The Influence of Systems

Organisations that get their best work done do it with people, and other organisations that struggle to achieve their strategic priorities also fail with their people. Take the same people who succeed in their endeavour to an unsupportive environment; they will most likely fail. Hence, the system problem trumps the people problem, almost every time. “A bad system will beat a good person every time. People are already doing their best; the problems are with the system.” — W. Edwards Deming.

People are already doing their best; the problems are with the system.” — W. Edwards Deming.

It can be said that an ineffective system is the cause of most organisational problems. The question is – ‘who is responsible for creating effective systems?’. It is the role of leadership to ensure that the environment is good enough for people to bring their best self to work and contribute to the achievement of the organisational vision. As it is, only management can change the system with their legitimate power and influence. If the improvement and performance of a particular system is important, then leaders must not only lead the required change but must also remove all the roadblocks to ineffective systems.

To make the change stick, a culture of continuous improvement must be floated. This would be achieved by actioning small enhancements. “It’s easier to act yourself into a new way of thinking than to think yourself into a new way of acting” — Millard Fuller. Systems thinking capabilities needs to be demonstrated and applied across the board. Not only that, if any problem is identified, effort must be made to deal with the root cause rather than fixing the effect. In other words, it is not enough to state what the problem is without showing how to fix it.

“It’s easier to act yourself into a new way of thinking than to think yourself into a new way of acting” — Millard Fuller.

Disciplined Agile has options that can help organisations fix their ineffective systems. If you would like to discuss more about how Disciplined Agile can improve your system, you can get in touch with us at Pete Lauren Consulting. We’ll love to hear from you and help you create a better system.