“We should not try to design a better world. We should try to make better feedback loops” – Owen Barder

For much of the industrial age we have been attempting to design a better world.  We’ve applied our considerable intellects, combined with ever increasing data and attempted to create beautiful solutions to the problems our customers face.

The modern world however is increasingly being regarded as an uncertain one.  It’s a world where adaptability is the key capability required for organisations to thrive.  It brings to mind the so called Wireachy coined by Jon Husband back in 1999.

a dynamic two-way flow of power and authority based on knowledge, trust, credibility and a focus on results, enabled by interconnected people and technology.

It sees management 2.0 resemble the flexible and adaptable world of web 2.0.  We are some way from achieving this however.  As noted management thinker Gary Hamel said in his latest book “right now, your company has 21st-century Internet-enabled business processes, mid-20th-century management processes, all built atop 19th-century management principles.”

The complex and uncertain world in which we now inhabit doesn’t allow organisations to create static and controllable environments.  Instead it demands a level of flexibility that allows organisations to react to what they see in front of them.  It also demands an attitude to knowledge that ascribes value from the insights that arrive from all parts of the organisation rather than merely those at the top.