The research leading to The Performance Triangle confirms that superior decision-making is the distinguishing capability of an agile organization. Agile organizations persistently develop and retain these capabilities with diagnostic systems that foster disciplined decision-making to amplify weak signals and separate signals from noise.
Systems frame: the implementation tool
Set the pace: fix what's broken
Decisions Need Design
It’s people that make decisions. And we make thousands of small to important decisions every day: imagine, therefore, the results if everyone in your company made the right choices and took the right decisions, regardless of context and hierarchy....
Good decision-making at scale. Insight from using the Agile Diagnostic around the world helps our clients understand that the challenges lie in enabling good decision-making at scale, regardless of location in the hierarchy or context. To consistently outperform competitors and remain flexible without adding risks, it is critical to embed good decision-making practices throughout the organization.
Focus on organization. With the expertise gained from using a consistent Management Design philosophy, we know that improving decision-making is not simple in an operating environment with multiple geographies, functions, organizations, and products. In larger firms training is often focused on individuals or teams. But the real challenge is to address the underlying rules, routines, and tools to consistently enable good decision-making at scale. They are the foundation for entrepreneurial behaviors throughout the organization.
Systems Frame Decisions
Insights into implementation. Systems are located at the right corner of the Performance Triangle. In the form of rules, routines, and guidelines of many types, the role of systems in our context is to create meaning and balance top-down direction with bottom-up creativity. Systems support implementation with the right balance between freedom and constraints. To support the collaboration of people, systems provide the fuel to power formation of beliefs and decisions – essential information needed to find purpose. Further, systems set boundaries with the desired balance between entrepreneurship and efficiency.
Invest in Time and Rhythm
Remove broken systems. With ten years' experience working with clients from a variety of industries and life cycle stages on challenging projects, we recommend that in agile organizations, decision-making needs a different design. When systems are broken bureaucracy takes over, routines take a break, formalism kills creativity, faulty controls lead to wrong decisions, noise distorts senses, and infected rules lead to unintended consequences. Diagnostic systems guide time and rhythm in organizations. Time is a precious resource that is non-recoverable. Given this, designing human systems for rigor, discipline, and efficiency has a high return on investment.
Since 2002, we create twins of organizations with the AI-based operating system for dynamic leadership.
Management Insights is an independent and privately owned company with headquarters in Zuoz, Switzerland.
For more information, contact Lukas Michel, founder and author, or our partners across the world.
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