Synergy between Sociocracy and the VSM

There are 6th editions of the Stacey book 'Strategic Management and Organisational Dynamics' available for under £10. They are fine. I wouldn't recommend getting any older ones because the thinking developed over the years and the first editions are no longer so useful.

If you want a mind bending and eye opening read I thoroughly recommend it. There's nothing I like more than reading something that so resets my view of the world and fits in the stuff that hasn't fitted. Systems based techniques and models didn't fit my lived experience as a coop 'manager'. Was it me not using them correctly or maybe there was a better systems theory based tool that I didn't know about or maybe it was that coops are rubbish businesses (but the evidence was a probable no to all of these).

And then I read Stacey and discovered that senior managers in normal businesses (like him) felt the same way. But unlike most, he wanted to get to the bottom of what that problem was. Why did we have this huge denial, that all schools of strategic management and our thinking about what an organisation is were rubbish as effective tools of management?. Most managers knew it but weren't saying it.

Then I knew how to proceed, what should be encouraged (effective communication) and what discouraged (blocks to communication) and suddenly my practice became much more effective or 'promising'. Which as Pete says is a sign that what you're doing is probably more 'right'. No longer barking up the wrong tree.

New Year update:
Wow! when I said I hoped to read "The Heart of Enterprise " over the Christmas period, I really had no idea what I was about to embark on. Thank goodness I has Jon's abridged version on the VSM as an introduction. There is no way I could stay with this work if I had no invested so much time and effort into the ISO QMS diploma. I will now have to rewrite everything I have produced so far. All is not lost, although this is heavy weight stuff it adds maturity and depth to what can be rewritten. During the last few years I had a growing unease that I was discovering some form of coverup, after all turkeys don't vote for Christmas. It has been refreshing to find in the "Forward" to Jon Walkers book, "A Complexity Approach to Sustainability" acknowledgement of the wider sciences behind complexity and that this book along with others form a series of volumes. The series editor is Professor Henrik Jeldtoft Jensen. I am no intellectual heavyweight, just a jobbing guy trying to make sense of the reality as I observe it. If anything could be learned from reading my contributions it is perhaps in appreciating what is needed to improve the educational material and support for this science so that practicing managers can embrace and change how they manage their organizations viably and sustainably.

VSM and Sociocracy

Angela and I have been working with Oscar and Siri (from Sweden) who were involved in setting up a community using Sociocracy, and were interested to see if the VSM had anything to say about the problems they were having. We gave a talk in Kerry on our discussions last summer, and here’s a very short synopsis of what we found.

The two approaches are very, very similar in many respects.
• They are part of the family of organisational theories which base effective organisation on unleashed individuals and self-organising work groups, and then design structures to knit the autonomous parts together in an effective, coherent whole organisation. Elinor Ostrom’s 8 principles are also relevant, as is much of what Laloux writes about with his Teal theory.
• Both have their origins in systems and cybernetics, so they are all about real-time information flowing in loops, multiple feed-back structures, and patterns of relationships.
• Both are recursive “Those organizations are all autonomous but they might choose to form bigger organizations. There is no limit to the number of levels we can link together. The structure works like fractals. We can apply the same rules again and again and through recursion, we could, in theory, build a world organization.” This comes from Sociocracy, but could easily be from a VSM paper.

However:
• Sociocracy is much more accessible and friendly.
• Sociocracy has lots of details about the practicalities of the way things work - like double linking - which the VSM doesn’t get into. VSM is much more about general principles, axioms and laws and doesn’t specify details which are context specific. (You are expected to work it out for yourself)
• VSM is (I believe) a more complete theory and is clearer about some things which are implicit in Sociocracy but not clearly defined.

So, looking at the way they work:

VSM starts with ‘primary activities” the parts which do the stuff which define the identity of the system. So, doctors and nurses in a hospital, teachers in a school, brick-layers, electricians and carpenters (etc) in a building company. Stafford called them Systems 1 or the Operation.
Sociocracy starts with circles which do the same sort of thing. They say “circles which carry out the aim”.

However, all the operational bits of the VSM are always drawn interacting with their environment, and studied in this context.

VSM then says everything else is a service to the Systems 1. Stafford calls this the Meta-system as it’s logically “over and above”, and it’s job is to provide the glue which binds the Systems 1 together into a larger whole.
This seems entirely compatible with the Sociocracy approach. They say the circles need to be connected through double linking to avoid silos.

The VSM has a System 2 which deals with conflicts of interest. We concluded that all the Sociocracy mechanisms for discussion and decision-making fulfil this requirement very well indeed. So while this function isn’t defined it’s clearly alive and kicking in Sociocracy. Note that conflict resolution is Elinor Ostrom’s 6th principle, and identified by Laloux in all his case studies of Teal organisations.

VSM then has a System 3 which looks at the cluster of interacting operational units, and looks for ways of making them interact in a more effective way. So it’s looking for collaboration, mutual support and synergies.
In Sociocracy this function is carried out by the General Circle or CG.

“The GC has three main tasks:

The GC holds the department circles accountable and supports their functioning.
The GC is also the centre of the flow of information between circles that carries out the aim.
The GC sets the aims of the circles and supports clarifications of aims.”

Excerpt From: Ted J. Rau, Jerry Koch-Gonzalez. “Many Voices One Song. Shared power with Sociocracy.”

Again: just like the VSM. Information flows between the Systems 1 and S3. The GC has delegates from all the S1 circles, and discussions are concerned with the whole system: they talk about discussing ways circles can support each other, which sounds just like looking for synergies.

So far the similarities are striking: self-organising, autonomous work groups, working in ways which avoid conflict, and coming together for their mutual benefit in a General Circle which looks exactly like System 3. Information always flows in loops.

The VSM has two further systems: System 4 which scans the outside world, looks for opportunities and threats and then comes up with cunning plans and schemes. (The Baldrick system . . .) And, System 5 which develops and enforces policies, visions and values, which define the identity of the whole system.

Sociocracy combines these two systems into the Mission Circle, originally called the Top Circle. The name was changed – sensibly- as it sounds too much like the Boss.
It’s also been called
“vision-keepers circle
Board of Directors
Board of Trustees
strategic planning circle
root circle
Council of Elders”

So clearly a mixture of what the VSM defines as Systems 4 and 5.

So far, the two are very similar. The jobs needed to hold the autonomous operational parts together, and the way information flows in loops, are almost identical.

So: what can we learn from a synthesis of the two theories ? Here are some initial thoughts off the top of me head:

1. Sociocracy is so much more accessible – the ideas are clear and well presented and the diagrams are friendlier than the VSM.
   
2. The VSM diagrams distinguish between the operational and meta-systemic roles - one is round the other square. This adds clarity to the diagrammatic presentation of the ideas.
3. The VSM develops the way Systems 3, 4 and 5 interact, and that’s an important part of the theory. Combining Systems 4 and 5 in the Mission Circle makes this difficult. For example: the core of the way decisions are made requires a rich interchange of ideas between Systems 3 and 4, which is monitored by System 5 . I can’t see how this could work if Systems 4 and 5 are the same.
4. The VSM is always drawn interacting with its environment and all diagnosis and design takes place in this context. (Gregory Bateson : “the basic unit of survival is organism plus environment”). This opens up lots of possibilities for designing organisations which work in balance with their eco-systems.
5. While both are recursive, Sociocracy diagrams of very large organisations (several levels of recursion) lose some of Mission circles of the lower recursions. VSM is much clearer. Generally this is invaluable in diagnosis when you need to look at a number of viable systems nested one within the other.

I’m not sure where this takes us. It would be great if we could base our models on Sociocracy diagrams and add the extra stuff from the VSM. But it’s likely that the extras would make the diagrams as complex as the VSM.

Davie Philips (Clough Jordan Eco-village and Cultivate ) has redrawn the VSM and it looks a bit like a jelly fish. Stafford tried a circular diagram , but he said when he’d finished the Meta-system looked like a big spider in the middle of a web. Panagiotis in Toronto has lovely 3D diagrams.

But it’s heartening that all these different approaches come to very similar conclusions about what an efficient structure based on individual freedom should look like. Stafford from his quest for the principles of viability in the way the body works, Elinor Ostrom in her studies of thousands of long-enduring Commons, Laloux in his observations of Teal businesses, and Sociocracy in it’s practical application of Kees Boeke’s work in schools by Endenburgh.

What I think is important is that all these approaches are saying the same thing: there is a better way to organise than command and control. I am still amazed that the VSM began life in the very traditional steel industry in Sheffield in the 1950’s and yet concluded that the best way to organise is to give everyone on the front line as much autonomy as possible, and requires them to be creative and innovative.

For cooperatives, this stuff is crucial: if we want large , efficient coops that can flourish, we need organise effectively. And structure becomes necessary : NOT to slot people into boxes and demand obedience, but to provide the framework where unleashed, creative individuals can collaborate for their mutual benefit. Otherwise the Tyranny of Structurelessness takes over. The UK co-op movement voted for hierarchy at the end of the 19th Century, and it’s decline started from that moment.
We need a better way.

All four of the theories mentioned above contribute to this, as do the workings of Mondragon and Emilia Romagna. Complexity theory has wonderful insights, but so far I’ve been unable to find a comprehensive vision of what they think effective organisation should look like. (Please let me know if anyone has found one !)

The battle to un-throne hierarchy is critical, and all of the above (including complexity theory) has much to contribute.

Variety: Hi Jon, In your post, variety was not mentioned, perhaps it was implied? One thing I gleaned from reading "The Heart of Enterprise" was the requirement of variety match. ie operational unit to its environment. The same matching occurs in the metasystem when you have a moment, will you please expand on how that works with Sociocracies "Mission Circle"?

Hi, sorry I forget not everybody is indoctrinated!
https://solidfund.coop/ was set-up by and for worker co-ops to fund worker co-op activity. Membership is £1 a week and members decide what proposals to support. The groups decision making forum is one of the sub-groups on Loomio but only members can join and participate (they are quite robust what they will fund as its there own money so be prepared to put in a good case if you want cash for something).

The Worker Co-op Weekend is hosted by Co-operatives UK who are the membership association for all sorts of different co-ops and provides the usual associations stuff like lobbying, campaigning, providing advice, training and events.

Worker co-ops create their own programme so if there is interest in this forum then I'm sure we could put something on the programme.

A 2 day events also sounds good, but logistically may take some organising.

Hi @jonwalker that's is a lovely piece of work and very helpful.

As you say it seems like the two approaches are very similar, in many respects.
Providing a framework where unleashed, creative individuals can thrive for their mutual benefit does indeed seem to be a common aim.

And I am sure both approaches have much to contribute to 'un-throne hierarchy'.

I would also like to add something in relation to the debate that has been running about what did (or didn't) happen at Suma. It also strikes me that we may have been talking at cross purposes?

By this I mean that a lot of what you describe seems to be about structure - using Stacey's language, this is an approach which sees an organisation as a "complex adaptive system".

There's an alternative approach - which, again using his language, is about seeing and experiencing 'complex responsive process'.

I think these two ways of seeing are different but probably complementary.

I think they're really about mindset.

In organisational development as you probably know we talk about Diagnostic OD and about Dialogic OD.

Diagnostic OD is a mindset which looks at organisations - often from the outside - as systems, and as systems which can be changed and developed. This attitude often continues into practice - historically OD practitioners have, for example, started their work by analysing and diagnosing organisations. Interventions follow, leading to 'changed' structures, changed behaviour and so on, at least in theory!

Dialogic OD sounds like it is about getting people into dialogue (and in a way it is). But it is also about a mindset. Which experiences organisational life as an on-going, emergent experience, in which the OD consultant is a participant. Not standing outside, 'diagnosing' and then 'intervening'. But taking part in that emergent process. This is how I understand Stacey's 'Complex Responsive Process' - as a theoretical discussion of such an approach.

This is not actually a new idea, of course. Parmenides (late sixth or early fifth century BCE) gave us a world of objects and even 'systems'. Heraclitus (535 - 475 BCE) famously suggested that you can never step in the same river twice.

In the Western world, as I understand it, we have largely built our philosophy, our education systems, and our management theories on the ideas of Parmenides and not Heraclitus. So perhaps it is unsurprising that approaches that are in more tune with a 'Complex Adaptive Systems' way of thinking seem to dominate.

But I think most of us, when we reflect will realise that both ways of thinking have much to offer. I think we can all use both modes of thinking.

And of course, both VSM and Sociocracy can be seen through either lens. Sociocracy, for example, and as you point out, has many ideas about structure.

Introducing Sociocracy (and I suspect VSM) into an organisation is also a 'dialogic process' where people (external and internal) engage in conversations with other people with largely unpredictable and uncontrollable outcomes.

From this approach - which you will recognise as 'emergence' - it is also completely explicable why what seems to be a sensible structure can work in one situation and not work in another. And actually can appear to some people to work and not work to others! Or even at some times it can appear to have worked, and at others not!

Leading to all kinds of debates between individuals - as long as we stay within those distinct frames.

If we step outside the diagnostic frame and experience the debate dialogically, there is always difference to be uncovered and always similarity too.

As Mary Parker Follett, writing nearly a hundred years ago, said “Unity, not uniformity, must be our aim. We attain unity only through variety. Differences must be integrated, not annihilated, nor absorbed.”

Basing our conversations on the principles of respect for each other, empathy and congruence of thought and feeling can really help with this integration, I think. So thank you again for the work to try to integrate the above approaches, and also to stay open integrating different ideas and frames by having this conversation.

Hi Pete, and many thanks for your very kind comments and extremely interesting responses.

On the question of Diagnostics and Dialogics, we have come to very much the same conclusion. In 2007 Angela and I were invited to introduce the VSM to Cloughjordan Ecovillage in Ireland. It immediately became obvious that if we wanted to do anything useful we'd need to get very involved. So we started to go over every few months: we were learning about the Village and they were learning about the VSM. It was clear that one without the other was not going to work. Happily they already had a "Process Group" who were working with the way the Village was organised, and there was a policy to never work with command-and-control. So the VSM was exactly what they were looking for , and several members of the process group got very good indeed with VSM ideas - in fact, on one or two occasions I found myself being corrected ! (Wonderful!) Over the course of the first year the plan emerged and was put in place, (with the agreement of the whole village - nothing being imposed on anyone ) and then there was the inevitable period when lots of things don't go the way we expected, and the review, re-think, try-again loop started to function. We were involved in the whole thing for a couple of years, and it became obvious that the usual consultancy approach of Parachute-in, Study, Write a report, and Leave was all a bit of a waste of time as the crucial work starts when you take your lovely, elegant theories and try them in the white-heat of reality.

I think this is what Dialogic OD and Complex Responsive Process must be, and is also just what Cybernetics is all about : it's the steersman at the back of the boat, responding to wind and waves and giant-squid and using real-time information to steer a path to where you want to go. She will, of course, be in conversation with the look-out and the people keeping the engine going. All a pattern of relationships.

(Interesting that all the cybernetics I know looks at the way natural systems work and then try and find the invariances with man-made and social systems, and yet lots of people think it's about studying machines and then making groups of people work like machines. I blame Doctor Who . . . .)

I love the quote from Mary Parker Follet, and again it's something which becomes obvious once you make the leap from a hierarchical mind set to a systems approach (Systems for me is always about patterns of relationships.) As Bob rightly says, the hierarchical myth that one person controls dozens always leads to problems of requisite variety and thus to the need to limit the variety of the individual being controlled which usually means some sort of uniformity. If you're taking the VSM/Sociocracy approach of looking for synergies between unleashed people then the opposite is true : the more diversity the more chance of synergies. If everyone is expected to be the same, there's little to learn from each other.

And finally : in the work we do, structure is always a critical element of the dialogue. Ultimately everything is about deciding who's involved in what, who needs to talk to whom, what sort of decisions need to be taken, and where those decisions are made. I guess this is what a structure is. Both Sociocracy and the VSM provide a template to start the debate. But as Stafford used to repeat regularly, there are no right answers, only models which are more or less useful.

Hi Jon

Yes, it does again sound that there are a lot of similarities in these two approaches.

Your experiences in Cloughjordan - where the plan emerged and was put into place with the agreement of the whole village, with nothing being imposed - sounds great.

In a Dialogic approach, yes, we also use the review, re-think, try-again loop again and again.

We'd probably also draw on Argyris and Schon's work on double-loop learning - to look at 'conditions' as well as 'causes' - and that again sounds to me very like systemic thinking.

I also understand that for you systems are always about patterns of relationships, and there is certainly similarity there.

And we also certainly agree about the value of diversity.

I think there are also some differences. - again referring to Mary Parker Follett - the task is 'integration'. And to do that we need to find the differences in the similarities. I'll have a go!

Structure - as you describe it - is about deciding who is involved in what, who needs to talk to whom etc. I think we also need to recognise the many ways that structure is subverted. That is something I pay a lot of attention to in my work - the 'shadow system'. How does VSM include that?

OD and Dialogic OD in particular also pays a lot of attention to what happens outside of the cognitive realm - emotion, and what happens subconsciously, for example. Again I am curious about how VSM takes these into account?

And finally, I am really not sure about 'the steersman model. Dialogic OD is a 'mindset' - so it is about how the 'consultant' sees the world. But we're not steering. Or only steering in the sense that everyone else is steering too.

For me, a business is not a boat, and there is no single person operating the tiller.

I - like everyone else - am in a series of conversations. We are in a pattern of relationships, a pattern of conversations. And everyone has their own view of the pattern, and none are more correct than others.

My assumption is that we can barely predict the future and we certainly can't control it. This might start to sound hopelessly chaotic! That there is nothing that we can do. It can sound destabilising and even scary.

The way we approach this is by focusing on developing our own awareness. Of our own thoughts, but also our own emotional and intuitive responses. On our awareness of how the group (what we might also call the 'system') is behaving - for example, the norms of behaviour. Of our own responses in relation to that behaviour.

As we become more aware and more skilled it becomes easier to 'muddle through' (1) effectively. Always subject to those constraints of not being able to predict or control the future.

Is that too different? Can we start to integrate that?

Best

(1) Using my friend Chris Rodgers' words.

Hi Pete, I had hoped that Jon would respond but I must assume he is heavily engaged elsewhere. These are very much a students view but here goes:
Taking your point about the 'shadow system': it is my understanding ( open to correction) that The Heart of Enterprise, page 208, Fig 34 shows that well. To explain what that drawing conveys would take too long in words here.
You ask about 'the steersman model". "a business is not a boat, and there is no single person operating the tiller" Surely the synoptic view as an observer ( eg watching the murmurations of starlings) differs from the view of those engaged in the operational units ( eg the starlings)? The steersman states Stafford Beer is the heart of the enterprise. It is that entity which can comprehend all of the complexity in its many forms, which we as external consultants, "perforce rely on the human genius to know how, precisely, to apply itself". Quote Heart of Enterprise, page 518.

Hi Philip

Thanks for getting back to me, I am also assuming Jon is heavily engaged elsewhere.

On the shadow system, I'll have to look at the reference.

On the steersman model, yes, I think you are right, the view of an observer differs from those engaged in the operational units.

I would also add that every participant has a different view.

It's a nice idea to think that somebody with a big-picture (synoptic) view is at the heart of the enterprise. I guess it is also reassuring to many.

And I think this is precisely where a dialogic approach is different. It asks us to consider if we are ourselves bringing in our own assumptions and beliefs into how we see what is happening.

In systems thinking terms, using the idea of emergence, we might notice that a rainbow is an emergent property including of our eyes. (For example, when we move, so does the rainbow).

I really don't know very much about Stafford Beer but it sounds as if he believed strongly that the steersman had a special place in the enterprise. Taking a dialogic approach means noticing this belief, and how it might shape our behaviour - what we say and do. And how what we say and do affects what happens.

So I might ask the question - what do we really mean by 'external' in 'external consultant'? This internal/external boundary is one of our own making, I believe.

Best