". In Norman Grubb's book "Modern Viking" and the story of Christian Leadership in the US, the values of confrontation, shocks to the system and "men who won't take no for an answer" are strongly espoused in that particular sect of Christian philosophy which are almost a direct antithesis to the ideas of Confucianism.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The first points to note are that there are many values, those values will differ between collectives, some values are more evolved than others and there can be conflict between values between different collectives. As described above, values are also not static but they evolve. The question should be - how do they evolve? As with mapping other forms of capital, evolution requires competition between different forms.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
That competition comes from the collectives themselves. The success of any collective is determined by how well its values diffuse. A company that promotes the use of green energy to reduce global climate impact will not succeed if another collective persuades everyone else that reducing global climate impact is not a value they should aspire to. For this reason, all collectives are in competition with each other to spread their values in the wider society (figure 2 above, point 2).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
It is the competition to diffuse different forms of a value driven by the actions of their respective collectives that drives the evolution of that value. Like a virus, ideas and values not only diffuse in society but through multiple iterations they evolve. Competition is a necessity for evolution of those values. Without collectives such as the Knights of Labour (workers' rights) or the "Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade" then these values would neither have diffused nor evolved to become accepted in the wider society. Without this evolution, there would have been no "higher order" values created through componentisation effects and hence no modern concepts such as paid holidays which many of us now take for granted or have become embedded in law.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Within any large social system such as an international company, we can therefore expect to see a diversity of competing values from many collectives including but not limited to the company and the nation states that members belong to. One of the issues with attempting to creating a single culture within a company is it conflicts with the very diverse nature of competing values that arise from the different collectives its members belong to. Furthermore, this diversity of values whilst creating conflict within any single collective is also a necessity for such a system of values to evolve and adapt to the outside world. A single monoculture is not only nearly impossible to achieve but highly undesirable from an evolutionary viewpoint. Such an organisation would require very strict and narrowly defined values that allow for little to no diversity within its collective and hence it will be fragile to outside changes. Those that design for a greater freedom in interpretation of values and allow for diversity will tend to be more adaptive and resilient. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
These concepts are simply a reflection of C.S Holling's work on engineering and ecological resilience as shown in figure 3. The most resilient biological systems require a high level of diversity in the ecosystem (ecological resilience) combined with a broad tolerance in associated structures (engineering resilience). For example, it would be possible to design a robust nation with structures designed to cope with known impacts e.g. poor crop harvest (grain stores), economic shocks (banking system) but it would lack the diversity required to adapt to a shock outside those known boundaries e.g. a popular democratic movement in a feudal system.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 3 - Diversity</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2niaM4unvcdPBahLMdB5yGOqsfQbLcAHp0s4MUExVHQyOvHSu-Y9bBfDcxEw0ZJXTJBUQwyp26bm8pb5QZ7fjsQaUWy2aqln71WL30D31n_XrZKcRE40vOs8eX2oReDg6UrTbPQ/s1600/Culture+Res.003.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2niaM4unvcdPBahLMdB5yGOqsfQbLcAHp0s4MUExVHQyOvHSu-Y9bBfDcxEw0ZJXTJBUQwyp26bm8pb5QZ7fjsQaUWy2aqln71WL30D31n_XrZKcRE40vOs8eX2oReDg6UrTbPQ/s400/Culture+Res.003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Values and Principles</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In the corporate world, a good example of the form of thinking required to encourage diversity of values & competition between them can be seen in Amazon's Leadership Principles. In particular, one set of values can be described as be self-critical and work to disconfirm beliefs by seeking diverse perspectives. A reflection on the need for a diversity in opinion. Obviously, the question should be - is that value itself challenged? In fact, Amazon's principles set up a state of competitive duality - be self-critical and work to disconfirm beliefs by seeking diverse perspectives whilst at the same time valuing leaders that are right a lot. It's a constant struggle to be right but also to challenge yourself and disconfirm your own beliefs in order to be more right.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
However, these principles are highly individualistic in approach i.e. disconfirm your beliefs rather than seek a collective view. Furthermore, many of the principles listed are in fact universally useful and part of doctrine - think big, understand the details, focus on the user needs, a bias towards the new. At this point, we need to clarify some differences between values and principles.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Values</b> are the things and qualities we consider important as described by belief. We hold them as truths within the collective. They are not uniformly shared with others and those values will evolve over time.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Principles</b> are the rules by which we operate by as described by action. They may reflect our current values or past values or some value that has become a long accepted norm in the collective and even forgotten about. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In some cases, people describe how "focus on the user need" is a value their company holds. However, to "focus on the user need" is not a belief but an action. Furthermore, it turns out to be a universally useful principle for all companies. It's a rule we should all operate by in order to be effective (and hence is include in my doctrine - the list of universally useful principles). </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
A value that a collective might hold could be "the quality of courage" or "a belief in God" whereas its principles might be a "focus on the user need", "challenge assumptions" and "use appropriate methods". Those principles can be shared with many collectives, even those with which it directly competes. The values between them however will be different. What is remarkable about the collective should not be its use of universally useful principles but its values. However, despite this, such universally useful principles are not widely used and hence it is understandable that many talk about rules such as "challenging assumptions" and "focusing on user needs" as some earth shattering belief that divides them amongst others. The only truly remarkable thing is that others do not follow such basic principles but then collectives are in competition and it's fine to be hopeless at the basics as long as everyone else is.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
When it comes to examining any company, we need to carefully remove out the doctrine (ie. universally useful principles) from the statement of values. This itself is a valuable exercise as examination of a company's use of the universal principles gives an indication of how adaptable and competitive it is compared to others. In figures 4 & 5, I've provided an examination of two companies on doctrine using a red (warning), amber (weak) and green (good) notation. One of the companies is a tech giant and one is a banking giant.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 4 - Tech Giant</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMhZ6_sLroQfHcmK63PvixlrJFsYr0XQA6qp1E0cdLqgEmQXY0f52zQoERPrCQzpHJCUV0XwA98ARHnNLtzMZFpQrsM9M3Ii9e2ENB8ZwQ3txAdL1lgZNYSNPf9Luf3ELM_R19dw/s1600/Culture+Res.004.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMhZ6_sLroQfHcmK63PvixlrJFsYr0XQA6qp1E0cdLqgEmQXY0f52zQoERPrCQzpHJCUV0XwA98ARHnNLtzMZFpQrsM9M3Ii9e2ENB8ZwQ3txAdL1lgZNYSNPf9Luf3ELM_R19dw/s400/Culture+Res.004.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 5 - Banking Giant</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiijZMzENgaiCJDtiTXx7FEmQYIQDkYtyosH-GeVPVIYwGTkzlVjNNr1lb63yzkT-GfjL2QzvJOleYWuJsr0w8Uk9-jly60fefSJWiHzfto2tKoSImUXFjpBtSXt1aDMgZfyTlKmg/s1600/Culture+Res.005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiijZMzENgaiCJDtiTXx7FEmQYIQDkYtyosH-GeVPVIYwGTkzlVjNNr1lb63yzkT-GfjL2QzvJOleYWuJsr0w8Uk9-jly60fefSJWiHzfto2tKoSImUXFjpBtSXt1aDMgZfyTlKmg/s400/Culture+Res.005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
On the basis of universally useful principles then the tech giant simply outclasses the banking giant. However, these collectives (in this case both global companies) might not ever compete. If they did, in the same industry, assuming they have roughly the same values then the tech giant should have all the advantage of adaptability and efficiency to overpower the banking giant whose only effective line of defence would be regulation. Doctrine provides us with a moderately useful way of examining competitive effectiveness of two collectives.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Once doctrine is removed from any statement of values then what is left are any visible values plus a mix of more local principles i.e. ones which might not be universally useful or have not been identified as such. In the case of Amazon, once doctrine is broken out of the Leadership Principles then you are left with a core set of values that are highly individualistic, probably reflecting its US nation origin. Excluding the doctrine, then these values can be summarised as :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<ul>
<li>leaders are right a lot. </li>
<li>leaders commit wholly, with conviction, tenacity and never settle.</li>
<li>leaders speak candidly and do not compromise for the sake of social cohesion.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
By comparison, Facebook has a similar mix of doctrine (i.e. universally useful principles such as focus on outcome, think big, a bias towards outcome, a bias towards action) combined with one pronounced value of build social value. Whilst action orientated, the question we have to ask is "social value" for whom? Who defines it? There is a belief in the statements for creating social value but what that is has not been defined other than Facebook should be the one to build it as opposed to say some other collective such as a Nation State. This value almost certainly puts Facebook in direct competition with Nation States themselves and given Facebook's history of psychological experimentation on users, use of the service by others to interfere within national politics, its effort to create a global currency and more recently announcements of creating its own court like system to regulate free speech online then it would not be surprising if Governments start to view Facebook as a competitive threat to themselves.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
By contrast, Alibaba also has a similar mix of universally useful principles such as a focus on the user needs but within this mix is a set of different values that are highly collective in nature, probably reflecting its China origin. These values include :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<ul>
<li>relying on one another</li>
<li>our employees to view themselves as owners of the business</li>
<li>Work is for now, but life is forever.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
This is not to say that one set of values is more right than another, nor that my interpretation is free from bias nor that a collective approach (given our social nature) is inherently more effective than an individualistic approach. Whether we like it or not, our success depends upon us diffusing our values which in turn impacts the wider system. You might not wish for a future in which we "speak candidly and do not compromise for the sake of social cohesion" preferring instead a future of"relying on one another" but what the future holds depends upon the success of current day collectives and a lot of that depends upon the doctrine they use.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
However, there's one other aspect we need to consider here. It's not just the collective, its values and how well it operates (doctrine) that matters. There is the act of diffusion itself and that requires enablement systems,</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Enablement and Principles</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Values themselves don't just diffuse, someone has to share the ideas with others. There are two aspects to be considered here, firstly that collectives are in competition with each other and that competition does partially depend upon how effective the collective is and therefore it use of universally useful principles (point 1 in figure 6). For example, a poorly run collective is likely to struggle against a more effective collective. The second aspect, is the need for a mechanism to spread the collective's values. The most effective collective imaginable (using all the universally useful principles) is hardly going to succeed if it has no mechanism of enabling others to discover its values. This discovery process requires systems of enablement (point 2 in figure 6). </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 6 - Enablement</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV1g_p_ylmjHBX6YIj39LhCs8nUkVLLNZrP-2W-fDjhPYqtgCGQtoEhA2csPhXwWky3mwo3bFKwPLepY0mtSJoT2WwA0_mP7ifIgbdxe5Du3-zPKbPvkQKrvW34zU6OW4oM4fXxQ/s1600/Culture+Res.006.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV1g_p_ylmjHBX6YIj39LhCs8nUkVLLNZrP-2W-fDjhPYqtgCGQtoEhA2csPhXwWky3mwo3bFKwPLepY0mtSJoT2WwA0_mP7ifIgbdxe5Du3-zPKbPvkQKrvW34zU6OW4oM4fXxQ/s400/Culture+Res.006.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Those systems cover a pipeline of constantly evolving techniques, including examples such as :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<ul>
<li>Word of mouth where members inform others of their values.</li>
<li>An initiation ceremony where new members are indoctrinated to the collective.</li>
<li>An oath of loyalty in which new members agree to be bound by the collective's values.</li>
<li>A democratic process where members share principles and values through some form of manifesto and others choose to support one or another. </li>
<li>A town hall where members discuss principles and values.</li>
<li>A weekly newsletter where a collective reinforces its values to members.</li>
<li>A vision statement or constitution for the collective where values are written down for members.</li>
<li>A mechanism of propaganda where information is provided to influence a recipient audience in order to promote the collective's values.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Summary</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In this section I simply wanted to point out some basics from the map. These include :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<ul>
<li><b>Values</b> are the things and qualities we consider important as described by belief. We hold them as truths within the collective. They are not uniformly shared with others and those values will evolve over time.</li>
<li>Values <b>evolve</b> through competition between collectives.</li>
<li><b>Different</b> values exist between collectives.</li>
<li><b>Resilience</b> of a collective depends not only upon its structures but diversity in values i.e. many pursue rigid sets of values which make adaption difficult.</li>
<li><b>Success</b> of a collective is defined by its values diffusing in the wider society. The success of a collective is influenced by its use of doctrine (i.e. universally useful principles) and <b>enablement systems</b> i.e. being effective is not enough, it needs a mechanism by which its values can diffuse.</li>
<li><b>Principles</b> are the rules by which we operate by as described by action. They may reflect our current values or past values or some value that has become a long accepted norm in the collective and even forgotten about. </li>
<li>When collectives describes their values this is often a <b>mix</b> of universally useful principles (some of which might not be widely spread) along with actual values.</li>
<li>An <b>individual</b> may belong to many collectives.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Finally, I wish to note that all maps are wrong and imperfect representations of the space. However, the purpose of a map is it enables us to discuss the space by reference to the map rather than the story teller. So, if you disagree with this so far then tell me where the map is wrong. Otherwise, we need to explore a bit more into our map.</div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-55234137685852647602019-09-09T20:52:00.002+01:002019-09-09T21:03:04.067+01:00From values to rituals<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
In the previous chapter, I left you with a map of brexit. I said that I had avoided the use of values within it ... mea culpa ... I had left some in there. Two values in particular - fairness and equality (see highlighted point 1 in figure 1)</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b>Figure 1 - Brexit Map</b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4rRBuRh9O3lCWArlWUmJJqVn46cGXQ6hZ98RjM6YsSOCECSJjnFxbmiqgKnBj2NC7sC8PfvvIUlijj-GE48N2qF6M4UPwdvFyB4iGPxN0Xd1nMWHNNLKXmdEZvahyEeTrD2-mTg/s1600/Culture+Res.006.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4rRBuRh9O3lCWArlWUmJJqVn46cGXQ6hZ98RjM6YsSOCECSJjnFxbmiqgKnBj2NC7sC8PfvvIUlijj-GE48N2qF6M4UPwdvFyB4iGPxN0Xd1nMWHNNLKXmdEZvahyEeTrD2-mTg/s400/Culture+Res.006.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
But what are values? Values identify what is judged as good or evil within a culture. They are more than just the operating norms or principles of behaviour, they are beliefs and often abstract concepts of what is important, what matters, what is worthwhile. They are within and derived from a collective (see point 2) i.e. the values I share with best friends, a family group, a squad of soldiers, a company, a political party or a nation state. An individual may have many values which come from many collectives and in some cases those values can conflict. The individual is then forced to choose.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Values are also not fixed. What society values today is not necessarily the same as five hundred years ago. What we understand by those values is open to interpretation and evolves with the value. We also build enabling systems to embed and represent our values i.e. democracy (see point 3) in nation, or a town hall in a company or a family gathering like a wedding or seasonal holiday.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
When we think of values, we need to think of a pipeline of continuously appearing and evolving values within that collective. Some get rejected, some evolve to be universally accepted and understood in meaning. I've represented this in figure 2 (point 1) using a small box to represent "values" and a larger box to represent the evolving pipeline of "values".</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b>Figure 2 - A pipeline of values.</b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3_hwgLVoUGRifypDpNRVwjOg7Qr5uWiOZNWzS5Hp4Kx0778Lak4dpTNCtvjbBhqavroFMtxg5-UOGneqKomdNwMvLv0gr0mAAgSZ5OhcRlaq9HN5lfTFl4WHJbLoub_RZof1jSA/s1600/Culture+Res.007.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3_hwgLVoUGRifypDpNRVwjOg7Qr5uWiOZNWzS5Hp4Kx0778Lak4dpTNCtvjbBhqavroFMtxg5-UOGneqKomdNwMvLv0gr0mAAgSZ5OhcRlaq9HN5lfTFl4WHJbLoub_RZof1jSA/s400/Culture+Res.007.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Those values aren't simply isolated things but interwoven and connected. In the case of collective they are often in the rules, in the constitutions or in the legislation. It doesn't mean they started there however, they existed before and evolved to become accepted.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Take a group of people and a few values and simply ask them to plot them on a map and to look at the interconnections. This is exactly what I did, expanding the exercise to various polls in order to refine the positioning. Since maps are a way of de-personalising a space and talking about the issue, I deliberately picked a highly charged subject. In this case, workers' rights and slavery within the US (see figure 3)</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b>Figure 3 - Connection of values.</b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgI7qSIuM-UV35keFASd-H5HA2WPq29m7jwxFOMQaQgux0_X9QtoCUE98wiq6lAFGnerF6PT7R96KL3tS9xKxN5ZR2hkNX1HmI6c1tFB4MwAPEAGIo5TkJzQbORwECgsH_qhuc-qw/s1600/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgI7qSIuM-UV35keFASd-H5HA2WPq29m7jwxFOMQaQgux0_X9QtoCUE98wiq6lAFGnerF6PT7R96KL3tS9xKxN5ZR2hkNX1HmI6c1tFB4MwAPEAGIo5TkJzQbORwECgsH_qhuc-qw/s400/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
At first sight, it might look confusing. What has Worker's Rights (such as the idea of a right to paid holiday given the US currently has no Federal laws requiring this) got to do with the Abolition of Slavery (a well understood idea, accepted and embedded in law though unfortunately not yet completely gone).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In <i>"Our Forgotten Labor Revolution"</i>, Alex Gourevitch discusses the Knights of Labor, the first national labour organisation in the United States, founded in 1869 by Uriah Smith Stephens. The organisation was based on a belief in the unity of interest of all producing groups and proposed a system of worker cooperatives to replace capitalism. The emancipation of slaves had inspired a further movement to emancipate workers from the domination of the labor market.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i>The Knights’ expansion into the American South began in 1886 at their general assembly meeting in Richmond, Virginia. In a conspicuous show of racial solidarity, a black worker named Frank Ferrell took the stage to introduce the Knights’ leader, Terence V. Powderly, before Powderly’s opening address. To defend his controversial decision to have a black Knight introduce him, Powderly wrote “in the field of labor and American citizenship we recognize no line of race, creed, politics or color.”</i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i>After the general assembly the Knights spread throughout Southern states like South Carolina, Virginia, and Louisiana, setting up cooperatives, organizing local assemblies, and agitating for a new political order.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Such change of values and structures however are rarely welcomed from established collectives nor individuals who seek to control. For the Knights of Labour, an organisation striving for better rights for all through <i>"co-operation"</i> then the response was alas, very predictable.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i>First the Louisiana state militia showed up, sporting the same Gatling guns that had, only a few decades before, been used for the first time in the North’s fight against the South. The militia broke the strike and forced thousands of defenseless strikers and their families into the town of Thibodaux, where a state district judge promptly placed them all under martial law. A group of white citizen-vigilantes called the “Peace and Order Committee,” organized by the same judge that had declared martial law, then took over and went on their three-day killing spree. </i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The modern US workers' rights and movements are decedents from these early Labor organisations which themselves are decedents from emancipation. The 1963 march for jobs and freedom showed this connection between both the civil rights and the workers rights movements. Martin Luther King described how both movements were fighting for <i>“decent wages, fair working conditions, livable housing, old age security, health and welfare measures, conditions in which families can grow, have education for their children, and respect in the community”. </i>They were the <i>"two architects of democracy"</i> as King would explain.<br />
<br />
Even the modern idea of universal basic income is derived in part from a value that all forms of economic dependence are incompatible with free citizenship. Our legal systems reflect this evolving nature of values in the precedents and components upon which they are built. They are chains of values that have in part been codified and hence can be described. They consist of evolving components building upon one and another. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>On communication</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The enabling system for our values (in this case above we have chosen democracy) requires mechanisms of communication. This is not only needed to diffuse the values among wider groups but to enable challenge and the evolution of those values. Of course, in order for communication to happen then there also needs to be some measure of psychological safety within that collective unless your intention is not to evolve but simply to propagate. <span style="text-align: left;">The same mechanisms seems to appear whether we're discussing a political change of values within a nation state or simply a company. If we choose the collective as a "company", use a town hall as the enabling system rather than democracy and refer not to the many and the few but workers and executives, the same map provides a useful starting point for discussion of a company. </span><br />
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In one such interview the question of the purpose of the company arose. Initial reactions discussed goals and the need to economically survive though examples were given of organisations that were temporary with a fixed ending point. The idea was then refined by the phrase <i>"The purpose of the company is to succeed in achieving its values but this also requires economic success in order to survive".</i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The problem with this idea is that other forms of collectives have existed long before companies and we can't simply tie the idea of a collective to economic success. Fortunately economic success is simply a measure of competition and we can tie the idea of collectives to competition with other collectives.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In figure 4, I've provided an early map used to discuss companies. A few things should be noted.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 1</b> : the many and the few have been changed to workers and executives.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 2</b> : it is recognised there are many types of collective - a pipeline of forms from well understood company structures to co-operatives. Rather than draw the box across the entire map, a simple square box was added to denote that this wasn't a single thing.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 3</b> : the term economic has been replaced with competition. A collective needs to succeed in achieving its values but it is also in competition with others. In the case of the company this is economic competition.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 4</b> : there is a pipeline of enabling systems from the moderately well understood ideas of democracy to town halls to hack days. In order to diffuse the value these enabling systems require some mechanism of communication.</div>
<i><br /></i>
<b>Figure 4 - Communication, Company and Values.</b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinYFq4TZboFp3nBb_TjzrxwdKR8D8zToYuIpU9trLH6fRVfxWjSQqj3pkqakX_fJkSi8SG1g-AQsbW2K-1DtApu8BGZOnJGg-eILmdPerlMIr-9KTM4xqXDccJsWjphv2fFl7KkA/s1600/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinYFq4TZboFp3nBb_TjzrxwdKR8D8zToYuIpU9trLH6fRVfxWjSQqj3pkqakX_fJkSi8SG1g-AQsbW2K-1DtApu8BGZOnJGg-eILmdPerlMIr-9KTM4xqXDccJsWjphv2fFl7KkA/s400/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<b>From Rituals to Gameplay</b><br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
With more discussions comes more flaws and there are many in the map above. Success in competition doesn't just require values to be diffused by some enabling system but instead many components are needed. Communication itself was just one of the many principles (universally useful practices) that we described as doctrine highlighted in Part I (repeated in table 1 below). To complicate matters more, communication itself is evolving but then so are all the other principles. Even <i>"focusing on user needs"</i> is not universally accepted but more of a converging principle. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Another problem with the map is the notion of hierarchy. There are many different ways of structuring a company from the rigid concept of silo'd hierarchies to holocracy to two pizza teams to anarchy. Even this space is not a single idea but a pipeline of evolving components.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The map above also lacks any notion of the competitive landscape it is dealing with. The principles of doctrine (see table 1) whilst universally useful need to be applied to and are derived from an understanding of the competitive landscape.<br />
<br />
<b>Table 1 - Doctrine.</b><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNPnwQ1EGU2JHrsk4frW4aRvy7ivcAiWxKD3whrIuy_okhT5p4cQbHVEQPE6WokY6XBerFLf5UoXwECHvxxlHdOE4I9XYZjJ-69gUkxH56mtY-U0MUoyLABu-9NKyIy3C8C8aUNg/s1600/Culture+Res.005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNPnwQ1EGU2JHrsk4frW4aRvy7ivcAiWxKD3whrIuy_okhT5p4cQbHVEQPE6WokY6XBerFLf5UoXwECHvxxlHdOE4I9XYZjJ-69gUkxH56mtY-U0MUoyLABu-9NKyIy3C8C8aUNg/s400/Culture+Res.005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Alas, our understanding of the space that our companies compete in is both primitive and evolving. The concept of mapping a business (for example, using a Wardley maps) is not widespread, nor is it well understood or even accepted. There are far more diverging opinions on this subject than converging.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
On top of this, you have the issue of gameplay. There are 64 publicly available forms of context specific gameplay derived from Wardley Maps (see table 2) which is only part of the total known which itself is a fraction of the possible. This list is constantly changing as new forms of gameplay appear and existing methods evolve. Some of these forms of gameplay are fairly positive in nature (e.g. education) whilst others are Machiavellian (e.g. misdirection). The use of them depends upon the competition that you are facing, the landscape and your values. However, in their use they can have long term impacts. You can become known as the company that co-operates with others, creates centres of gravity around particular skillsets or you can become known as the company that raids others for talent whilst misdirecting its competitors. This history can become part of your culture through the stories will tell each other.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Table 2 - Context Specific Gameplay</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihQPMqhKtiGuaKQeCAhgfUj1vqcEPhz2dopWud6sXDeo1taelPEoq_Aos5O6hvrNOUtKN-wJw-0wDzh32ncpcsNhno4n3bPGP_SMRZa0n5VfGiFZgGHtPl4tpr018xgrylHq-m-w/s1600/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihQPMqhKtiGuaKQeCAhgfUj1vqcEPhz2dopWud6sXDeo1taelPEoq_Aos5O6hvrNOUtKN-wJw-0wDzh32ncpcsNhno4n3bPGP_SMRZa0n5VfGiFZgGHtPl4tpr018xgrylHq-m-w/s400/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
However, it's more than just stories that make our history. There are echos from past gameplay, from past practices, from past values in the rituals, the symbols, the stories and the talismans we use. The insurance company example (in Part II) is one of a ritual of customising servers which echoes from a past practice which at some long forgotten point, made sense. These rituals, symbols, stories and talismans are part of an evolving pipeline that represents the collective's <b>memory</b>.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Let us add this all to our map. From figure 5 below:-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 1</b> : Our values, enabling systems and principles are pipelines of evolving components represented by single square boxes.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 2</b> : Our structure is an evolving pipeline of methods from anarchy to two pizzas.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 3 </b>: The principles and gameplay we use are influenced by our understanding of the competitive landscape which in general remains poor today.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 4</b> : Our gameplay is a pipeline of constantly evolving context specific techniques. In general, we have a poor understanding of these techniques, their context specific nature or even how many there are.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Point 5</b> : Our collective's memory echoes past value, past principles and past gameplay. This collective memory can influence how we feel about a collective and our own psychological safety within it.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Figure 5 - From Rituals to Gameplay.</b></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHQ6MCDOuNjLconJBWa_aGAvlLbhNpPPzcw8EedkCpaQpa7lnq45Kppi_afAv_9FWg6EsELynvyphUbhCQKUDOTxkdUaMMTcZClL1-XtIfogUMDNzPwnE8ojuJYPllTgp22U09Uw/s1600/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHQ6MCDOuNjLconJBWa_aGAvlLbhNpPPzcw8EedkCpaQpa7lnq45Kppi_afAv_9FWg6EsELynvyphUbhCQKUDOTxkdUaMMTcZClL1-XtIfogUMDNzPwnE8ojuJYPllTgp22U09Uw/s640/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<b>Towards a map of culture.</b><br />
We are now in a position to propose a map for culture. I've done so in figure 6.<br />
<br />
<b>Figure 6 - A Map for Culture.</b><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFfWMrbe5MJlVgqqiHY6HdoI6tPzgJUJaIXqEqe430t6c05Oa2SlVcGgMyTJ3EVbm_h5EFQdQe2G-llPEFPFaIt5ZVOIQ_M_h9s-TCvqOj1j3srYsXjp6Ns_ONS9_jns8RlMA-lg/s1600/Culture+Res.003.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFfWMrbe5MJlVgqqiHY6HdoI6tPzgJUJaIXqEqe430t6c05Oa2SlVcGgMyTJ3EVbm_h5EFQdQe2G-llPEFPFaIt5ZVOIQ_M_h9s-TCvqOj1j3srYsXjp6Ns_ONS9_jns8RlMA-lg/s400/Culture+Res.003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Other than highlighting areas where it has gone wrong or disagreeing on the placement of components then your first reaction should probably be <i>"I can't see culture on this?"</i></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
That is because the entire map represents culture - the pipelines of evolving principles, values, enabling systems, memory, gameplay, collectives that we belong to and interactions between them. It is all culture. It is all involved in helping us describe our "designs for living". Our extrinsic behaviours are learned from our interaction with it, our intrinsic behaviours play out on this space. </div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Being a map, it's also an imperfect representation of the space of culture which itself is evolving. It does not fit into a pleasant 2x2, there are no cultures to be simply copied from other companies because both others and ourselves change with the landscape, with the collectives' memory of the past, with the evolving values and principles that are at play and with the collectives that it touches upon and people belong to.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<span style="text-align: left;">At this point, your reaction should be <i>"What the hell am I supposed to do with this?</i>" </span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
For that, we will need another chapter.</div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-89925858040609218732019-09-05T15:33:00.001+01:002019-09-05T15:40:48.119+01:00Exploring Brexit<style type="text/css">
p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica}
p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; min-height: 14.0px}
</style>
<br />
<div class="p1">
The first rule of brexit is <b>“you’re wrong”.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></b></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
No matter what you say on brexit then someone will argue that you’re wrong and that they’re right. So let us start by concluding that whatever map I’m going to produce on the subject is wrong which is ok because all maps are wrong anyway. The purpose of a map is never about being right but instead helping to create a better map. Hence, I’m going to start by saying that I accept that the maps are wrong but I’m not interested in why they are wrong, I am only interested in a better map. So, if you want to discuss this subject then produce a better map. Everything else I will consider a waste of time wrapped up in individual political capital, stories and desires. If you want to have a shouting match over some narrative then find a mirror and knock yourself out silly. Since the map is wrong, I’m going to assume the assumptions are wrong as well. It’s all wrong but that’s ok. The question is whether it can be useful.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
In discussions with a group of people who voted Leave and Remain a couple of key words and phrases resonated. On the Leave side there was the idea of an elite (the few) versus the people (the many). This concept of “the many” was also replicated in the Remain discussion but through terms such as populist, appealing to populism and even a mob. Whilst variation existed in what those terms actually meant and who those groups were, the idea of a many and a few was fairly consistent. Hence, I will start with those as my main two users - the many and the few.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
On the Leave side emphasis seems to placed on two key concepts - democracy and control. Both we couched in terms of the collective rather than the individual i.e. <i>“our democracy”</i> and <i>“we are taking back control”</i>. On the Remain side emphasis seems to be placed on belonging and freedom. This was often a mix of both individual and collective as in <i>“We are European”</i>, “<i>We are part of Europe”</i> (i.e. a sense of belonging to a wider collective) and <i>“Benefits of freedom of movement”</i> (i.e. how I or other individuals benefit from this). To a lesser extent this also occurred with discussions over wealth, as in the Leave side tending to more grandiose discussions of a <i>“Global Britain”</i> invoking a more collective slant whereas the remain side tended to discuss both the economic impact to them and issues of safety to the unfortunate - <i>“Do I need to hoard food?”</i></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Two other interesting ideas appeared early on in the discussion which were the idea of hierarchy and responsibility. Whilst hierarchy could often be well articulated and agreed upon, its associations seems to diverge. In almost all cases it was described in relationship to ideas of control but in some cases it was associated with belonging as in <i>“a tribe needs a leader”</i>. I tend to avoid the use of the word tribe finding faction a far more appropriate term, hence I will use faction in this description.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> However, what was </span>highlighted was a distinction between meaning i.e. does an accepted meaning exist for the term) and association (the strength or weakness of associations between meanings. Hence we can agree on what hierarchy means but can disagree on what it is connected to i.e. belonging.</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
In contrast, and quite unexpectedly, the notion of responsibility exhibited differences in meaning. For some, when describing ideas such as <i>“We need to pull together”</i> what is meant by “together” is not the same. For some, together describes more of a collection of individual responsibilities i.e. in the melting pot of the market, the overall effect caused is through a collection of individuals acting. For others together describes a collective responsibility i.e. we as a group need to achieve something.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Of all the terms raised, notions of “safety” and the term “democracy” were particularly fascinating. Safety showed not only disagreement over specifics but people exhibited a reluctance to discuss the issue in the company of others with a different view. The reactions were often either quickly defensive, closing down the conversation, talking over each other, failure to listen or simply not engaging.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>These reactions are the sorts of behaviours often seen when discussing in psychologically unsafe environments.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>The notion of safety also had strong resonance with the Remain parts of the group in terms of membership of the EU with the benefits of <i>"a larger trading block"</i>, dealing with defence and outside threats. </div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
The idea of democracy had some peculiar divergence with general agreement on the term and ideas of fairness and equality but disagreement on what is fair with notions of the referendum being “<i>cheated</i>” or “<i>stolen</i>” or the Parliament <i>"subverting the will of the people"</i>.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
So, to begin with we have concepts of a few vs many, individual vs collective, democracy and control, belonging and freedom, wealth and safety, responsibility and hierarchy, safety and democracy. Many of the terms had disagreement over specifics or associations but convergence in terms of general meaning. From these discussions, we have enough components to create basic map using the axis of “ethical values” described in Part I.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
I’ve used the ethical values axis simply because it appears more meaningful in this context. Hence we start with concepts, emerging meanings, converging meanings and things which are universally accepted and agreed upon. Remember, the terms are simply labels for the different stages of evolving capital. Where possible, I’ve also avoided adding in any principles (e.g. communication and challenge) or concepts of values in both society and local groups. I’ve also added in the term Agency as in the power and independence to influence one’s own environment as it was an idea that was often described with few being able to give meaning to that term. Lastly, remember that we will assume the map is wrong, the sample size is far too small but that’s ok as this is only a stepping stone to a better map (see figure 1). I've highlighted weak associations as dotted lines.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<b>Figure 1 - Brexit</b></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgamr9hKO6UTGtJW4Voi9NbLXAyjaOIILlbrgZht8K-bpw2qGdzD5uCjodDUm4jEuGjDj-vEZ91j2qfxtCzSyBzOQJyyY6F4hc2XBNo3BreJmKJZVDBITn7yWBw0uulF3hXh9glOw/s1600/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgamr9hKO6UTGtJW4Voi9NbLXAyjaOIILlbrgZht8K-bpw2qGdzD5uCjodDUm4jEuGjDj-vEZ91j2qfxtCzSyBzOQJyyY6F4hc2XBNo3BreJmKJZVDBITn7yWBw0uulF3hXh9glOw/s400/Culture+Res.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Let us use this map to describe some of the narratives that appeared to be in play.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> Do remember, that since I was the person recording and transcribing the interviews that I will have my own perspective and bias. Fortunately, that will be exposed in the map for you to challenge.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p2">
<b>The Few</b></div>
<div class="p1">
On one side, there are the few. The few wanted control for the individual (i.e. themselves) and by this we mean both the agency (the power) to act independently and control over others (a collective) through some form of hierarchy. The purpose of this agency was economic wealth, as in it both needs it and provides it and creates safety for that group. The sense of belonging here was more a tool for controlling a collective i.e. the few were the faction leaders and the sense of belonging (to the faction) was focused on controlling the collective. This narrative I’ve shown in figure 2 as red lines and text (which I've also made bold and increased the thickness).</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<b>Figure 2 - The Few</b></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEjSeVjcrOHWzIEUGBwVyJmPc7MzLUpmSS-GY7Wp3pK6PIR44lH-zw5sa8WPIZBxgF6HEMgWiStQj9QgELyllF2qTfNPQA9s3-adBN65K_p3krzIEWPvDMwo4TCdhr8GMUJTysCQ/s1600/Culture+Res.002.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEjSeVjcrOHWzIEUGBwVyJmPc7MzLUpmSS-GY7Wp3pK6PIR44lH-zw5sa8WPIZBxgF6HEMgWiStQj9QgELyllF2qTfNPQA9s3-adBN65K_p3krzIEWPvDMwo4TCdhr8GMUJTysCQ/s400/Culture+Res.002.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="p2">
<b>The Many</b></div>
<div class="p1">
One the other side, there are the many. The narrative tended to again discuss control but in a sense of a collective that belongs together (as a faction) which is focused on creating safety for the entire group. This was wrapped in notions of collective responsibility with the <i>“freedom to discuss and challenge” </i>with each other. The notion of collective responsibility was also tied to concepts of democracy through both equality (the line of <i>“one person, one vote”</i>) and fairness (the glib <i>“no taxation without representation”</i> was stated). This narrative I’ve shown in figure 3 as green lines and text (which I've also made bold and increased the thickness).<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<b>Figure 3 - The Many</b></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlBu23txIrnl7gPnX8S7fm1YrNwhtxG5AAPfDDCN1QxFtmuJw-239O4HzdPjvA8HqUw_EB_pPqrszDMOA_qJsm3zHku6zb2YNbo0cMxLO7iCdt6cd5khV2DSaipbuN0ALJd1IJdQ/s1600/Culture+Res.003.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlBu23txIrnl7gPnX8S7fm1YrNwhtxG5AAPfDDCN1QxFtmuJw-239O4HzdPjvA8HqUw_EB_pPqrszDMOA_qJsm3zHku6zb2YNbo0cMxLO7iCdt6cd5khV2DSaipbuN0ALJd1IJdQ/s400/Culture+Res.003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline" /><b>Commonality</b><br />
Now let us overlap these narratives - see figure 4. Whilst there maybe disagreement on the meanings and the associations between terms, common core ideas appear in both narratives - that of control, of belonging, of collective and of safety. I've highlighted in blue and made those terms bold. There are also clear distinctions, in one narrative responsibility is to the individual and safety is strongly connected to economic wealth, in another the responsibility is to the collective and safety is more to do with engagement, being part of the faction. What we are slowly starting to visualise is the description (these are only narratives) of two distinct cultures with overlapping and common components.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<b>Figure 4 - Overlap</b></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdK2E_CgumeGVLuZRpc5P2IZ_nHnc3_6AOVonswyKSkzWewrH9a2bFEHAf_YgErx0xiFO2g0WACoO-qqF9XbB1rF_EE05RABb7QR6akeSQ2Aul1UlvKFbrNLjuyHimkrQyPshDgA/s1600/Culture+Res.004.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdK2E_CgumeGVLuZRpc5P2IZ_nHnc3_6AOVonswyKSkzWewrH9a2bFEHAf_YgErx0xiFO2g0WACoO-qqF9XbB1rF_EE05RABb7QR6akeSQ2Aul1UlvKFbrNLjuyHimkrQyPshDgA/s400/Culture+Res.004.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<b>Why does this matter?</b><br />
If we can visualise the landscape then we can start to learn patterns and determine ways of manipulating this environment to our favour. For example, we might wish to educate to create a common understanding of some idea or we may wish to emphasis or create new associations. From the narrative of the few then a key component is economic wealth however from the narrative of the many then the focus appears to be on safety within the group. Hence I might wish to establish an association between the collective and economic wealth and I can do this through a sense of belonging i.e. <i>“Make America Great Again”</i> or <i>“A Global and Prosperous Britain”</i>. What I am emphasising is the importance of economic wealth to the collective. My intentions might be to diminish collective responsibility and emphasise individual responsibility over time hence reinforcing my advantage but I cannot start with that message (see figure 5).</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<b>Figure 5 - Focus</b></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNF5fUz7TzPyEu02omwXzsQp35o9A-IM_vH6bx8U_Tc_c2XzEqDWVSO2_hr1rV8mrz_eWYC3IccJ8pcgRe0lhMAtb8D-oUdZOq9zQEuhUjxSdVDezoGTjRDKy3WAO8n-36qcY1Aw/s1600/Culture+Res.005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNF5fUz7TzPyEu02omwXzsQp35o9A-IM_vH6bx8U_Tc_c2XzEqDWVSO2_hr1rV8mrz_eWYC3IccJ8pcgRe0lhMAtb8D-oUdZOq9zQEuhUjxSdVDezoGTjRDKy3WAO8n-36qcY1Aw/s400/Culture+Res.005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
The point of the map is not that it is right but that we can discuss these issues, identify common components and start to learn how to change the landscape to our favour. We can start to add these components to our future map of culture, combining these elements with communication and challenge but before we do this we need to explore further including the areas of values, symbols, rituals and embedded knowledge.<br />
<br />
Oh, and if you're looking for the answer to brexit then I'm afraid you'll have to look elsewhere. I'm much more interested in the mechanics of culture and populations.</div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-86799805083017879042019-09-04T15:49:00.003+01:002019-09-04T15:49:45.666+01:00Mapping Culture
<style type="text/css">
p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica}
p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; min-height: 14.0px}
</style>
<br />
<div class="p1">
How do we map culture? What is culture? Will mapping a culture somehow effect it?</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
In one interview with a global company that relied upon the use of stories, an observation was made that was quite startling to begin with but obvious in hindsight - “maps are helping us shift our culture”. <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
One of the issues with using stories in decision making is that stories are often tied to an individual - the storyteller. We even teach people how to be a better storyteller as though the idea itself has more validity if only presented in the right way. This personalises decisions as it is not so much about whether we believe the story but whether we believe the story teller. Hence the conversation can quickly become political. One of the advantages of putting the idea down in a map is that we now focus on challenging the map. It depersonalises the discussion. It enables the company to have some difficult discussions about its future and to identify how its culture needs to change with less of the baggage of politics.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
The company itself faced a changing market but it was also in denial over the change. Part of the company, on the engineering side, could see the change coming but one part of the business, who happened to be the strongest storytellers, disagreed. The storytellers were winning and revolt was fermenting elsewhere due to frustration over the inaction in the face of perceived doom. This tension had exploded in the boardroom into quite heated arguments whilst at the same time defensive gang-like mentalities were evolving elsewhere. The threat for the company was a web giant was about to industrialise their main product area. The storytellers dismissed this as not being important because users would like their new product features. The engineering group disagreed. Whether conscious or not, exceptionally long powerpoint presentations were used by the storytellers to communicate their vision or more aptly “to beat doubters into submission”.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>In cases, this “death of thought by powerpoint” had become so bad that rules had been created to limit powerpoint presentation to no more than 2 hours and 60 slides of heavy text.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
The CEO of the company was more of a steward (a peace time CEO) rather than a war time CEO as depicted by ideas of great generals or conquerors. They saw their role as building consensus and brokering conversation rather than leading a charge. Unfortunately the consensus had broken down into hostility. Groups of engineers with strong local leaders were refusing to work with the business on projects that they considered “daft”.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>With revenue growth softening, any culture of safety and belonging within the organisation had been diminished by recent layoffs. Off-sites had become profanity laden blame meetings. However, despite this various groups at a low level from engineering to the business did work together in a highly collaborative fashion. Those groups were the gangs under strong local leaders.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
By a set of happy coincidences, a small part of the engineering function had recently introduced the use of maps. The maps had “quite a revolutionary impact” as one interview told me. The maps had depoliticised the problem. People were talking about and arguing to the map rather than each other. This had enabled the engineering group to explain their concerns, allowing for more challenge and discussion over ideas. It enabled them to explain how the market was changing, how the competitor was playing the game and how they would need to change. The maps have spread from the shop floor to the board room building communication, challenge and trust. They were having “positive effects along the way in all but one group”. The one group that strongly resisted this new way of communicating were the storytellers. They operated in a far more hierarchical manner, with strong control of the narrative and a view that we just needed a better story.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>The problem was always something else i.e.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>“engineering isn’t listening” or “the story was explained right”. The maps directly threatened their control over others, they allowed people to challenge and it was no longer possible to hide behind the fog of long powerpoint presentations and well spoken narrative.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Whilst the impacts of maps are talked about in glowing terms, the only point we should really note is that changing the means of communication can change our ability to safely challenge an idea, to express our concerns, to collaborate with and trust others. Different communication mechanisms can result in very different culture. As one commentator noted “you can't change the culture by diktat, it's a function of the experience of the people. If you want to change the culture you have to change the experience of those people. Maps enabled us to communicate with each other, we were finally discussing ideas and concerns by talking and listening rather than being presented at”.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
The introduction of maps can influence your culture but that should not be a surprise as some of the first parts of doctrine are communication, challenge and situational awareness. But does that mean a map of culture will impact culture and what is culture anyway? We’re no closer to answering that question other than to say the means of communication matter.</div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Kroeber, A.L., & Kluckhohn, C. (1952) said that by culture “we mean all those historically created designs for living, explicit and implicit, rational, irrational, and non-rational, which exist at any given time as potential guides for the behavior of people”. The key to this phrase is in the words “designs for living” as it highlights the interactions between people and this is where communication comes into play. It might seem trivially obvious but there is no culture without people and without communication. Instead there are just fragments of some past culture. Our focus therefore has to start with the interactions of people but which people? In the example above, we have two different cultures represented by two different groups. One was a top down driven, narrative focused, hierarchical and politicised culture that resisted challenge. The other was more of a bottom up, emerging local leaders, high degrees of challenge and communication that focused on the landscape. This is not to say that one group was wrong and the other right but simply to acknowledge that difference. Whilst maps had enabled different forms of communication and challenge, it was the two competing groups that had highlighted the differences.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div>
<div class="p2">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Hence, we’re going to continue to explore these issues of culture on our path to creating a map.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>So, we need something with different types of people, possibly highly political and with division between those groups. I can’t think of anywhere better to start than with Brexit itself.</div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-84487873212029233222019-07-31T18:17:00.003+01:002019-07-31T18:17:46.136+01:00What culture is right for you?<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>THE PROBLEM</b><br />During 2005-2006 with the implementation of a pioneer-settler-town planner structure in a high tech startup in Old Street, London (a barren wasteland of technology at that time), one noted observation was that the different components of the structure appeared to have different cultures. A more recent set of observations (2014-2016), through examination of company’s doctrine has shown us that the principles used in companies are not the same and not even necessarily uniform within a company and this appears to impact the adaptability of the organisation.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
To put it simply, if I take a list of universally useful principles derived from mapping (see figure 1) and then compare companies with a simple traffic light system (are you good at this or not) then differences exist (figure 2 and 3).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><i>Figure 1 - Doctrine, a list of universally useful principles.</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9E5LHfXhLeTtlz39oKJvUG5mcO16xmNNX1_w7Mp81I0I0YaD53TKcyzoUpiwREB6OavMLyLxDETWXa7Uz5xc7qZOrg1Nj-eSWat5qOvUZSsDAyohsd9aKlBt7jflE1fkyiynZ3g/s1600/New_wide.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9E5LHfXhLeTtlz39oKJvUG5mcO16xmNNX1_w7Mp81I0I0YaD53TKcyzoUpiwREB6OavMLyLxDETWXa7Uz5xc7qZOrg1Nj-eSWat5qOvUZSsDAyohsd9aKlBt7jflE1fkyiynZ3g/s400/New_wide.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><i>Figure 2 - Doctrine within a Web Giant</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgq4TmXACtovqx77e5GXAKiNAfemEkuSnGN2LVPLkFScIIwVofWDPs_j0J0beO1M34__u-2gnU_JuskxQ44Ba09Phw2FHlouBDvMwBUQBo9VfzhPQCdTNIbaHorhiEXDkF3Y16_Kg/s1600/New_wide.002.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgq4TmXACtovqx77e5GXAKiNAfemEkuSnGN2LVPLkFScIIwVofWDPs_j0J0beO1M34__u-2gnU_JuskxQ44Ba09Phw2FHlouBDvMwBUQBo9VfzhPQCdTNIbaHorhiEXDkF3Y16_Kg/s400/New_wide.002.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><i>Figure 3 - Doctrine within a Banking Giant</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0vm241PYQLFESauiza4GFYrzt_eW7xutEOABqhr0P5JjshQnOgu7VfqFXrHwmr1EhZe9WL-3iWlt3PTXJx3jBZnssR45WA4TJNE_3pkhl0I7fvtxFa_8Ldu1au5009ZMV3EVwug/s1600/New_wide.003.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0vm241PYQLFESauiza4GFYrzt_eW7xutEOABqhr0P5JjshQnOgu7VfqFXrHwmr1EhZe9WL-3iWlt3PTXJx3jBZnssR45WA4TJNE_3pkhl0I7fvtxFa_8Ldu1au5009ZMV3EVwug/s400/New_wide.003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Now, we cannot say which principles matter more and the doctrine list itself is constantly expanding. For example, as technology evolves then there is a constant co-evolution of practice and some of those practices are instead universally useful principles i.e. focus on user needs or use appropriate methods (i.e. XP vs Lean vs Six Sigma). </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
It's worth unpacking this a bit more. Practice itself tends to be tied with a specific implementation of an underlying systems i.e. best architectural practice for compute as a product included disaster recovery tests and capacity planning. The practice itself evolves - it doesn't appear fully formed - and hence we have novel, emerging, good and best practice i.e. all four stages of any evolving capital (see figure 4).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /><b><i>Figure 4 - The stages of capital and the labels we use.</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><i><br /></i></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBFwvdobNzg_LCZbZvXqrloziZ99TTiH9a0LTPTug65w0TqCWmC3oH3I6RLjMbhttnHOYNkS9bwTs51rpGbRTFvI-LpZioAJyA3rJ0dRzSqmBbdAxnzAX_71qEA0Lsa74DVRzgWg/s1600/New_wide.004.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBFwvdobNzg_LCZbZvXqrloziZ99TTiH9a0LTPTug65w0TqCWmC3oH3I6RLjMbhttnHOYNkS9bwTs51rpGbRTFvI-LpZioAJyA3rJ0dRzSqmBbdAxnzAX_71qEA0Lsa74DVRzgWg/s400/New_wide.004.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
When technology evolves, a novel practice can co-evolve due to some characteristic change. In the shift from Compute as a Product (stage III, see figure 4 above) to Compute as a Utility (stage IV, see figure 4 above) then the characteristic that changed was MTTR (mean time to recovery). In the old world, when a server went bang it could take months to get a new machine. In the new world, it can take seconds. This allowed for a new set of practices (which we labelled, overtime, as DevOps) and included design for failure, continuous deployment, distributed systems and chaos engines (random introduction of failure into the system). Such practices then themselves evolved and are now considered good (becoming best) architectural practice for compute as a utility.<br /><br />This is best seen with a map, hence I've highlighted the process in figure 5. It's worth noting that a major form of inertia to a change of an underlying technology are the best practices that existed with the less evolved technology. It's not just pre-existing capital (i.e. sunk cost) that causes a resistance to change (such as shift from product to utility) but also the practices associated with the past way of doing things.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><i>Figure 5 - A map of co-evolution with technology.</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSDvISi0Ssp0f5uvRbHGufoX2771Ulbfph7b_svGBlHSdy9rmgCXLdKbI52vx3SQLGl27D29fKyz3c0rPKOrveMb49XGRpZ-ezBNW51mZneXsDKLZk_Pvad2WmzTvn5QsToATmzg/s1600/New_wide.005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSDvISi0Ssp0f5uvRbHGufoX2771Ulbfph7b_svGBlHSdy9rmgCXLdKbI52vx3SQLGl27D29fKyz3c0rPKOrveMb49XGRpZ-ezBNW51mZneXsDKLZk_Pvad2WmzTvn5QsToATmzg/s400/New_wide.005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br />Sometimes, within the maelstrom of a changing technology there emerges a set of practices that transcend the context and are universally useful i.e. focus on user needs or think small i.e. know the details. Sometimes these practices are hidden in more context specific practices i.e thinking small hidden in both micro services and the use of cell based structures. These practices are not dependent upon the underlying technology and the specific context. These practices we call universally useful principles and doctrine is simply a collection of universally useful principles. The appearance of such principles is often by happenstance or as a process of people rethinking how we do stuff. The principles do have a contextual side to them i.e. my user needs are not necessarily the same as your user needs but overall a focus on user needs is seen as universally beneficial.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
However, what matters in competition is also your competition. Being hopeless at these principles doesn't matter as long as your competitors are the same. If we all ignore user needs then no-one gains any advantage. It only becomes a problem when a different style of company (such as the Web Giant) enters our industry (i.e. Banking). Finally, within a single company these principles aren't even uniform. Some parts may well have a different style of leadership and a different emphasis.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Overall, these statements should not be surprising - "cultures and related principles are different between organisations and within organisations and this may have an impact on performance". <br /><br />Unfortunately, this leads us to a question of “What culture is right for you”. The problem with that question is in its unpacking.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>WHAT CULTURE IS RIGHT FOR YOU?</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Firstly, we have to define what culture is in order to distinguish between what maybe right or maybe wrong? In 1952, the American anthropologists, Kroeber and Kluckhohn, critically reviewed concepts and definitions of culture in the academic world and compiled a list of 164 different definitions. Any review of popular business press shows the term is equally, if not more so nebulous today. Despite this, we assign almost mystical properties and powers to “culture” with memes such as “culture eats strategy for breakfast”.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The subject matter itself is complicated in terms of many different components that influence it from learned to inherited behaviours, from both social to personal constructs, from layers to manifestations, from determinism to relativism, from the semantic to symbolic history. It is also complex in that many of its attributes appear emergent as with many evolving processes. The field is also littered in business press with many inadequate concepts that do no hold up well to scrutiny such as the idea that culture is homogenous (as in one thing), that it is evenly distributed among members of any social group (including organisations), that individuals possess just a single culture or that culture is simply custom or that somehow culture is fixed rather than transient and timeless.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
At best, we can say that culture contains many things from experience, learned behaviour, knowledge, meanings, relationships, hierarchies (i.e. power structures), capabilities (i.e. skills), values, possessions, aspects of belief (i.e. ethical position relative to others), principles and attitudes. It has many layers from the individual to the group to the organisation to the nation. It has many perspectives which may vary with context.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In terms of the question, the problems with it can be stated as follows :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
1) with the word “culture” and its definition.<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
2) with the words “what is right” as this requires some measure of what is right and acceptance that there may be many rights and many wrongs both of which may change with context.<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
3) with the words “for you” as there are many perspectives. There is also the derived implication that culture can be directed because there is no point in knowing what's right if you can't get there. The issue here, is that many parts may only be ever emergent i.e. we might be able to nudge but can't force a direction.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
This mess of a subject however does not prevent a thriving and lucrative industry of self-help guides, performance value matrices, eight or ten step processes and declarations of what makes a successful culture - short term wins, empowering employees, establishing a sense of urgency, communicating the vision, from good to great matrices etc. Most disturbingly, many of the characteristics described as associated with success often through positive case examples can equally be found in those that failed. This also leads to a notorious problem of outcome bias where we adopt some approach simply because others we see as successful have used that approach and finally confirmation bias where the evidence that such an approach works is that others are now adopting it. This seems to lead to an endless barrage of memes and the desire to get "big names" to bless some approach. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
From my personal experience, the net result of an extensive reading of business press left me with one of two paths, either join some cult of belief around the latest management guru or throw my hands up in horror and retire to the marsh I inhabit. Fortunately, anthropology came to the rescue. The single distinguishing difference between anthropology and the business press when it comes to the issue of culture is that anthropology is observation led and focuses to minute detail on observation whereas the popular business press seems to start with a hypothesis and find case examples to fit it.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
This question of observation provides me with a route into the field, because maps are all about observation. The very start of the strategy cycle (figure 6) is the first O of OODA - observation, from which contexts can be learned and patterns discovered then reapplied.<br /><br /><b><i>Figure 6 - The Strategy Cycle.</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifenA6g_NHrYv2VsrhrbE9JGD2h9f2SeU1EbGaHaShTKauAbx9olov3JtVCoZcXbjtViuRdOOr5z8opp9O4S4eollxtOocGqVMUC-RnkmLS50KIpc7DPcQlAq3drJvexi6q71lrA/s1600/New_wide.006.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifenA6g_NHrYv2VsrhrbE9JGD2h9f2SeU1EbGaHaShTKauAbx9olov3JtVCoZcXbjtViuRdOOr5z8opp9O4S4eollxtOocGqVMUC-RnkmLS50KIpc7DPcQlAq3drJvexi6q71lrA/s400/New_wide.006.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>CAN WE MAP CULTURE?</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
It's not just activities and practice that evolve. From figure 4 above, we could map knowledge as a form of capital. As a primitive example, I've added a quick map of population genetics using the knowledge axis. Now, you might disagree with how evolved the components are, you might add additional components that are missing but that's the point of maps. Our evolving higher order systems are built upon evolving lower order components whether activities, practices, data or knowledge.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><i>Figure 7 - Population Genetics as Knowledge.</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQWXPxM5LnB55nJiqFmZzCjx8eNiIDefBCObuw5iFerQdzfMia-i6J0wfB7miXDNziGh_onR41bEH3-Tg37hIaMBcY4oUG7vA0awKn9jcA0hIVK1ANmE9Y6SOeJz4J035GRK0Wog/s1600/New_wide.005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQWXPxM5LnB55nJiqFmZzCjx8eNiIDefBCObuw5iFerQdzfMia-i6J0wfB7miXDNziGh_onR41bEH3-Tg37hIaMBcY4oUG7vA0awKn9jcA0hIVK1ANmE9Y6SOeJz4J035GRK0Wog/s400/New_wide.005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In the same way, we have to accept that culture has many components rather than being one thing. It is a construct built on constructs. The question is, can those components be mapped or can mapping help? We already know that mapping has proved useful in terms of understanding a competitive landscape, investigation of practices, determining what appear to be commonly useful principles (i.e. doctrine) and examination of other forms of capital (i.e. knowledge or data). Maps inherently have perspective and many layers can be used from the individual to the nation state. Maps are designed around the concepts of evolution and for this reason maps can assist with both the complicated and the complex (emergent behaviours). Maps are a context aware mechanism of communication and learning for both past actions and potential future behaviours. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br />At first glance, these concepts of context and of universal patterns appear to chime well with the ideas of culture. We already have some fair advanced thinking on landscape, on doctrine and on inertia. We can even expose attitude through organisational structures such as Pioneers - Settler - Town Planner. But there are limitation with maps. The technique is imperfect (all maps, in order to be useful, have to be imperfect representations). We also know that maps themselves can change behaviour, from the tackling of bias to inertia. Maps have the potential to be a visible artefact of culture and as much a part of the landscape as a means of visualising it. The most severe limitation is that maps depend upon evolution of capital.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br />However, ideas, the meanings between them and even our values and ethical constructs evolve. In Edgar Schein’s Organisational Culture : A dynamic model he directly refers to the changing nature of value from espoused values to assumptions to unconscious responses. <br /><br />In mapping terms, a similar evolutionary scale can be acquired by combining the labels from different forms of capital (across practices, data and knowledge). Taking figure 4 above, I've highlighted the following labels (figure 8) to provide a scale of :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Stage I: Concept (and observation) - an espoused value.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Stage II : Emerging - the evolution of an espoused value as an emerging theme.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Stage III : Converging - the conflict between emerging themes to form an assumption or an array of assumptions</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Stage IV : Accepted - the unconscious response when the once espoused value has become an accepted norm and taken for granted.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /><b><i>Figure 8 - Labels for ethical values.</i></b><br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpSRoiFc5GXgzZ0lcde-hxZO-Jhp1PuyB90D7fbLvUar1s7J0TE6pRK6NG7-m2P8gh_rDjL03UmgOlPt8uA82IByzneatOe2QfDOQdhHgL8UnI-YCwdk8y_sGQo2sS6kvW6qrbTA/s1600/New_wide.007.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpSRoiFc5GXgzZ0lcde-hxZO-Jhp1PuyB90D7fbLvUar1s7J0TE6pRK6NG7-m2P8gh_rDjL03UmgOlPt8uA82IByzneatOe2QfDOQdhHgL8UnI-YCwdk8y_sGQo2sS6kvW6qrbTA/s400/New_wide.007.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
As with any form of capital, we can simply map this and combine it with other forms of capital. Using the ubiquitous cup of tea example, we can add to the discussion not only the physical components, any practices, any knowledge, any flow of capital (i.e. finance) but also considerations of value and ethics such as fair trading or green energy (see figure 9). In this figure I've changed the x-axis (in red) to the labels used for discussing ethical capital.<br /><br /><b><i>Figure 9 - Expanding the cup of tea.</i></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><i><br /></i></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlnu38BpNFH0tId3J6OJo0y3wAyplrpj6uy7s4L-0Q8xjtMAQfn-8pfA6WvgIoBWRJzTqFzF3BWqDIjjfhtRRQf7vjWRkF_ooV7EKHasegyasiRrRct9L4Y-m7kL_Z2SiK1sRtIQ/s1600/New_wide.008.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlnu38BpNFH0tId3J6OJo0y3wAyplrpj6uy7s4L-0Q8xjtMAQfn-8pfA6WvgIoBWRJzTqFzF3BWqDIjjfhtRRQf7vjWRkF_ooV7EKHasegyasiRrRct9L4Y-m7kL_Z2SiK1sRtIQ/s400/New_wide.008.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;">Since the labels on the x-axis are simply notations for stage I to IV of capital, I have provided the alternative labels in the figure above but normally, I just use the labels for activities (from genesis to utility) as in figure 10 whether I'm talking about activities, practice, data, knowledge or even ethical values. This provides a good enough representation for me.</span><br style="text-align: justify;" /><br style="text-align: justify;" /><b style="text-align: justify;"><i>Figure 10 - A normal map including ethical values.</i></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b style="text-align: justify;"><i><br /></i></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhfLTNlLDDMDL_2OxWtP4c2oglH3VdEjxpt9KriYZRM6C21rvfj71OVg556d3FZGM-wRXNOYCySTj5Tv_NSeIdytfCVclRH7QiSXhG0wU6B1QZKqDIHoi449xNTTnWZ7bgZEHcQQ/s1600/New_wide.009.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhfLTNlLDDMDL_2OxWtP4c2oglH3VdEjxpt9KriYZRM6C21rvfj71OVg556d3FZGM-wRXNOYCySTj5Tv_NSeIdytfCVclRH7QiSXhG0wU6B1QZKqDIHoi449xNTTnWZ7bgZEHcQQ/s400/New_wide.009.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Since mapping itself is derived from the strategy cycle, it is inherent in maps that the existing state is derived from looping around the cycle i.e. past action informs the present. This would mean that culture (as with other forms of capital) in an organisation would not only be a set of evolving components that interact but also a consequence of past actions (i.e. loops). The choices of today being limited by past contexts and decisions. This means that culture cannot be measured against some standard because it is dependant upon the landscape, varies with history and is inherently emergent in the same way that strategy is. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
However, this doesn’t mean patterns don’t exist and hence the same climatic patterns (rules of the game), context specific patterns (methods of manipulating certain contexts) and universally useful principles (i.e. doctrine) can exist. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Finally, mapping does distinguish between the needs (it describe a chain of needs in a landscape) versus the want (i.e. often how we wish to influence or manipulate the landscape). This difference of wants and needs is also present in culture i.e. the a set of generic wants of the poor and the middle class might be identical but the needs can be very different. All has a cultural bearing when it comes to describing a landscape.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>NEXT STEPS</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Though all maps are an imperfect representation of a space, they have uses in communication, learning and pattern recognition. Some of the components of culture (whether principles or attitudes or ethical values) can be mapped with the assumption of values evolving as described above. Some of the components of today's culture are a consequence of past choices in past landscape. In the same way that we have technical debt to past choices and inertia to change from past success, we should also see cultural debt and inertia to change from ethical capital.<br /><br />Of course, I've specifically focused on activities (one type of capital) with a particular reference to technology in this discussion whereas co-evolution can occur with many forms of capital i.e. co-evolution of practices (and hence the appearance of principles) can occur due to evolving knowledge or data or even practices themselves (in a delightful recursive twist).<br /><br />This, however, is a dangerous line of inquiry. As we already know, competitive markets can be easily mapped and manipulated through gameplay from a local industry to nation state. The problem is not can we map and manipulate the culture of a local organisation to create some favourable change as we can simply do this by giving someone the list of doctrine and ask them to examine the company. The problem is can we manipulate the ethical values of a wider system such as a nation state once we have mapped it?<br /><br />For over a decade, I've been hesitant to explain more on this topic. Times have changed though. Mapping has spread enough that I should open the door a bit more.</div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-56279716435803398492019-05-20T09:13:00.001+01:002019-05-21T18:07:19.354+01:00A fond and final farewell<div style="text-align: justify;">
It is with great sadness that I write on the sudden and unexpected passing of Martin Burns. Death has become a frequent visitor in my world as of late, each time cruelly taking a friend and in selfish terms, making my life the poorer for it. I will miss Martin, his humour, his graciousness, his willingness to debate, to foil, to challenge, to question and so much more. I will also miss the occasional game of werewolf.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
I have many fond memories of Martin, from LASCOT to SAFe, from dinner to party, from that occasional quiet time when we just got to chat. Oh, and chat we would across political spectrums to project methodologies to the Eurovision song contest. We not only agreed but disagreed on many a thing but that was the true magnificence of Martin. We could debate, discuss and always remain friends. Never a cross word, just robust challenge. I will miss that. I will miss his support and his kind words of encouragement.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
His jovial smile, his laugh, his mannerism, his character, his love of Scotland, his love of life. I enjoy the memories, I'm sad at the parting and I'm angry. O' Death, get to fuck yer wee man, this was a low blow. But then, that is not Martin. He would celebrate life and I will celebrate his.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
I will miss Martin. I will miss a friend.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
My thoughts at this time are with Lucy and the family. </div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-14277012406178743552018-10-31T19:04:00.003+00:002018-10-31T19:14:11.506+00:00What is an expert(draft)<br />
<br />
I often see examples where people add characteristics to a map or use new definitions for one of the axis. There's nothing wrong with this and I want to encourage people to explore. One recent effort by Manish has the axis as Rookie to Expert which leads to the question - what is an expert?<br />
<br />
A map (and I have an entire creative commons book on this, if you want to know more) is a map of capital. The nodes are stocks of capital and the lines are flows of capital. On the x-axis, I normally use the labels for activities - genesis, custom, product (+rental), commodity (+utility). But you can map not only activities but practices, data and knowledge. We use different terms for each stage of evolution of these forms of capital which for reference I've included in the table below.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipEf19RAk6zqzfGwUInp1Vqf67DapLVr8Uw83D_TqVEj6uK8ZC3Mk54A20MmAYdJDTLGcA626lWfeNUMC4jYfWZMoX5UV0oDYkRFLb1PohLG3BULGu9wBKPlCiK6jrfEdCRdFPoA/s1600/New_wide.001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipEf19RAk6zqzfGwUInp1Vqf67DapLVr8Uw83D_TqVEj6uK8ZC3Mk54A20MmAYdJDTLGcA626lWfeNUMC4jYfWZMoX5UV0oDYkRFLb1PohLG3BULGu9wBKPlCiK6jrfEdCRdFPoA/s400/New_wide.001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
All of these forms of capital have common characteristics as they evolve. These characteristics are captured in the cheat sheet, which even after nearly a decade, I still find to be a useful tool though to be honest, it's embedded deep in my mind these days.</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaKC-nN16tTXYzAl3PEzmLeadM-iZrhzERt9sY6sf8mfvEfKLbTYRzV2TV-XfA6bDJCCbzsSUYXuFNtx-3RrHEwZwZgaTgbsJGysuzbfLQIM2ykmJlJ9snYW-KqFZVJeGf3ChVHw/s1600/New_wide.002.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaKC-nN16tTXYzAl3PEzmLeadM-iZrhzERt9sY6sf8mfvEfKLbTYRzV2TV-XfA6bDJCCbzsSUYXuFNtx-3RrHEwZwZgaTgbsJGysuzbfLQIM2ykmJlJ9snYW-KqFZVJeGf3ChVHw/s400/New_wide.002.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
So what has this got to do with expertise? Well, let us take a grossly simple map of healthcare starting with the public and assuming some form of Government sponsored healthcare system. One of the components is treatment but treatment isn't a static thing. There is constant range of new treatments produced whilst the once remarkable becomes routine, even dull. </div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_TXpEwQZWOn5zVWlHvwOhCZm0puyeZEN7Eb7Kg6vxr9RzjQRQ2Rc-V0y6aQs_AQKUZRY6sc6khRxVe5yT1Swyrw8E-5fogLx_i0VQqEgkGsw5Jdoi-CHCV1NSXwf1DihzpOvgmg/s1600/New_wide.003.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_TXpEwQZWOn5zVWlHvwOhCZm0puyeZEN7Eb7Kg6vxr9RzjQRQ2Rc-V0y6aQs_AQKUZRY6sc6khRxVe5yT1Swyrw8E-5fogLx_i0VQqEgkGsw5Jdoi-CHCV1NSXwf1DihzpOvgmg/s400/New_wide.003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
So, what do we mean by expertise? Well an expert could be someone who is experienced in a broad range of treatments. They would be a generalist or an expert in general practice.</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidB-_9l8tS1KfTN6cxvtU2Y9IgRvSCgv2a7vXszMDcgcmjRCtslXFmXJlMmZzIIrJb1xORM8QzDoa4Qflpvl4oX8iKcebI6dnGimQoj3sYlxazWgpGMnQjHGB_sdjVmMEKlhG1YQ/s1600/New_wide.004.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidB-_9l8tS1KfTN6cxvtU2Y9IgRvSCgv2a7vXszMDcgcmjRCtslXFmXJlMmZzIIrJb1xORM8QzDoa4Qflpvl4oX8iKcebI6dnGimQoj3sYlxazWgpGMnQjHGB_sdjVmMEKlhG1YQ/s400/New_wide.004.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
But an expert could equally be someone who has specialised in a particular area e.g. the novel study of epigenetic cures or even appendicitis. This person would be a specialist<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicQJ8h5E57ntOXbuWYL5qKeuBjTorzZC6VrDrYbYBIxswzQyimZRT-VqQo0yGog9Qpcz_vp5RihgAolGjRzNiywRmvJiVGG45HSGOB0y1J8vrqjbQnnFZQ3DqCx1LZfs-zV9rkvQ/s1600/New_wide.006.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicQJ8h5E57ntOXbuWYL5qKeuBjTorzZC6VrDrYbYBIxswzQyimZRT-VqQo0yGog9Qpcz_vp5RihgAolGjRzNiywRmvJiVGG45HSGOB0y1J8vrqjbQnnFZQ3DqCx1LZfs-zV9rkvQ/s400/New_wide.006.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
What is important to understand is that every node on a map can in fact be itself a map. For example, if we expand out Appendicitis into its own map (see below), there will be many components involved in its treatment. A specialist would have in depth knowledge of each of those components.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzNwtDlnswV_v1jxQwQVTJI5kfEEkPebwVDLN7LsFbALAPn8mrP26OKxt6GOVFJYWLZfUItMAu3cS22u4jzFMhA4u4_BXSIir3lAzrk6rx44apkd7BOFoYricN44pj4OBDGSEuBg/s1600/New_wide.005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzNwtDlnswV_v1jxQwQVTJI5kfEEkPebwVDLN7LsFbALAPn8mrP26OKxt6GOVFJYWLZfUItMAu3cS22u4jzFMhA4u4_BXSIir3lAzrk6rx44apkd7BOFoYricN44pj4OBDGSEuBg/s400/New_wide.005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Now, you might ask me why the nodes on the last map have no labels. Well, it's because I don't know what they are. I've just added some node and links as a way of saying - there will be components involved but I have no idea what they are. If you actually want a map for it then you'll need to talk to an expert on the subject.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
The only people who can actually map a space are those with expertise in that space. In the same way, the only people who can draw you a map of London (even a crude one) are people who have either been to London (physically or virtually) or seen a map.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
The beauty of maps is we can have many experts (both generalists and specialists), sharing and communicating with each other through the use of maps and hence improving them. This leads to best thing about maps. For a rookie like me, then a map is the fastest way I know of bringing me upto speed of a complex and complicated environment. It's also the fastest way of discovering just how little I know.</div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-27425951932335319862018-10-30T16:43:00.000+00:002018-10-30T17:01:14.660+00:00Rebooting GDS<div style="text-align: justify;">
(draft)</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
There has been a lot of chatter recently about rebooting GDS (Government Digital Service). Don't get me wrong, GDS has made mistakes but some were actually my fault. I made a terrible assumption in writing the "Better for Less" paper to do with mapping and how much people were aware of it. In hindsight, I should have pushed mapping into that paper rather than leave it as background noise.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
So, in order to avoid making this mistake again, I want to extend this question of rebooting GDS and tackle the scenario of you're newly minted CxO (CIO, CEO et al) or Dept Head or - it doesn't really matter. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The first thing you're probably going to feel is a bit of panic. Who put me in charge? I know there is the temptation to stamp your mark on organisation, to create that strategy which will propel the company to fortune but I'm going to ask you to hold your horses. The Titanic might be sinking and we've got to plug the massive great big hole before messing around with the deckchairs or plotting a new course.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
To begin this journey, I'm going to introduce you to the strategy cycle (figure 1). It's fairly simple :-</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
1) Have a <b>purpose</b>, a moral imperative.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
2) <b>Observe</b> the landscape you're operating in and the climatic patterns that impact it (in terms of business we call these economic patterns). These patterns are useful for anticipation of change.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
3) <b>Orient</b> your organisation around the landscape using basic principles (known as doctrine).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
4) <b>Decide</b> where you're going to play, game the landscape to your favour and <b>act</b>. This is collectively known as leadership.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
5) It's a <b>cycle</b> - every time you or anyone else acts it can change your purpose, the landscape, where you need to act etc.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib9sfvDJ_jAnGVsZqjnrBUNYatY5GmBo7ROuxzt4A-5vMiubmOYHJ6CqU2jodCZZvgwCu1wSvgBcT6EsQxxaD4VPHkbrRtj9VvRxqP-fo5WriNUgUeCvhge9HtYatghRGFZLlhJQ/s1600/IM001.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib9sfvDJ_jAnGVsZqjnrBUNYatY5GmBo7ROuxzt4A-5vMiubmOYHJ6CqU2jodCZZvgwCu1wSvgBcT6EsQxxaD4VPHkbrRtj9VvRxqP-fo5WriNUgUeCvhge9HtYatghRGFZLlhJQ/s400/IM001.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
I'm going to assume you don't have a map of your business landscape. You might have things like business process maps, systems maps, mind maps and a host of other things called maps but none of these actually are maps. The odds are, you're blind to the environment. But that's ok, so is almost everyone else.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
When it comes to using the strategy cycle then is these early stages we're going to skip climatic patterns, anticipation, gameplay, leadership and all that good stuff. Instead, we're going to focus on doctrine and how to stop the organisation from actively harming itself. We're going to plug the Titanic! We're just going to loop around adding doctrine.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgp2auIhE1DEkRxVPcVckc8xSjWNP5qQonZwEy8QYZfJW9JNQDKFH5tsvI5foeCCTJCzd6DF1UrDGBuenVYcr1dcFDrqYArveq8TVCTTTyZZNCq4ikilLZT4ATX9xhqE0gtl4Y1eg/s1600/IMG001B.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgp2auIhE1DEkRxVPcVckc8xSjWNP5qQonZwEy8QYZfJW9JNQDKFH5tsvI5foeCCTJCzd6DF1UrDGBuenVYcr1dcFDrqYArveq8TVCTTTyZZNCq4ikilLZT4ATX9xhqE0gtl4Y1eg/s400/IMG001B.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Now, there are forty patterns that make up doctrine. These are all universally useful to any organisation but not all doctrine is made the same i.e. some is more important than others. Hence, I've provided a phased implementation of doctrine and we're going to start with principles in phase I (marked in blue). These principles are challenge assumption, know your users and know your user needs.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXZegtA6QodUBwJ5yYEys-GyxqGkxNIQ_STdStUSi7QdI11Q80iCJtpEpabSGYt73Tt_D7vpwZUmMl-Ay6dd0hb6OMhHPcuVgdnM5mXHidPO5CBwVQuHqTO6d1Wr2h7E_5Wxb65Q/s1600/IM002.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXZegtA6QodUBwJ5yYEys-GyxqGkxNIQ_STdStUSi7QdI11Q80iCJtpEpabSGYt73Tt_D7vpwZUmMl-Ay6dd0hb6OMhHPcuVgdnM5mXHidPO5CBwVQuHqTO6d1Wr2h7E_5Wxb65Q/s400/IM002.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
But how to introduce challenge in the organisation? Doesn't challenge already exist? Why challenge?</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Ok, for most organisations you have endless lists of committees - global architecture group, business strategy forum, policy committees etc. They are generally full of well meaning people but there's usually not a lot of actual challenging going on and communication is nearly always suboptimal. If the organisation is of any size it'll have lots of waste, failed efforts, bias and duplication but no-one can really tell you how bad the problem is. When most CxOs stumble on this, they often want to take stock.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Taking stock of a large estate (whether IT or otherwise) is usually a pretty daunting task and the problem we're trying to solve is not "what we have" but "don't do silly things". Hence we really don't need to know how much waste we have, we just want less of it. To solve this we're going to introduce a group which will become a future bedrock of strategy in the organisation. That group is <b>Spend Control</b>.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<b><u>The beach-head of Challenge</u></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
The purpose of spend control is simply to challenge what we're doing. It's important to remember that it doesn't control the budgets. Those budgets belong to other departments. Spend control simply says that if we're going to spend more than £25K on something then that has to be presented us and exposed to a bit of challenge. To begin with, spend control should simply ask - who are the users, what are their needs and by what metric will we measure those needs?</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
You can even reinforce this by going around leaving posters of "What is the User Need?" or sticking it on the back of your phone as per Liam Maxwell (former UK Gov CTO)</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfe1uQiCXlxkd80xpa98L7ijbTfDqRlT3895x8icX2-rFCEQQRmK-CqfBAy2phuZ7Nbc2YX0vFzNuab3_ewlL8sU907WCPUk14oenLHTnBf6YhxhNhV4eI5GCdfA9G770ushW83w/s1600/IM003.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfe1uQiCXlxkd80xpa98L7ijbTfDqRlT3895x8icX2-rFCEQQRmK-CqfBAy2phuZ7Nbc2YX0vFzNuab3_ewlL8sU907WCPUk14oenLHTnBf6YhxhNhV4eI5GCdfA9G770ushW83w/s400/IM003.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;">Who are the users, what are their needs and by what metric will we measure those needs - surely everyone does this? You'd be surprised. Last time I counted, less than 20% of organisation could clearly identify their users and far less could describe their users needs. You might be lucky and be in one of those exceptional organisations but chance are, you're not. </span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
So, how does spend control work? Well<span style="text-align: left;">, a project owner turns up at spend control with a project that they've got budget to spend £100K on. Spend control asks who are the users, what are their needs and how we will measure this? The response can often be "I don't have a clue, it's only a £100K". </span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Well, spend control's job is to ask the project owner to find out. But remember, the project owner is also the budget holder and so they can simply ignore spend control on the grounds that "It's a waste of my time". You'd be amazed at how many people try to get exceptions to spend control because they're too important to be challenged on basic questions.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Let us assume the project owner does the work anyway. They might be successful but the problem for the project owner is should something go wrong then there is paper trail that they refused to ask the most basic of questions. This is the other side of challenge - you need to ask the questions and audit what happened. Now, what is happening here is spend control is not only building up a picture of things we might be doing (the projects coming into spend control), the users we serve, their needs and how we measure success but it's also building up a picture of which project owners listen, accept the challenge, succeed in projects and also understand their users. This is all good stuff.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
At some point, maybe six months or a year into the process, then spend control needs to have a showdown with one of those failing project owners. You need to emphasise that people can't keep on just doing stuff without understanding the users, their needs and some basic metrics to measure against. This showdown is rarely comfortable but you need to push for no exceptions to the idea of being challenged. Once you're there, the beach-head of challenge has been established then we can start to ramp things up.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<b><u><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />Introducing Awareness.</u></b></div>
<div>
<b><u><br /></u></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
At this stage, we going to extend spend control to ask more questions. We're going to go beyond just simply users and their needs but start to look at what is needed to build a project. I've highlighted the extended set of phase I doctrine that we're going after in blue.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfSn6jBk6x5EKiyVQ7BiU9V9e461BFj9jCipJOXgYxAAdF9Q2pQmSkms2lF9o6BymJ9jw6kqbWOrmfb9Y-pqGgjG3DIbbnnfhyphenhyphenIvQHbjVcTP8P-02DZtfmaZ9ynMo38KdA8XECfw/s1600/IM010.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfSn6jBk6x5EKiyVQ7BiU9V9e461BFj9jCipJOXgYxAAdF9Q2pQmSkms2lF9o6BymJ9jw6kqbWOrmfb9Y-pqGgjG3DIbbnnfhyphenhyphenIvQHbjVcTP8P-02DZtfmaZ9ynMo38KdA8XECfw/s400/IM010.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
The first thing spend control is going to ask people for is a map. This is a fairly simple exercise, you simply start with the users, their needs and then work out the components involved in making that happen. You do this through a chain of needs i.e. this needs that which needs that etc. The tricky bit with a map is you ask people to also put down how evolved the components are. There's an entire book on this, so I won't repeat that here. I've provided a very simple map for a tea shop.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWpbiTkSUIFMX0dQdkdL-0YBFr34rDjJz-rhVeyK68HTCCQFPKRXVSxfx7WYIKTA3bKNpA4tYP2Cs3FHYRCN_1lStM13odyvayuEuf8wukVtCah9dz4VBcaciIci-nJLrysd7NOw/s1600/IM004.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWpbiTkSUIFMX0dQdkdL-0YBFr34rDjJz-rhVeyK68HTCCQFPKRXVSxfx7WYIKTA3bKNpA4tYP2Cs3FHYRCN_1lStM13odyvayuEuf8wukVtCah9dz4VBcaciIci-nJLrysd7NOw/s400/IM004.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
The point of the map is we can challenge more i.e. there's a lot of components missing from this map for a tea shop from chairs to sit on to a method of taking payment. By sharing a map with others we can often find basic things that have been missed. We can also challenge in terms of what we're doing i.e. why are we custom building kettles?<br />
<br />
These maps are in fact maps of capital (with flows and stocks). So we can add metrics to the map. Each line is a bidirectional exchange of capital i.e. the user gets a physical flow (the cup of tea) in return for a financial flow (money to pay for the cup of tea). The capital itself can be physical, financial, social, risk, information ... all sorts of things and yes we can build P&Ls from this.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZP3fTAHsInRl8AQuevEpET9jlL2jvzCDqaCMO8IaYANB5G-Zi8l00GYQsKBBsjDSX0M-Gh-4kPLgYNdEP33VN371nqAf1IJOHKc7b5dPUYxAqc5-11TTvZsSAXiciJ0TMpI6SNg/s1600/IM005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZP3fTAHsInRl8AQuevEpET9jlL2jvzCDqaCMO8IaYANB5G-Zi8l00GYQsKBBsjDSX0M-Gh-4kPLgYNdEP33VN371nqAf1IJOHKc7b5dPUYxAqc5-11TTvZsSAXiciJ0TMpI6SNg/s400/IM005.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
The point is, we're now asking who are the users, what are their needs, how will we measure this, what components are involved, where is the money going and challenging across the lot. As we get more maps, we can even discover duplication between maps i.e. we're building the same thing twice. The worst I've found in Government is 118 times. The worst I've found in the private sector is a Finance company that has managed to rebuild the same thing over 1,000 times. Do remember, it's not because people are daft but because of suboptimal communication. People just don't realise they are doing this.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Let us repeat those steps just to be clear.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b>Step 1</b> - <i>Focus on the user needs</i> which means you also need to identify the users.</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5bKabN_2DZhf6sSWKEZiU8upTSh7XvOUEvaP3567OqiYfUCLCeyL1sO2dhmMEctNCWPtWWJe-fyvBAEAQ1doAONk3wVMHkXOVyxL4CTlyINHGojn0EMHwvxPce_g6Rlih2kFiYw/s1600/IM006.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5bKabN_2DZhf6sSWKEZiU8upTSh7XvOUEvaP3567OqiYfUCLCeyL1sO2dhmMEctNCWPtWWJe-fyvBAEAQ1doAONk3wVMHkXOVyxL4CTlyINHGojn0EMHwvxPce_g6Rlih2kFiYw/s400/IM006.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<b>Step 2</b> - <i>Know the details</i> i.e. what is involved in building the thing. This allows others to challenge, find missing components and create a common image which can be communicated with others.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEk66ArvDeruXPH28D92CWrjq1nfXovYY-Hmrlny6aQ5EAMXv4nZYAVQBrt67hd2s4ICoNkraTeuDDbLbE2CKekWIFRzG2qScwL09i7e8amjTFaHSZf2Vu96aoB3r5iATMvNgmxg/s1600/IM007.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEk66ArvDeruXPH28D92CWrjq1nfXovYY-Hmrlny6aQ5EAMXv4nZYAVQBrt67hd2s4ICoNkraTeuDDbLbE2CKekWIFRzG2qScwL09i7e8amjTFaHSZf2Vu96aoB3r5iATMvNgmxg/s400/IM007.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b>Step 3</b> - <i>Reduce duplication</i>. When we have several maps then we usually start finding duplication rather rapidly. In general, I hold a view based upon experience that over 90% of the P&L of most organisations is waste. It's a far bigger problem than people realise and I'm genuinely surprised by organisations that have any sort of handle on this problem.</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhChWqJp5mxyKTjCB8xB8EqfctV9CGtJj3d5Tpp9Z9rM9pTls10a-9iGI-HPPoox3KCM4CfqF_O280g3kHSuO9nz2fpCMEYGJUKbKSM_uH2o_ZuAtk8Irf36cug2mKl2rxuDwrseQ/s1600/IM008.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhChWqJp5mxyKTjCB8xB8EqfctV9CGtJj3d5Tpp9Z9rM9pTls10a-9iGI-HPPoox3KCM4CfqF_O280g3kHSuO9nz2fpCMEYGJUKbKSM_uH2o_ZuAtk8Irf36cug2mKl2rxuDwrseQ/s400/IM008.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<b>Step 4</b> - <i>Reduce bias</i>. I can't tell you the number of times I've come across organisations custom building what is a commodity because it's so common that it is normal. I've had people looking to invest in robotics (with lovely business cases provided to show an ROI for the capital investment within 12 months) to improve the efficiency of some workflow for a problem that only occurs because they're custom building something which is a commodity. In this case, the item was custom built racks, the problem was standard servers didn't fit into their custom built racks requiring people to remove cases, drill holes and add new plates. The "proposed solution" was to replace people with robots. The actual solution was to stop making custom built racks and start using standard racks. This sort of stuff is very common.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
Hence, use the maps to challenge and question - why are we custom building this thing?</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_4n2FEtPYoS79hN8VylyHOqRetr_uvw_mfmOLm9M-qyPS9vhcRBCJ9NlAnUIfz6uhzCKPolnQM_ddAdO19pKwzdhypU_M5th-EJfv2KN8KqzkEjB9bN25XXN24Hy2uXX2JRmemA/s1600/IM009.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_4n2FEtPYoS79hN8VylyHOqRetr_uvw_mfmOLm9M-qyPS9vhcRBCJ9NlAnUIfz6uhzCKPolnQM_ddAdO19pKwzdhypU_M5th-EJfv2KN8KqzkEjB9bN25XXN24Hy2uXX2JRmemA/s400/IM009.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;">At this point, you want to give the changes another six months or a year to bake into the process. Spend control should be challenging across a much broader spectrum of things from the user needs, to the components involved, to duplication, to bias and where we're spending money. The process of making a map is fairly quick - a few hours or so - but expect more resistance. Everyone likes to talk about the importance of challenge but no-one actually likes to be challenged. Expect lots of demands for exceptions and why this is too complex to go through the process and a host of other excuses. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;">Don't get disheartened. In some cases, spend control will be able to really help others by showing them that what they're building is also being built by others. This will enable people to focus their efforts on stuff that matters, to get rid of the common (the boring) or even identify opportunities across multiple maps for building common services. But there will always be those who think they're too important. Just remember to record the advice given, those who ignored and what the end result of the project was. Build that evidence base. I'm afraid you'll probably need a few more confrontations with failed projects before it becomes accepted that challenge is not a bad idea.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;">What is also happening behind the scenes is you're also now building a view of the landscape you're competing in. All those maps are connected, part of a wider landscape and you're starting to get a view of this and your estate.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: justify;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b style="text-align: justify;"><u>Finishing Phase I</u></b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b style="text-align: justify;"><br /></b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
At this stage, whilst things should be getting better, you're still going to have oodles of failed projects. You need to have built that evidence base and trust before you really embark on this part of the journey which is all about completing phase I (highlighted in blue).</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE28Ii-r4sj5xKRaDoBIDOwjegpDAcnx48sNF-yhP6VUXOqy93-SCmbre3TPRdOnmgkX0XdzLDlR4T8v4JyvIuABs9-ZyfMDPPiN_SBGdoObcaW0CxRO9Dx2PHnduRLzlSVMgmcQ/s1600/IM014.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE28Ii-r4sj5xKRaDoBIDOwjegpDAcnx48sNF-yhP6VUXOqy93-SCmbre3TPRdOnmgkX0XdzLDlR4T8v4JyvIuABs9-ZyfMDPPiN_SBGdoObcaW0CxRO9Dx2PHnduRLzlSVMgmcQ/s400/IM014.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
To begin with, we going to have to start breaking down projects. Just because we have a map, doesn't stop people trying to build the entire map in some Death Star like project outsourced to their friendly SI. You'll need to introduce ideas like FIRE (Fast, Inexpensive, Restrained and Elegant - see Lt Col Dan Ward) and constraints. What we need to do is break things up.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Step 5</b> -<i> break into small contracts.</i></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRr2WkUA4zk_V6nn6g_dOnDiP5CNRtM-1gcmLGvTUO0Ppqqv9DWRPet5JaDQK-qx92VQgx6xw6KHS9KvykM9Egd2LovU3dTGg11KyQaBJSkdWPOjUpbzlXG69LeUETdGJEp__UCQ/s1600/IM011.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRr2WkUA4zk_V6nn6g_dOnDiP5CNRtM-1gcmLGvTUO0Ppqqv9DWRPet5JaDQK-qx92VQgx6xw6KHS9KvykM9Egd2LovU3dTGg11KyQaBJSkdWPOjUpbzlXG69LeUETdGJEp__UCQ/s400/IM011.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
The usual resistance to this is because it makes the landscape more complex as I've got multiple contracts now and interfaces between them. Please note the interfaces already existed and no amount of pretending they don't by trying to hide it in a big contract is going to make them go away. But breaking into small contracts is vitally important because it means we can now apply appropriate methods.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b>Step 6 </b>- <i>apply appropriate methods.</i></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrkag4pSP1G-y7Wma-EW3HQC6SAcQiC0ZUvYVZpjlte2P7Tep7bfkdHzO_hinvPERvKfVWabSvyfZuFnnOeC-tC0a9B8DBu2KHtcFjR_TWmh7Cf1PBVnKLQZhbluEsYtyK46cA8Q/s1600/IM012.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrkag4pSP1G-y7Wma-EW3HQC6SAcQiC0ZUvYVZpjlte2P7Tep7bfkdHzO_hinvPERvKfVWabSvyfZuFnnOeC-tC0a9B8DBu2KHtcFjR_TWmh7Cf1PBVnKLQZhbluEsYtyK46cA8Q/s400/IM012.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
You might not be aware of this but there is no magic one size fits all method for project management anymore than there is for purchasing. You need to apply multiple methods at the same time. Hence you'll tend to outsource those more industrialised components on the right whilst building in-house with agile techniques those uncharted and uncertain components on the left. You'll also use different purchasing mechanisms. </div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
The overwhelming majority of large scale failures that I see come from misapplication of techniques and almost all of them can be anticipated before the project has even started. Typically, we'd take a project like the one above and outsource it all in one big contract. To mimic this, I've just marked all the "mini contracts" as outsource. Now the components on the left hand side are uncharted i.e. novel, new and changing. We can't actually specify them because they constantly change. Hence sticking them in a contract with components that can be specified always ends up with excessive change control cost overruns. People argue that next time we need to specify it better but you can't. The solution is to use appropriate methods.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<b>Step 7 </b>- <i>Learn about context</i> i.e. what works where.</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNxA2nFNyCpcqmvwvmcDpPR0GAuLCag4h4hEyx8b0fvA5-YLhFpF6IYfM4b9IwRVWlv2Ot1ObQltrfsMg1CpwH6AOwenu6qpDFjq8gHy864D8ABB849H_meiAUOWYeEas_OHdwhg/s1600/IM013.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNxA2nFNyCpcqmvwvmcDpPR0GAuLCag4h4hEyx8b0fvA5-YLhFpF6IYfM4b9IwRVWlv2Ot1ObQltrfsMg1CpwH6AOwenu6qpDFjq8gHy864D8ABB849H_meiAUOWYeEas_OHdwhg/s400/IM013.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Helping and advising project owners on how to manage their environment is where spend control can truly shine. At this stage spend control will already be on the path to becoming the intelligence function that every organisation needs. But let us not get carried away with the future. At this stage you've completed all the doctrine in phase I and should be embedding that into the organisation through spend control. You're challenging across multiple aspects from the user, user needs, components, how we treat them, where we spend money etc. All the time you're learning about the environment and what methods work where, removing duplication and bias and hopefully becoming fitter and leaner.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
You should be a couple of years into your journey. We've still several more phases of doctrine to go and we're years away from creating adaptive cell based organisational structure that use multiple cultures to cope with evolution (see below) but we're better than we were. We're also a good 5-10 years away from being able to effectively anticipate change, to use maps to target the landscape and to start learning how to manipulate the market and write strategy. </div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7_ZXWtW1c3_hyd155C4GbZsflRaAiy6QN9bmq0LWQP1C0W4CGWGfttLrreas2pbyTEhz3lpdFtf1IVKk0ATn9znRxEqhBY3J8fzurJm5HiwVkp-IOTP0CQH5qTqXyixrPybr8vA/s1600/IM015.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7_ZXWtW1c3_hyd155C4GbZsflRaAiy6QN9bmq0LWQP1C0W4CGWGfttLrreas2pbyTEhz3lpdFtf1IVKk0ATn9znRxEqhBY3J8fzurJm5HiwVkp-IOTP0CQH5qTqXyixrPybr8vA/s400/IM015.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
At the beginning, I did say hold your horses on organisational change and strategy because the honest truth is most people haven't got a clue how to do this - it's pretty much all random, blind luck, memes picked out of the air. The reason why you felt panic is because you didn't know what to do. The good news is, most executives don't either.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Rather than blindly stumbling around, it's far better that we've made our first steps and mapping is itself a journey. You will eventually get to the point that you can play those more advanced games but let us get these basics sorted first. As a a rule of thumb in the private sector, by the time you complete the first phase of doctrine then you should probably set a stretch target of demonstrably reducing waste in the P&L to about 50% or below i.e. less than 50% of the P&L expense is waste. Obviously, some players are already far better than others. In Gov, there tends to be less waste because there are pre-existing mechanisms of challenge such as the MPA, NAO and PAC but even in such spaces, it's more than possible to save billions.<br />
<br />
When it comes to the original question of rebooting GDS, I can't emphasise enough the importance of focusing and doubling down on spend control.</div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24244078.post-60550418377002996502018-03-07T14:45:00.002+00:002018-03-07T16:03:50.068+00:00On Playing Chess<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Chapter 19</b><br />
(rough draft)<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>On Stepping Stones</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Manipulating the environment to your advantage is the essence of strategy. In the case of Fotango, we understood our competitive environment and that we were losing the battle in the online photo service business. We were losing this external battle because we had to focus internally on our parent company's needs and that absorbed what little resources we had for investment. Alternative services such as Flickr were rapidly dominating the space. Any differential we had with the service was in image manipulation but being a relatively novel act and uncertain we had no way of foretelling its future. We certainly were unable to predict the rise Instagram and what would happen next, this was 2005. We were also aware that our existing business with the parent company would eventually be caught up in their outsourcing efforts. In other words, I was losing the external battle and would eventually lose the internal one.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The strategy game starts with being honest with yourself. You're not going to improve if you believe everything is perfect despite the evidence. If you accept this, then even failure provides an opportunity to learn. Strategy is all about observing the landscape, understanding how it is changing and using what resources you have to maximise your chances of success. Obviously, you need to define what success is and that's where your purpose comes in. It's the yardstick by which you currently measure yourself. However, as this is a cycle, your very actions may also change your purpose and so don't get to stuck on it. Ludicorp was once a failing online video game company that shut down its Neverending game in 2004 and became a massively successful online photo service known as Flickr. It's worth noting that after Flickr, the founder Stewart Butterfield then went on to create another online video game company - Tiny Speck. Its game, known as Glitch, was shut down in 2012. As with Ludicorp, the founder had once again singularly failed to deliver on the promise of a huge online video game but in the process of doing this for a second time, he had also created Slack which is now a massively successful company valued in the billions. If Stewart had "stuck to his purpose" or "focused on the core of online video games" then we probably wouldn't have Flickr or Slack and we'd all be the poorer for it.<br />
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Back to Fotango, I knew we had to act. We needed to free up resources and find a new path. I knew that such action would have to create a new purpose for the organisation in order for us to have a future. I didn't now how much time I really had, how much political clout I could use to hold back the wolves nor even what it was we were going to do. Somehow, we needed to find a way to flourish as the unwritten purpose of every organisation and of every organism is always to survive. Using our maps, we determined that creating a utility platform or infrastructure play was the best option as there were established product markets, these markets were suitable for utility provision and incumbents would have inertia to change. Both approaches would not only enable us to build a new business but free up capital through more efficient use of resources in our existing business. However, infrastructure itself was capital intensive and despite our profitability we had imposed constraints from capital expenditure to being both profitable and cashflow positive each and every month.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
However, I gambled that if we believed the market was about to change then others would see the same. Some new entrant such as Google would play the infrastructure game. If they launched such a play, we could then exploit this by building our platform on top rather than just consuming our own infrastructure. The timing was going to be critical here. We could make enough savings from our existing business through the provision of our own utility infrastructure environment to initiate our own public platform play. To grow the new business quickly, we would need someone else to make that big infrastructure play or else constrain our own platform growth to a manageable level. I had talked to the rest of the board, highlighted this future trillion-dollar market opportunity and bought enough slack (or rope depending upon your point of view) to do it anyway. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The PaaS play (what you would call Serverless today) also suited our capabilities because we had the skills required to build a low cost, large-scale distributed architecture. This would also act as a barrier to entry for others. The nagging question was who would trust this online photo service for their coding platform? By open sourcing the PaaS technology itself (Zimki) we planned to overcome many of the adoption fears and rapidly drive towards creating a standard. If we were lucky then others would set up as Zimki providers (offering their own PaaS play). This suited us because our ultimate goal was not to be a PaaS provider but to build the exchange, brokerage and assurance industries on top of this. We had used maps to extend far beyond the obvious and speculate at what was coming next. The PaaS play was simply our beach-head. Our strategy was developed from our map and our understanding of it. We would use both the landscape and our capabilities to our advantage to the best of our understanding.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
We launched, and shortly after Amazon (not Google) launched an infrastructure service known as EC2. We didn't care who it was as we were over the moon. We positioned our platform to build upon Amazon's infrastructure, we rapidly grew and then we were shutdown (in 2007). The parent company's outsourcing plan overtook my own. They did not believe in this space, this purpose. The future to them was not cloud and I had miscalculated. I had enough political capital to get started but nowhere near enough to stop the outsourcing change. I tried the usual routes of management buy-out even VC funding but the asking price was either too high, the VC too focused elsewhere or just too skeptical. You have to remember, this was between 2006 and early 2007. Investors wanted to hear web 2.0, collective intelligence and user driven network effects. Terms like "compute utility" and "coding platform" were just not "something we'd invest in". There were exceptions, such as BungeeLabs but as one investor told me "Wrong approach, wrong technology and wrong place. No-one has ever heard of a successful tech firm from Old Street, London". It was a cutting point but fair enough, we were operating in a barren land with the barest whiff of tech companies and good souls. This was a long way from the heartland of Silicon Valley though of course, Old Street these days is known as Silicon Roundabout. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The crunch then came, and I had choice. Dismantle the service and the team, take a cushy number within the parent company or resign. I decided to take the hit. Cloud became that billion-dollar industry and Serverless will grow far beyond that, realising that trillion-dollar dream. If you're reading this and that hasn't happened yet then you still might not agree. Just wait. This story has its uses. When we consider mapping, there are multiple methods to use them to create an advantage or an opportunity. For example : -</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Method 1)</b> You can use a map to see how components that are evolving can be combined to create new activities or to support your own efforts. If what you're doing is focusing on building something new in the uncharted area of the map then you should note that whatever you do will be risky - it's the adjacent unexplored, an unknown area. In figure 246, I've given an example in the mobile phone space where each higher order system combined underlying components with more industrialised technology. The map assumes a timeframe of the early to mid 2000s, obviously these components have evolved since then. The play of combining industrialised components to expand into the adjacent unexplored with some new higher order activity is a high-risk stepping stone. You don't know what you'll find nor where it could lead next. It might be the next best thing since sliced bread but the past is littered with failed concepts. The problem with figure 246 is we always look back from the perspective of today and highlight the path by which success was achieved. There were other ideas such as phones integrated with projectors, printers, firearms, umbrellas, clothing and even into a tooth that have all been, gone and quickly forgotten.<br />
<br />
<u>Figure 246 - Combination Plays</u><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtaky4i_CvXdDHMJg0KP3lwJ8lPe0nQbMDbNIAG9_kZvQYRnMtuH4_WnIW3uVXfc1diYdB_BDlb4MsUbPwyI5P-JZbc778KuNLSbN9pv8RJCdpBcauo_WFb0sz2ygpK8BwPw0Z8w/s1600/f246.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtaky4i_CvXdDHMJg0KP3lwJ8lPe0nQbMDbNIAG9_kZvQYRnMtuH4_WnIW3uVXfc1diYdB_BDlb4MsUbPwyI5P-JZbc778KuNLSbN9pv8RJCdpBcauo_WFb0sz2ygpK8BwPw0Z8w/s400/f246.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
In our case, we used our maps to anticipate future developments including exchanges, assurance reporting, application marketplace, billing facilities and a brokerage service.<br />
<br />
<b>Method 2) </b>Beyond removal of duplication and bias, you can also use a map to find efficiencies and constraints by examining links within the value chain. For example, take something as trivial as a desktop role out. You might find that you're forced to treat the operating system as more of a product than a commodity because some essential business application is tightly coupled to the operating system. By understanding and breaking this link, such as forcing the application into a browser, you can often treat a wide number of other components as a commodity. From our position, we understood that building data centres would be a constraint to building an IaaS play and that infrastructure was a constraint to building a PaaS. This also created opportunities i.e. if one player launched in IaaS and became dominant then competitors could launch equivalent services and use a price war to force up demand beyond the ability of the first mover to supply (this assumes that competitors had their wits about them). Given we had the underlying infrastructure technology known as Borg to do this, we could exploit such an opportunity.<br />
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Method 3)</b> Another way is to take advantage of both evolution and inertia itself e.g. by driving any component to a more evolved state such as from product to commodity. These are potential goldmines hence I tend to look at those components that are described as being in the product stage but are close to becoming a commodity. I look for those four factors (concept, suitability, technology and attitude) to exist in the market. I even double check by asking people. The problem here is that people who work in that space often have inertia to this idea and will tell you endless reasons why it won't work and this or that thing can't become a commodity. You want that inertia to exist because then all your competitors will have that inertia and equally dismiss the change but you also wanted to get to the truth of the matter. The question becomes how do I find out whether it's really suitable for a shift to commodity when almost everyone in the field will tell me it isn't because of inertia? To find out if something is viable, I cheat. I find a group of people familiar with the field and ask them to imagine we have already built such a service. I then ask them to write down exactly what it looks likes and what it would need. The modern way of doing this is to get them to write the press release. If they can do this clearly, precisely and without recourse to hand waving then we've got something widespread and ubiquitous enough to be suitable for an industrialised play.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Whichever method you use, aim to make this a stepping stone to a further play. For example, in the case of Zimki then:- </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<ul>
<li>creating a utility service in the platform space and exposing it through APIs was a stepping stone towards running an ILC (ecosystem) like game. </li>
<li>open sourcing Zimki was simply a stepping stone to achieving an exchange with many providers. </li>
<li>the play to open source Borg (our underlying infrastructure system) was a counter play against any one competitor becoming dominant in the IaaS space.</li>
</ul>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
This idea of future possibilities through stepping stones is an important concept within strategy. If we look at the first method again (i.e. banking on recombination efforts in the uncharted space) then this is often a bad position to find yourself in. More often than not it leads to a dead end - the phone firearm or the phone tooth. I tend to refer to these high risk approaches as "gambling" rather than "opportunities" because opportunities should expand your future possibilities and not reduce them. If you're going to gamble then the only way to consistently make this work is to be lucky.<br />
<br />
Try instead not to gamble as much as focus on expanding future possibilities. Just because you could do something, doesn't mean you should do it. Strategy is as much about saying what you won't do as it is about what you will do. This is summed up in the highly mischievous phrase "opportunities expand as they are seized" which is often misinterpreted as "grab everything" which is precisely not what you should be doing. This is also why Fotango pivoted from a declining online photo service to a platform play, as it expanded our possibilities. See also Stewart Butterfield who seems to have become a master of such pivots. This doesn't however guarantee success as these are opportunities and not certainties.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>On Policy</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Through-out this book, I've heavily relied upon examples from the technology industry. The reason for this is that information technology has been undergoing profound change in the last decade. If it had been the legal industry that had been impacting so many value chains (though there are past examples of industrialisation with will-writing and current trends for general purpose contracts through AI) then this book would have mainly focused on the legal industry. Despite this technology industry focus, most of my work tends to deal with nation or industry level competition and touches upon areas of policy. The concepts of strategy, mapping and finding opportunities apply equally well in this space. Remember your map is not just activities but includes practice, data, knowledge and all forms of capital (including social).<br />
<br />
<i><u><b>Scenario - first pass.</b></u></i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Since Brexit is very much the talk of the town, I'm going to focus on one specific area namely that of standards. However, I'm not going to start with a UK centric view but instead let us pretend you're a regulator in some mythical country. Your role is covering the pharmaceutical industry e.g. you're working for the Office of Compliance within an administrative body (i.e. equivalent to the Food & Drug Administration, USA). Your purpose is to shield patients from poor quality, unsafe, and ineffective drugs through compliance strategies and risk-based enforcement actions. To this end, you use strategic and risk-based decisions that are guided by law and science to foster global collaboration, promote voluntary compliance and takes decisive and swift actions to protect patients. It's exciting and noble sounding stuff! Well, it should be as I lifted those words from the FDA website. But why do you exist? You exist because bad medicines kill people and those people tend to be voters. Any Government knows that being in charge and doing nothing when people are dying doesn't tend to win elections in a democracy. There are no positives about bad medicines and there's no way to spin this.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
When something goes wrong then you need to investigate and take action (often legal enforcement). In light of this, you tend to do audits of facilities and enforce compliance to standards which you also develop. But there's a problem. The pharmaceutical industry is a global and complicated supply chain. The drugs in your local chemist shop probably were delivered through a series of warehouses and transportation systems (facilities) with plenty of opportunities for things to go wrong. Before this it was manufactured (in another facility) with the active / inactive components being chemicals which themselves were delivered through a series of warehouses, import/export, transportation systems and manufacturers. Even the raw material to make the chemicals can come through another set of facilities which can include refiners and miners. The supply chain can be very long, very complicated and provides many points where disaster can be introduced. It's also global and when you cross international borders then you have no guarantee that the standards which you apply are also the standards that are in practice applied elsewhere. Which is why you, as a regulator, probably push for global standards and close co-operation with other agencies. You work with other nations to develop supply chain toolkits covering good manufacturing practice, transportation practice, product security to track & trace.<br />
<br />
Let us assume you have brought in legislation which demands that pharmaceutical companies must know their supply chain i.e. we want the origin, history and interactions of every component that went into the drug. Let us also assume that some companies don't see the benefit of exposing their supply chain but instead see cost beyond a one up, one down approach i.e. they know the boundary of their suppliers - we bought this from them - and who they supplied their products to. From a regulatory viewpoint whether pharma, automotive, consumer goods or any other then this is not enough especially when the supply chain crosses an international boundary. We could attempt to introduce legislation that they must know about the entire supply chain but this will invoke potentially huge lobbying bodies against us. At this point, someone normally shouts a technological solution such as "use blockchain" to create a chain of custody. Beyond the issue of implementation, the idea of a public blockchain is normally faced with criticism that being public it would expose the sales of the company to competitors. Often, there is a push to modify the idea and make it private. Such a private chain would in itself create a new hurdle for new entrants trying to get into an industry and whilst barriers to entry might be welcomed by some companies to reduce competition, the purpose of regulators didn't include "protect incumbents from competition". It's a thorny issue. How to protect the public but allow for competition?</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Part of the problem noted above is the inertia to having a publicly visible global supply chain whether using blockchain or not. It is amusing that if you ask executives within the industry whether they know what their competitors are selling they will often answer "Yes". There is an entire industry of marketing, competitor analysis and surveillance companies that everyone feeds in order to gain competitive intelligence on what others are doing. In fact, so complicated is the internal supply chain of gigantic manufacturers that when combined with discounts, promotions, variability in production, fraud, returns and even error within their own internal systems then sometimes companies can only approximate what they've sold. One executive even told me that they knew what their competitors were selling better than they knew what they were selling themselves hence they had also started to use a marketing analysis company on their own company. An argument for radical transparency is to simply recognise this (i.e. be honest) and eliminate the cost of such competitive intelligence by making the blockchain open. However, this also threatens to expose the inefficiencies, waste and practices within the supply chain which is probably where the real inertia exists. The problem with exposing waste is that it doesn't tend to go down well with either customers or shareholders. Let us assume this is the scenario in our case.<br />
<br />
First thing I want you to do is to take 30 minutes and come up with ideas of how you will solve all of this?<br />
<br />
<i><u><b>Scenario - second pass</b></u></i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
So, how do you as a regulator manage this? Well, let us start with a map. I provided the map in figure 247 and will give a brief explanation underneath.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<u>Figure 247 - Regulator's Map</u><br />
<u><br /></u>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpB4xbJ8UUW_kNBQ9HYYPiB-AbvtZ0l9Gitf6MfLVeFIrcKie6hsM7utEY25SK_-lQI9ZyQ8ebaDR8i656-iA2JvPR_jFcqHfFdp5XphnnxGEjjJ1SmTYdQyDSHd0l64429_-2mA/s1600/p247.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpB4xbJ8UUW_kNBQ9HYYPiB-AbvtZ0l9Gitf6MfLVeFIrcKie6hsM7utEY25SK_-lQI9ZyQ8ebaDR8i656-iA2JvPR_jFcqHfFdp5XphnnxGEjjJ1SmTYdQyDSHd0l64429_-2mA/s400/p247.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
From the map, we start with the industry itself. It has a need for investors (i.e. shareholders) which involves a bidirectional flow of capital e.g. investment from the shareholders and return on investment to the shareholders. I've simply marked this as a "$" to represent a financial flow in both directions. Remember each node (circle) is some form of stock of capital (whether physical, practice, information or otherwise) and each line is a flow of capital. In order to pay for the return on investment (whether dividends or share buybacks) the industry needs to do something that makes a profit. This involves making the DRUG which in this case I've described as a quite well evolved product. Obviously, in practice there is a pipeline of drugs (from the novel and new to the more commodity) but this map will suffice for our purposes.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
To make a profit on the drug then there are costs in making it and hopefully revenue from selling it. Our drug therefore needs consumers. Hence we have a bidirectional flow of capital with consumers i.e. the physical drug is exchanged for monetary $. Now, those consumers also want the drug not to kill them and hence they need standards that ensure (as much as it is possible) that the drug is safe. Those standards add to the cost of the drug i.e. certification to a standard doesn't come for free. Let us assume that if our industry could get away without standards, they probably would as such costs reduce profits which the industry needs in order to pay the return to shareholders. Fortunately for those consumers, someone else needs them. That someone is the Government and what it needs are voters. These voters just happen to be also consumers. Hence in order to gain its voters the Government has a need for regulators who in turn create and police the standards that satisfy the needs of the consumers. Naturally, standards without enforcement is worthless and hence the regulators use audits which in turn use legal enforcement against the drug itself. This gives the industry two costs. The first cost is that of implementing the standard which is usually a bidirectional capital flow of investment in standards for a certification that the drug meets the standard. The second cost is the cost of legal enforcement i.e. a failure to meet the standard which can take many forms from court cases to product recall to enforced action.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
But how are those audits conducted? In general, it is against the facilities involved whether this is the distribution point (i.e. the chemist shop), the warehouse, the transportation system or the manufacturer. Product can be taken from any of these points and tested or the facility inspected. Obviously, that involves a cost which in part is hopefully recovered from the standards process or at worst from taxes from the voters. You can simply follow the lines on the map (which represent capital flow) to determine possible ways of balancing this out. How you balance that out is a matter of policy.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
At this point the map starts to become a little bit more complicated. For this map, I have considered all of the flows so far to be inside a border i.e. we manufacture and distribute within a single market (the dotted blue line border in our map). This could be a single nation or a multilateral FTA (free trade agreement) or a common market with agreed standards. Now let us look at the raw materials (another source of cost for the drug) and bring in the idea of import and export from outside of this market. This is going to bring into play a bewildering array of import & export arrangements, warehouses, manufacturers, transportation systems and an entire global supply chain. As per the scenario we have a one up, one down form of understanding within the industry and hence the global supply chain in all its details is poorly understood. Also, as per the scenario there is significant waste in these global supply chains. In general, from experience, I have yet to find one where there isn't. Another problem is that outside of the common market then standards will tend to be specific to other countries. These might be more evolved than within the market but I'm going to assume for this exercise that they are less evolved, less developed hence the manner in which I've drawn standards on the map.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Our regulator has all the power it needs to enforce legislation on facilities within its market, but it wishes to gain access to information related to the global supply chain. It wants to make these supply chains both more clearly defined and transparent. It also wants to bring standards in the outside market upto its own level and ideally increase co-operation with other countries. However, both efforts will face inertia i.e. resistance to change and extensive lobbying if we attempt to do this trough legislation. The inertia over global supply chains will normally be disguised as competitive reasons (fear of exposing information to competitors) but it is usually related to cost and fear of exposing the waste that exists. The second case of inertia includes resistance from other nations and their regulators to any imposition of standards by another party. Sovereignty is a big deal for lots of people. So, considering your ideas from the first pass at this scenario, take another 30 minutes and come up with what you would do and try to avoid "use a blockchain". Think of non technical opportunities i.e. policy.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i><u><b>Scenario - my answer</b></u></i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
One of the beauties of maps is that I can describe a space and what I intend to do about it, allowing others to challenge me. Now, I'm no regulator but I can propose a solution. It might be a dreadful solution, there might be far better ways of doing this, the map could be more accurate but that's the point. Maps are fundamentally about communication. It's also important to note, that every choice you make (if you have a map) can be reviewed in the future and learnt from. Mapping itself isn't about giving you an answer, it's about helping you think about a space and learn from what you did. You won't get good at mapping or strategic play if you don't either act or put the effort into understanding a space before you act and review it later. It's a bit like playing a guitar - there's only so much you can read from books, eventually you have to pick up the instrument and use it. This is when you really start learning.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Hence I'll give you my answer which took about thirty minutes but on the provision that we all understand that many of you will have a better answer. If you shared those maps with me, then I might learn (something I'd appreciate). Let us start with a map on which I've marked my play (see figure 248) and I'll go through my reasoning after.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<u>Figure 248 - My answer</u><br />
<u><br /></u>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8Mom2q13omwKERktZlc304vAIFtYGY0ay0BAQjoNU3qNpxpNe3jL4nmsMG5ez9K1XIxnm1hZXGDhKNLUVK-UfbQOEig723Ptud3LhfC1q1ETvyDuXDosGc8W3Z6bR9NHy1OrJWQ/s1600/p248.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8Mom2q13omwKERktZlc304vAIFtYGY0ay0BAQjoNU3qNpxpNe3jL4nmsMG5ez9K1XIxnm1hZXGDhKNLUVK-UfbQOEig723Ptud3LhfC1q1ETvyDuXDosGc8W3Z6bR9NHy1OrJWQ/s400/p248.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
I have two parts to my answer. The first (marked as number one in red circles) is to open up the data, practice and systems that I use to build and manage standards to other countries. The reason for this is that I want to drive standards to a globally accepted norm and make it as easy as possible for other nations to learn from our experience and reduce cost. In return for such a generous gesture, I'm aiming to "buy" both ease of use and interaction when dealing with other country agencies including good co-operation through a hefty element of goodwill. By opening it all up, I'm also carefully avoiding trying to impose any standard but instead encourage adoption. I might have invested in building those systems (i.e. invested financial capital in activities, practices and data) as a Government but I'm trading that capital for data and social capital from others.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The second part of my play (the red number two) is to name and shame. I would aim to deliberately undertake a campaign of highlighting waste in global supply chains and the poor understanding that companies have over their actual supply chain. This will involve us working with other countries to understand the supply chain hence another purpose to step one. I'm going to direct this campaign towards shareholders and customers in order to create pressure for change despite the inertia that executives within the company might have. I don't care how the industry solves the problem (they can use blockchain if they wish) but I'd intend to use policy to drive for a more open approach on global supply chains. The two parts are needed because having a global supply being transparent is useful but not as useful if the standards involved throughout the chain are similar or at least the details can be accessed. Now, you might fundamentally disagree with this approach and that's fine. It might surprise you to discover that I'm not a regulator and have little to no idea about the current state of the pharmaceutical industry. Hence, the mythical company. But disagreeing is part of the purpose of a map. It exists to enable precisely these sorts of discussions by exposing the assumptions. However, it's also important to note that action and strategy doesn't have to involve specific technology (e.g. blockchain) but can instead be driven through policy. There is a tendency in today's world to immediately jump for a technological solution when other routes are available e.g. frictionless trade doesn't necessarily require magic smart borders anymore than a common travel area does.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>On Capital and Purchasing it.</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
A map of a competitive environment is simply a map of capital (i.e. stocks of physical, knowledge, data, social, financial and information assets) and flows between them. What a map also adds are the concept that those capital stocks have a <b>position</b> in a chain of needs and they are not static, they are <b>moving</b> (i.e. evolving) themselves. From the original evolution graph, then evolution is itself related to the ubiquity and certainty of the thing. The value of any thing is also related to certainty i.e. some things we're more certain about and can precisely define a value because the market is defined, whilst other things we're unsure of. This uncertainty is often embedded in a concept know as potential value i.e. when we say "this has potential value" we mean "this has an uncertain amount of future value" compared to the current market.<br />
<br />
Roughly speaking (and based upon an idea proposed by Krzysztof Daniel) then :-<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiapLlkCHOJo69StWEh3nDXXaR279TyEu4GoVeJlFrE8faiv9McXRJ0nwgBi2VO2Tcrf_-ciA0auHIL4A5PtZvalS1Z72nIWGfudJ5qKuClaATtlnv4OEIFflQo_E65wFtuA9oEvw/s1600/table249.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiapLlkCHOJo69StWEh3nDXXaR279TyEu4GoVeJlFrE8faiv9McXRJ0nwgBi2VO2Tcrf_-ciA0auHIL4A5PtZvalS1Z72nIWGfudJ5qKuClaATtlnv4OEIFflQo_E65wFtuA9oEvw/s400/table249.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
What this is saying is that novel and new things that have a high potential value have inherently a lot of uncertainty around them. Hence all the risk in the uncharted space as we just don't know what is going to happen despite our belief in some huge future potential value. As the market develops and more actors become involved because that market becomes more defined, then the uncertainty declines because of competition. But, so does the potential value as the current market is becoming more defined, divided and industrialised. In other words by investing in some activity (e.g. computing in the early days) then by simply doing nothing at all the value of that investment will change as the industry evolves through competition.<br />
<br />
I said roughly for two reasons. Firstly, potential value itself implies uncertainty and hence the "equation" above breaks down to uncertainty is inversely proportional to certainty i.e. the less certain of something we are then the more uncertain we become. It's the self referencing flaw of Darwin's evolutionary theory and survival of the fittest. We define the "fittest" by those who survive. Hence evolutionary theory breaks down to survival of the survivors. This obvious circular reference doesn't mean it isn't useful. The second issue is the actual relationship between value and evolution isn't simple. The value of an investment in an activity and its related practices and other forms of capital which we spend financial capital on to acquire (e.g. by training) doesn't just decline with evolution. There are step changes as it crosses the boundary between different evolution stages. For example, a massive investment in computing as a product (e.g. servers, practices related to this and other components such as data centres) changes as compute shifts from product to utility. What was once a positive investment can quickly become a technical debt and a source of inertia. The act of computing might be becoming more defined, ubiquitous and certain but our past investment in assets can quickly turn into a liability. In practice, the early adopters of one stage of evolution (e.g. buying compute as a product such as servers) can quickly find themselves as the laggards to the next stage of evolution (e.g. cloud) because of their past investment and choices. The same change appears to also happen up and down the value chain. For example, with serverless (a shift of platform from product to utility) then often the first movers into the world of cloud (i.e. utility infrastructure) and DevOps (i.e. co-evolved practice) exhibit the characteristics of laggards to the serverless world whilst some companies that many would describe as laggards to cloud are the early adopters of serverless.<br />
<br />
These changes in the value of a stock are problematic because in accountancy and financial reports we rarely reflect the concept of evolution. At best, we use the idea of depreciation of some form of static stock but fail to grasp that the stock itself isn't static. The balance sheet of a company might look healthy but can hide a huge capital investment that has not only been depreciated but is now undergoing a potential change in the stage of evolution e.g. data centres, servers and related practices that will quickly become a huge financial burden requiring massive investment, retraining and re-architecting. The idea that suddenly an asset can become a liability due to a change of evolutionary stage in the industry is not one that fits well with double entry book-keeping. In other words Assets = Equity + Liability doesn't work quite so well when Assets become Liabilities due to outside forces. It's not that these things can't be accounted for, it's simply that we generally don't. This is one of the dangers of looking at a company financials. We can often make statements on the market evolving and impacting revenue but less frequently consider the debt that a change in evolution can cause. This also is not something that should surprise us. Unless there are genuine constraints then with enough competitive pressure, all the technical/operational obstacles to evolution (the four factors of technology, suitability, attitude and concept) will be overcome and such changes will happen. It's never a question of if but when.<br />
<br />
However, it's not just accounting methods that tend to be inadequate when it comes to evolution. As we've discussed at length, it's also development methods and even purchasing techniques. In figure 249, I've provided a map of a system which starting from user needs is disaggregated into components through a chain of needs. This has in turn be broken into small contracts with appropriate methods applied. However, the method of purchasing is also context specific. In the uncharted space where items have high potential value combined with lots of uncertainty then a venture capital or time & material type approach is needed for investment. As the same act evolves and we start to develop an understanding of it with introduction of concepts like MVP (minimal viable product) then a more outcome based approach can be used. We're still trying to mitigate risk but this time we have a targets and a rough goal of what we're aiming for. As a product evolves we can switch to a more commercial off the shelf (COTS) type arrangement. Finally, as it becomes defined, we have a known market and are focused on a more unit or utility based pricing around defined standards and expectations.<br />
<br />
<u>Figure 249 - Capital and Purchasing.</u><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi6aap80p20e38ewOD-ib25tP3v-tF1lQM8xQqqT50Oj8hssoLGVEOs8Zeae72eTplhvvFdiQszZqEWuNECmAorWSKGFNGmimQCipjvQq3vWT4cnOT7phl4G6bl2lOTC5cVPTlOA/s1600/p250.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi6aap80p20e38ewOD-ib25tP3v-tF1lQM8xQqqT50Oj8hssoLGVEOs8Zeae72eTplhvvFdiQszZqEWuNECmAorWSKGFNGmimQCipjvQq3vWT4cnOT7phl4G6bl2lOTC5cVPTlOA/s400/p250.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
The point of this is that not only does capital evolve (whether activities, practices, data or otherwise) but so does the means by which we should purchase it. In any organisation you need at least four different purchasing frameworks across the company. In any large complicated system, there isn't such a thing as a one size fits all purchasing method and you'll need to use many. Unless of course, you like things such as explaining massive change control cost overruns and trying to blame others. Maybe that floats your boat because it's simple and at least the vendor provides nice conferences.<br />
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>On Balance</b></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Whether it's finding opportunities (i.e. stepping stones that expand your future possibilities), using policy to change the game rather than just technology or whether it's the flows of capital within a system and how we account for or purchase it - these are all elements which we use in gameplay. There are also complications within the system i.e. inertia is both a good thing in terms of keeping you from industrialising an industry too early but also a disaster if you haven't effectively managed it when an industry is industrialising. In the same manner an investment in some form of capital can rapidly become a debt as the space evolves. The maps can help guide you but you'll need to scenario plan around them. In the next few chapters, we're going to start going through a long list of specific plays before we come back and break down an entire industry.<br />
<br />
To prepare you, I've listed the general forms of gameplay in figure 250. I've organised the table by broad category i.e. user perception, accelerators, de-accelerators, dealing with toxicity, market impacts, defensive, attacking, ecosystem, competitor, positional and poison. Each of the following chapters will deal with a single category (eleven chapters in total) using maps and where possible examples to demonstrate the play. By now, you're probably ready and dangerous enough to start playing chess with companies or at least learning how to do so.<br />
<br />
<u>Figure 250 - Gameplays.</u><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1vOQ_dfsx44Ma_QCQelXt9LBP1UML7qDUcGibjU3B8WngEOaMBcy5sA_b1x7Y9IXnzi1JyZkX2lcit61tnmAVAWUZqvsaqJuQyKsBUX_qe5MKeYcDRWkQ2N-pXZBLSgvgPZ01mA/s1600/p251.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1vOQ_dfsx44Ma_QCQelXt9LBP1UML7qDUcGibjU3B8WngEOaMBcy5sA_b1x7Y9IXnzi1JyZkX2lcit61tnmAVAWUZqvsaqJuQyKsBUX_qe5MKeYcDRWkQ2N-pXZBLSgvgPZ01mA/s400/p251.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
swardleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04702421918430488600noreply@blogger.com