After a recommendation by Sam Freedman, I recently devour Davies’s’s The innovation machine. It is an attempt to analyze ‘what went wrong’ in what we could call the West during the last decade more or less through the cybernetic lens. I know right?
However, if the first is to assume that it must have something to do with technology (or Dr. Who), it can be forgiven, since the term has thoroughly kidnapped its coined by the American mathematician in 1948. KybernetesWhich means “boyfriend.” The French, CyberneticIt is the “art of governing.” In this original context, cybernetics, or, to give its full title, “cyber administration”, worried about the design and implementation of effective and efficient systems.
The most closely associated with the development of cybernetics was Stafford Barbuded beer, now probably more famous for its axiom posiwid: “The purpose of a system is what it does.”
At first glance, this may seem banal, but the point that beer does is that the purpose of a system is not what intention To do or what you Hope will serve but what is activity does.
To give an example, last weekend I had to look for two train trips. In the morning I had to travel to Birmingham from Bristol and then, in the afternoon, I had to go to Bath. When I tried to book a train to Birmingham, I discovered that the trip, which would normally be less than 2 hours, would take more than three and a half hours as the trip was enrusted through Wales. You don’t have to say that I decided to drive. My plan was to make a round trip to my local train station and get on the train to bathe with the friend with whom I was traveling to avoid the horror that tries to park on Bath on a Saturday. But, for my discomfort, he called on the phone to say that all trains had canceled the leg. The inevitable conclusion is that train trips are more exempt, less convenient and less reliable than alternative travel media. Applying posiwid we must conclude that The purpose of the rail network is to discourage people to make trains trips.
The objective of all this is not to say that the systems are bad, but that they are powerful. The systems direct our behavior of forms that can be beneficial or harmful. From this observation, it should not be a jump too big to think about the various systems in which we trust management schools. Every time we see the school teachers and leaders doing something that appears, at first glance, a little strange, we must see the systems that could be channeling their behavior.
For example, I meet regularly with the notion that students need more practice in extended writing. This leads to systems to ensure that teachers provide students with more opportunities to write extended responses. While this may sound innovative and well intentional, we must see what Occur When these systems are enacted. What I discover too much is that students produce pages and low quality writing pages. We know that what we practice improves, but practice but practice something wrong does not lead the child of the improvements we want. If students fill books with low quality writing, they improve writing. The purpose of the system is to worsen students in writing. Obviously, this result has no interest in anyone.
The more tight and prescriptive a system is, the greater the danger that can lead to perverse incentives. The smallest and less prescribed system is, the greater the risk of lethal mutations. In any case, systems always run the risk of causing unintentional results. There is a batch O Detail in Davies’s book on how cyber management should incorporate safeguards and controls to mitigate the thesis risks, but, to be absolutely honest, I am still struggling to understand the details and, certainly, the Dowd -Lodular rabbit areas.
However, we may not need. When they are aware of the possible problems and reflect on the design of sensible safeguards, we can probably do a lot. With that in mind, these simple steps seem like a good starting place:
- Assume that the system is the problem
Look carefully what staff and students are doing and compare this with their intentions. Why does its beautifully designed full -class feedback policy result in the work of the students that worsens? Why their carefully considered the uniform policy teachers constantly fight with students about shirts without aquistar and upper buttons? Why don’t they seem to act the arrests as duck? Why do teachers leave the mass profession? Instead of blaming people, consider the possibility that their behavior is a rational response to the system that someone has implemented.
- Adapt to individuals
Maybe I can avoid some of the undesirable results by adjusting the existing systems. The systems that are too prescriptive try to anticipate too many possibilities and end up eliminating the agency. This leads to compliance in the best case, but worse, lip, conflict and resentment service. Loose systems overestimate the ability and experience of people, which leads to chaos, inconsistency and confusion.
In any case, the systems must be adjusted to those who need it and loosen for those who do not. If you know that a teacher is effective and hardworking, why would I want to meet a policy designed to meet the needs of less effective personnel? Similarly, if you know a teacher who has no experience or is not reliable, why would the same agency allow them as their most competent cocklesas? One of the most consistently poor system design attributes in schools is to assume that all staff is the same. Treating everyone equally is fundamentally unfair.
- Execute a pre-mortem
Before changing anything, execute the following thought experiment: he launched his policy a year ago, but he failed completely and has returned to the daily board. What went wrong? It is unlikely to attract everything, but when gathering all those involved in the implementation of a strategy to suggest possible reasons for their failure, it is likely that it avoids the most obvious and atrocious mistakes.
- Systems need maintenance
Only better designed systems can go wrong and stop working as planned. It is silly to wait for the wheels to come, so we need to build plans, additional systems, to verify the health of our systems. When and how you check should be decided in advance. How will you know if your system is working? What will you look for as signs of success?
- Beware of sunken costs and leadership bubbles
We all have a forced interest in believing that anything we have invested effort, resources or credibility must be good. If we have the correct step 4, we have unique checks and balances instead, we must aware of the tendency to systematically rule out any negative feedback and exaggerate the value of positive aspects.
The higher you are, the more likely people tell you what Think You want to listen. It is very difficult to see what happens around him through the leadership bubble he occupies. His interactions with systems are prone to being administered by the stage; Those involved in the daily operation of your system will do everything possible to protect it from reality. Added to this, its very presence can deform reality: things change around them because Are you there. It is very easy for higher leaders to convince yourself that behavior is excellent because you never see any poor behavior, but that is the people who are more likely to experience these behavioral staff such as the most junior staff.
Knowing how difficult it is to maintain the objective and kill us, we must point to the most invested in the success of a project outside the evaluation process. When we tie ourselves to the mast that we increase, we will resist the siren song of the fallacy of sunken costs.
None of this may seem especially original, but Postiwid’s clarity can be brutally enlightening. If it reformulates the purpose of their systems by observing what they produce real, we could put aside some of the many schools of the schools.
The purpose of their systems must be that students (and staff) are happier and more successful. If this is the result you are getting, there is probably something wrong with the systems.
