@innomadaPK Like a replacement leg for a coffee table?
@innomadaPK [Begin] A table leg is a defined, designed, and anticipated outcome. And it ‘emerges’ if you will from a system of logging and milling wood, tools capable of producing the length and shape required, electricity to power the tools, and people capable and motivated to use them.
@innomadaPK The idea that something ‘emerges’ which was not there in original form is no different than saying ice cream sundaes ‘emerge’ from the interaction of ice cream providers and ice cream consumers. It’s like saying 2 ‘emerges’ from adding 1 and 1, since neither of the ones is a two.
@innomadaPK Once you see it, you recognize everything ‘emerges’ from interactions within an environment. And thus ‘emerges’ simply breaks down to ‘is produced’. Even color is produced by the interaction of reflected light with our eyes, nervous system, brain, and language.
@innomadaPK Without each of these elements there is no blue. So why not just say interactions within a system produce outputs? Is it true? Yes. Is it interesting? Perhaps not. Perhaps it sounds trivial. Perhaps ‘emergent’ allows for interpretations that ‘produced’ does not.
@innomadaPK We use language as much to obscure as to clarify, probably moreso. If things ‘emerge’ from systems, then people are not responsible for them. If the system causes them, perhaps they also cannot be predicted or addressed.
@innomadaPK Crosby writes, “Quality is the result of a carefully constructed cultural environment.” We might even say, “Quality ‘emerges’ from a carefully constructed cultural environment.” But he clearly does not. He purposely chooses ‘is the result of’.
@innomadaPK Crosby goes on to say, “The purpose of quality management is to build an organizational culture in which transactions are accomplished completely, efficiently, the first time.” Thus, quality comes from a culture which is created and maintained, on purpose.
@innomadaPK Why did Crosby choose those terms? The answer is found here: “The culture we have was caused.” Crosby isn’t going to let management believe poor quality ‘emerges’ from some unknown and unknowable place. Poor quality isn’t forced on the organization, it is chosen.
@innomadaPK Safety is chosen. Table legs are chosen. Ice cream sundaes are chosen. So too are unsafe work environments, tables with three legs that fall over, and days without ice cream sundaes. If workplace accidents ‘emerge’ without effort, how can they be prevented?
@innomadaPK If they cannot be prevented, they are to be expected. For decades, people believed the price of the industrial age was dead employees. People were expected to be killed in factories, construction projects, and mines. We budgeted and took out insurance to limit the company’s cost.
@innomadaPK People then would tell you there was little they could do. Mines collapsed. People fell into concrete. Workers lost limbs in factories and farm equipment. Until they didn’t. What changed were expectations. What changed was people began to accept these tragedies were caused.
@innomadaPK I see many good things from the system thinking community. The idea of process, feedback loops, ability to intervene, demonstration of the impact of systems in influencing behavior. All of these are good and worthy topics.
@innomadaPK But we have to vigilantly prune the bad ideas if we’re to have people continue the good. We have to examine everything that comes from the systems community to see where value is added and where we’re creating unnecessary complexity and confusion.
@innomadaPK We have to ask, “if emergence is true, what doesn’t emerge”? And if we cannot answer, we must then ask if the idea of emergence is really something new and novel, or whether it can be eliminated to simplify and clarify systems thinking’s real contributions. [End]
