Hello there, friend!

I've been working on the introduction to my thesis yesterday, and some of it are thoughts I haven't shared here before, so below is a part. It's a bit of cheating to replace the essay with it, but... I warned you it might happen a few times now 😇 Feedback appreciated!

To study self-managed organizations (SMOs) as well as to study how organizations in general navigate change, organization science has used many concepts and approaches, e.g. process management, knowledge management, organization design, organizational learning, learning organization, communities of practice, and others. Some of these represent a more macro-perspective focused on structures and systems, some represent a more micro-perspective revolving around individuals. What all of them have in common is that they tend to neglect the object of activity of their units of analysis.

However, it's precisely the concept of object that enables the bridging of the macro- and micro-perspectives. The object represents the problem space at which the activity is directed and as such it embodies its meaning. It helps elucidate what are the structures, processes, and agents focused on, and thus it can help discover and address the contradictions arising from competing conceptions. Without the concept of object, the macro-perspectives tend to lose sight of the importance of agency and commitment of individuals, while the micro-perspectives struggle to describe the collective process through which individuals can relate to and transform the surrounding structures.

Either of these perspectives is thus incomplete (as every single perspective has to be) and taken on its own can only provide a partial theoretical understanding of how organizations decentralize authority and navigate change. Successfully bridging them in a dialectical way could therefore provide a more accurate picture of SMOs, which could in practice help other organizations move closer to this model and achieve the adaptability they seek.

Such a bridging perspective is offered by cultural-historical activity theory, in which the concept of object is central. Furthermore, the third generation of activity theory – the theory of expansive learning – is focused precisely on how organizations (and activity systems more broadly) transform. The expansive learning theory even led to the design of its own interventionist methodology called the Change Laboratory. As such, it constitutes a valuable complementary lens to understanding SMOs.

On the other hand, not even transformation initiated by a Change Laboratory intervention is guaranteed to lead to a sustained, continuous adaptation. However, this is supposed to be one of the hallmarks of SMOs, as indicated e.g. by them sometimes being called "evolutionary". Activity theory could thus benefit from studying SMOs in detail and finding out whether they indeed undergo continuous "expansive learning" and if so, what are the key factors that help them achieve this. (spoiler alert – I think it's the systematic and formalized rules of self-management that true SMOs use, as well as promoting a culture of "transformative agency")

Last week’s dig-ups

I've been listening to audiobooks a bit more lately, which means fewer podcasts (though still enough I guess). I'm letting you know to pre-commit myself to taking notes from them, so that I can share them with you. Expect notes on An Everyone Culture next week.

Personal metawork

• Mental visualisation can help you practice motor skills. The key principles are to keep the visualization short (below 15 seconds), it needs to mirror the visualized skill as closely as possible (inlcuding duration), it has to be practiced IN ADDITION to the physical practice, and you should create a label for each visualization, though these can be quite abstract (e.g. "spinning hook kick 1")

Collective metawork

• Residuality theory states that instead of designing "the right solution", we should design any architecture (software, organization, etc.) with the assumption of uncertainty, and try to come up from the start with stressors that could break our design. This results in a modular design, where modules are tightly coupled only when there are very good reasons for that.

Entrepreneurship

• Instead of offering discounts, drive signups and referrals by offering educational assets

• Employees should be encouraged to teach their skills – both to create a database of learning and to create more educational assets

Philosophy & Sense-making

• Destroying the polarity between our drives destroys our humanity – once again an appeal for embracing contradictions rather than trying to resolve them

• One audiobook I finished recently was The Enigma of Reason and it was exactly the one where I wasn't really taking notes. Fortunately, the main arguments were also summarised well in a podcast with one of the authors:

  • We don't have a single reasoning faculty. Instead, reason is a collection of many modules of our minds that we use to derive inferences (as the residuality theory would expect from a well-functioning complex system). Models like Kahneman's System 1 and System 2 are thus inaccurate.

  • Reasoning didn't evolve as a tool for problem-solving per se – it evolved as a tool for collaboration and coordination because we're one of the most collaborative and communicative species (if not the most). The key functions of reasons thus became (1) persuading others and (2) assessing the arguments the others are persuading us with.

  • This interactionist perspective helps explain the biases of reason: we do want to be able to come up with arguments that support our view and we want to believe them to be convincing, but we also don't have to waste too much effort on this, because coming up with a wrong argument isn't usually too dangerous – hence the confirmation bias (or "my side" bias more accurately).

    On the other hand, when assessing the arguments of others, we know we're at risk of being deceived by them, which could be quite dangerous. This is why we're much better at assessing the arguments of others then at coming up with good arguments ourselves.

  • What this means is that our reason is deeply dialogical – we need to either actually talk with others, or at least internalize their perspectives to simulate an internal dialogue. In fact, the better we get at internalizing different perspectives, the better we become at individual reasoning.

Reflection

• I've done my quarterly-ish (more like once every 4-5 months so far) 72-hour fast from Saturday evening until a few hours ago. Today was a bit rough as I had trouble concentrating (though I did drink water with salt, which previously helped with this). But the longevity benefits and the enjoyment I get from eating plain bread and vegetable broth after are very much worth it.

  • This also reminded me once again that not eating really saves a lot of time (and potentially money), so I'll probably return to OMAD (one meal a day) at least until I'm done with the thesis

And that’s it! Let me know what you thought, and I’ll see you here next time.

Take care

Chris