Tackling the Wicked Challenge of Strategic Change

Tackling the Wicked Challenge of Strategic Change PDF Author: Professor Longmore
Publisher: Author House
ISBN: 1496982886
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 371

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Book Description
The aim of this book is to make better sense of a long, complex, messy, change process through the stories of those who were involved. Over fifty participants were interviewed during the course of the study and their uniquely personal perspectives have been woven into a compelling story of organisational change. This book describes their ingenuity and effort in bringing about change that they and their organisation valued. Between 2009 and 2012, Southampton Solent University (UK) engaged in an unprecedented and highly complex strategic initiative which ran across the entire institution, its structures, processes and systems; it aimed to produce a fundamental shift in institutional culture. Such an all-embracing approach is rare in universities. This programme of organisational change is seen through the eyes of people who were immersed in the process. Their perspectives and feelings will resonate with anyone who has tried to bring about significant change in a university. Universities are inherently creative places but too often there is a pervasive inertia that prevents ideas from being turned into new and better practices. This programme aimed to create a culture of innovation. Conventional project planning techniques were deliberately avoided and replaced with an approach based on complexity theory, recognising that the process of change requires constant adaptation, acceptance of non-linear progress and subversion of conventional management discourse. Offering an unusual example from the higher education sector, this study is a distinctive contribution to the extensive literature on organisational change. Learning gained from participants is related to theories and research from this wider literature. The study proposes a holistic and integrated approach to change which might offer a more culturally relevant and sustainable model both for higher education and for those sectors of industry and commerce from which much change management practice has conventionally been drawn.

Tackling the Wicked Challenge of Strategic Change

Tackling the Wicked Challenge of Strategic Change PDF Author: Professor Longmore
Publisher: Author House
ISBN: 1496982886
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 371

Get Book Here

Book Description
The aim of this book is to make better sense of a long, complex, messy, change process through the stories of those who were involved. Over fifty participants were interviewed during the course of the study and their uniquely personal perspectives have been woven into a compelling story of organisational change. This book describes their ingenuity and effort in bringing about change that they and their organisation valued. Between 2009 and 2012, Southampton Solent University (UK) engaged in an unprecedented and highly complex strategic initiative which ran across the entire institution, its structures, processes and systems; it aimed to produce a fundamental shift in institutional culture. Such an all-embracing approach is rare in universities. This programme of organisational change is seen through the eyes of people who were immersed in the process. Their perspectives and feelings will resonate with anyone who has tried to bring about significant change in a university. Universities are inherently creative places but too often there is a pervasive inertia that prevents ideas from being turned into new and better practices. This programme aimed to create a culture of innovation. Conventional project planning techniques were deliberately avoided and replaced with an approach based on complexity theory, recognising that the process of change requires constant adaptation, acceptance of non-linear progress and subversion of conventional management discourse. Offering an unusual example from the higher education sector, this study is a distinctive contribution to the extensive literature on organisational change. Learning gained from participants is related to theories and research from this wider literature. The study proposes a holistic and integrated approach to change which might offer a more culturally relevant and sustainable model both for higher education and for those sectors of industry and commerce from which much change management practice has conventionally been drawn.

Leadership for Sustainability

Leadership for Sustainability PDF Author: R. Bruce Hull
Publisher: Island Press
ISBN: 1642831670
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
Solving today’s environmental and sustainability challenges requires more than expertise and technology. Effective solutions will require that we engage with other people, wrestle with difficult questions, and learn how to adapt and make confident decisions despite uncertainty. We need new approaches to leadership that empower professionals at all levels to tackle wicked problems and work towards sustainability. Leadership for Sustainability gives readers perspective and skills for promoting creative and collaborative solutions. Blending systems thinking approaches with leadership techniques, it offers dozens of strategies and specific practices that build on the foundation of three main skills: connecting, collaborating, and adapting. Inspiring case studies show how the book’s strategies and principles can be applied to diverse situations: Coordinating the activities of widely dispersed individuals and groups who may not even know they are connected, illustrated by the work of urban planners, local businesses, citizens, and other stakeholders advancing ambitious climate action goals via a Community Energy Plan in Arlington County, Virginia Collaborating with diverse stakeholders to span boundaries despite their differences of opinion, expertise, and culture, as illustrated by the bold actions of a social entrepreneur who transformed the global food service industry with the “plant-forward” movement Adapting to continuous change and confounding uncertainty, as a small nonprofit organization mobilizes partners to tackle poverty, water scarcity, sanitation, and climate change in rural India Readers will come away with a holistic understanding of how to lead from where they are by applying leadership principles and practices to a wide range of wicked situations. While the challenges we face are daunting, the authors argue that these situations present opportunities for creating a more just, healthy, and prosperous world.

Tackling Wicked Problems

Tackling Wicked Problems PDF Author: John Harris
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1136531440
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 327

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Book Description
From climate change to GM foods, we are increasingly confronted with complex, interconnected social and environmental problems that span disciplines, knowledge bases and value systems. This book offers a transdisciplinary, open approach for those working towards resolving these 'wicked' problems and highlights the crucial role of this 'transdisciplinary imagination' in addressing the shift to sustainable futures. Tackling Wicked Problems provides readers with a framework and practical examples that will guide the design and conduct of their own open-ended enquiries. In this approach, academic disciplines are combined with personal, local and strategic understanding and researchers are required to recognise multiple knowledge cultures, accept the inevitability of uncertainty, and clarify their own and others' ethical positions. The authors then comment on fifteen practical examples of how researchers have engaged with the opportunities and challenges of conducting transdisciplinary inquiries. The book gives those who are grappling with complex problems innovative methods of inquiry that will allow them to work collaboratively towards long-term solutions.

New Strategies for Wicked Problems

New Strategies for Wicked Problems PDF Author: Edward P. Weber
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780870718939
Category : BUSINESS & ECONOMICS
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
A "wicked problem" isn't one with an evil nature, but a problem that is impossible or difficult to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements that are often hard to recognize. Classic examples of wicked problems include economic, environmental, and political issues. We now live in a world full of wicked problems, most of them urgent challenges calling out for creative, democratic, and effective solutions. Ed Weber, Denise Lach, and Brent Steel, of the Oregon State University School of Public Policy, solicited papers from a wide variety of accomplished scholars in the fields of science, politics, and policy to address this challenge. The resultant collection focuses on major contemporary environmental and natural resource policy issues, and proposes an assortment of alternative problem-solving methodologies to tackle such problems. New Strategies for Wicked Problems will appeal to scholars, students, and decision-makers wrestling with wicked problems and "post-normal" science settings beyond simply environmental and natural resource-based issues, while providing much needed guidance to policymakers, citizens, public managers, and other stakeholders.

Wicked Strategies

Wicked Strategies PDF Author: John C. Camillus
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 144262406X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 201

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Book Description
In business, some problems are so complex, intractable and threatening to organizations—or entire industries—that they are best described as “wicked.” These problems appear to be unsolvable and they render traditional analytical tools of strategy virtually impotent. Wicked Strategies offers a comprehensive framework for identifying, responding to and profiting from wicked problems. John C. Camillus, drawing on detailed, real-life examples from companies across the globe, has skillfully woven together the analytical techniques, processes and organizational designs that will enable managers to navigate a disruptive marketplace. His feed-forward framework for fashioning wicked strategies empowers firms to presciently transform their business models before they are made obsolete by the competition. Wicked Strategies is a practical and evocative guide that demonstrates how business leaders can profitably capitalize on unknowable futures.

Wicked Problems Worth Solving

Wicked Problems Worth Solving PDF Author: Jon Kolko
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780615593159
Category : Design
Languages : en
Pages : 171

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Book Description
It feels like our world is spinning out of control. We see poverty, disease, and destruction all around us, and as we search for ways to make sense of the chaos, we're turning to new disciplines for answers and solutions. New, creative innovations are needed, and these new approaches demand different methods and different theories. This book is presented as a handbook for teaching and learning how to design for impact. In it, you'll learn how to apply the process of design to large, wicked problems, and how to gain control over complexity by acting as a social entrepreneur. You'll learn an argument for why design is a powerful agent of change, and you'll read practical methods for engaging with large-scale social problems. You can read this entire book online for free at http://www.wickedproblems.com/

Bulletproof Problem Solving

Bulletproof Problem Solving PDF Author: Charles Conn
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119553032
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
Complex problem solving is the core skill for 21st Century Teams Complex problem solving is at the very top of the list of essential skills for career progression in the modern world. But how problem solving is taught in our schools, universities, businesses and organizations comes up short. In Bulletproof Problem Solving: The One Skill That Changes Everything you’ll learn the seven-step systematic approach to creative problem solving developed in top consulting firms that will work in any field or industry, turning you into a highly sought-after bulletproof problem solver who can tackle challenges that others balk at. The problem-solving technique outlined in this book is based on a highly visual, logic-tree method that can be applied to everything from everyday decisions to strategic issues in business to global social challenges. The authors, with decades of experience at McKinsey and Company, provide 30 detailed, real-world examples, so you can see exactly how the technique works in action. With this bulletproof approach to defining, unpacking, understanding, and ultimately solving problems, you’ll have a personal superpower for developing compelling solutions in your workplace. Discover the time-tested 7-step technique to problem solving that top consulting professionals employ Learn how a simple visual system can help you break down and understand the component parts of even the most complex problems Build team brainstorming techniques that fight cognitive bias, streamline workplanning, and speed solutions Know when and how to employ modern analytic tools and techniques from machine learning to game theory Learn how to structure and communicate your findings to convince audiences and compel action The secrets revealed in Bulletproof Problem Solving will transform the way you approach problems and take you to the next level of business and personal success.

Stragility

Stragility PDF Author: Ellen R. Auster
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 1442648058
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 169

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Book Description
Success in business demands an organization that is agile, innovative, and alert, capable of reinventing itself to handle whatever comes its way. Yet most attempts at transformational change fail, hamstrung by poor strategy, office politics, stakeholder resistance, and the pressures of constant transformation. In Stragility, Ellen Auster and Lisa Hillenbrand provide a powerful, practical, action-oriented approach that equips leaders at all levels to navigate these challenges while building skills and capabilities for the next strategic change. Filled with great examples of leading edge companies, and jam-packed with concrete tips, action steps, and tools, Stragility offers indispensable advice on how to make continuous strategic changes, navigate the politics and emotions of change, and inspire and engage leaders and stakeholders. Building on a field-tested framework the authors have applied in Fortune 500 companies, small businesses, and social sector organizations, Stragility provides the tools for creating a thriving, high-energy organization that will excel at strategic change - again and again.

Inviting Leadership

Inviting Leadership PDF Author: Daniel Mezick
Publisher: Freestanding Press
ISBN: 9780984875351
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 388

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Book Description
The pace of societal and business change continues to accelerate daily. In the new world of work, adaptive self-management, at scale, is no longer optional!Self-management is what actually scales business agility across the enterprise. Inviting Leadership & Invitation-Based Change are very specific leadership techniques that create the very conditions that are necessary for scaling genuine and authentic self-management across the entire enterprise. If you lead people in the workplace, a deep understanding of Inviting Leadership & Invitation-Based Change might be the most valuable leadership know-how you can develop. These skills are essential to survive and thrive as a leader in the new world of self-managed work. Part tutorial, part reference guide and part toolbox, this book contains everything you need to develop these valuable new skills. Inside, you'll find a complete kit that contains the underlying theory, very clearly described actionable guidance, and a toolbox of templates, diagrams, checklists and measurement tools. Everything you need to begin leading a self-managed workforce is here.

Creating Wicked Students

Creating Wicked Students PDF Author: Paul Hanstedt
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000980715
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 181

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Book Description
In Creating Wicked Students, Paul Hanstedt argues that courses can and should be designed to present students with what are known as “wicked problems” because the skills of dealing with such knotty problems are what will best prepare them for life after college. As the author puts it, “this book begins with the assumption that what we all want for our students is that they be capable of changing the world....When a student leaves college, we want them to enter the world not as drones participating mindlessly in activities to which they’ve been appointed, but as thinking, deliberative beings who add something to society.”There’s a lot of talk in education these days about “wicked problems”—problems that defy traditional expectations or knowledge, problems that evolve over time: Zika, ISIS, political discourse in the era of social media. To prepare students for such wicked problems, they need to have wicked competencies, the ability to respond easily and on the fly to complex challenges. Unfortunately, a traditional education that focuses on content and skills often fails to achieve this sense of wickedness. Students memorize for the test, prepare for the paper, practice the various algorithms over and over again—but when the parameters or dynamics of the test or the paper or the equation change, students are often at a loss for how to adjust.This is a course design book centered on the idea that the goal in the college classroom—in all classrooms, all the time—is to develop students who are not just loaded with content, but capable of using that content in thoughtful, deliberate ways to make the world a better place. Achieving this goal requires a top-to-bottom reconsideration of courses, including student learning goals, text selection and course structure, day-to-day pedagogies, and assignment and project design. Creating Wicked Students takes readers through each step of the process, providing multiple examples at each stage, while always encouraging instructors to consider concepts and exercises in light of their own courses and students.