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The 1953–1961 US President Dwight D. Eisenhower emphasized that his experience as the Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Forces in Europe during the Second World War taught him that “plans are worthless, but planning is everything”. This sound contradictory: if plans are worthless, why bother with planning at all? In this paper, we show that Eisenhower’s observation has a meaning: while directly following the original plan in constantly changing circumstances is often not a good...
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Despite a swathe of critiques of logframes and other blueprint approaches to development over the last 30 years, most aid infrastructure continues to concentrate on the design and subsequent implementation of closed models. This article does not propose an alternative to blueprints, but challenges the inflexibility of their implementation, which is inadequate given the complex nature of social change. It proposes a supplementary management and learning approach which enables implementers to...
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After-action reviews identify past mistakes but rarely enhance future performance. Companies wanting to fully exploit this tool should look to its master: the U.S. Army’s standing enemy brigade, where soldiers learn and improve even in the midst of battle.
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This post is part of an HBR Spotlight examining leadership lessons from the military This is the first in a series on the four aspects of VUCA, a framework used by the U.S. military to describe the environment in terms of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. Do challenges and opportunities that once took days or […]
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This post is part of an HBR Spotlight examining leadership lessons from the military. It’s the second in a series on the four aspects of VUCA, a framework used by the U.S. military to describe the environment in terms of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. The frenetic pace of our environment, brought on by volatility, […]
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This is the third in a series on the four aspects of VUCA, a framework used by the U.S. military to describe the environment in terms of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. Our complex environment demands a perspective that goes beyond viewing threats and opportunities as collective; we must see them as interactive. Leading through […]
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This is the last in a series on the four aspects of VUCA, a framework used by the U.S. military to describe the environment in terms of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. Diversity and global reach introduce ambiguity to the environment; therefore opportunities and challenges must be appreciated from multiple aspects, not just our own […]
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World expert Bent Flyvbjerg and bestselling author Dan Gardner reveal the secrets to successfully planning and delivering ambitious projects on any scale.Nothing is more inspiring than a big vision that becomes a triumphant new reality. Think of how Apple’s iPod went from a project with a single employee to an enormously successful product launch in eleven months. But such successes are the exception. Consider how London’s Crossrail project delivered five years late and billions over budget....
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AI already is being used in some areas of process improvement, and the usage of this technology — including generative AI — promises to grow. That’s because it can perform tasks faster and much less expensively than humans alone. But it will never fully replace people — and that poses management challenges.
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#1 New York Times bestseller "This brilliant book will shatter your assumptions about what it takes to improve and succeed. I wish I could go back in time and gift it to my younger self. It would've helped me find a more joyful path to progress."-Serena Williams, 23-time Grand Slam singles tennis championThe #1 New York Times bestselling author of Think Again illuminates how we can elevate ourselves and others to unexpected heights.We live in a world that’s obsessed with talent. We celebrate...
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Extreme Teaming Lessons in Complex, Cross-Sector Leadership Today’s global enterprises increasingly involve collaborative work by teams of experts operating across different professions, organizations, and industries. Extreme Teaming provides new insights into the world of complex, cross industry projects and the ways they must be managed. Leading experts Amy Edmondson and Jean-François Harvey analyze contemporary cases that expose the complex demands of cross-boundary collaboration on...
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Dialogic Organization Development is a compelling alternative to the classical action research approach to planned change. Organizations are seen as fluid,socially constructed realities that are continuously created through conversations and images change happens when those conversations and images change. Leaders and consultants can help foster, support, or accelerate the emergence of transformational possibilities by encouraging disruptions to taken-for-granted ways of thinking and acting...
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ABSTRACT. We elaborate the necessary conceptual and strategic elements for developing an effective adaptive monitoring network to support Integrated Coastal Management (ICM) in a multiuser nature reserve in the Dutch Wadden Sea Region. We discuss quality criteria and enabling actions essential to accomplish and sustain monitoring excellence to support ICM. The Wadden Sea Long-Term Ecosystem Research project (WaLTER) was initiated to develop an adaptive monitoring network and online data...
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Complexity science has seriously challenged long-held views in the scientific community about how the world works. These ideas, particularly about the living world, also have radical and profound implications for organizations and society as a whole. Available in paperback for the first time, this insightful book describes and considers ideas from complexity science and examines their use in organizations, especially in bringing about major organizational change. Author McMillan...
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How to create the change you want to see in the world using the paradigm-busting ideas in this "utterly fascinating" (Adam Grant) big-idea book. Most of what we know about how ideas spread comes from bestselling authors who give us a compelling picture of a world, in which "influencers" are king, "sticky" ideas "go viral," and good behavior is "nudged" forward. The problem is that the world they describe is a world where information spreads, but beliefs and behaviors stay the same. When...
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This scoping paper explores the question ‘what would it take to build a culture of learning at scale?’. It focuses on systems-wide learning that can help to inform systems change efforts in complex contexts. To answer this question, literature was reviewed from across diverse disciplines and the realms of education, innovation systems, systems thinking and knowledge management. This inquiry was also supported by in-depth interviews with numerous specialists from the for-purpose sector and...
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The Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework has been applied to various environmental problems at multiple spatial and temporal scales and attempts have been made to conceptually improve the framework to encompass various stakeholder perspectives. However, recent literature experiences in the field have challenged the inclusive character of the framework applications. In particular, the framework's inability to incorporate the aggregated informal responses of people affected...
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Adaptive management has become the tonic of natural resources policy. With its core idea of “learning while doing,” adaptive management has infused the natural resources policy world to the point of ubiquity, surfacing in everything from mundane agency permits to grand presidential proclamations. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to suggest that these days adaptive management is natural resources policy. But is it working? Does appending “adaptive” in front of “management” somehow make natural...
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The challenges currently facing resource managers are large-scale and complex, and demand new approaches to balance development and conservation goals. One approach that shows considerable promise for addressing these challenges is adaptive management, which by now is broadly seen as a natural, intuitive, and potentially effective way to address decision-making in the face of uncertainties. Yet the concept of adaptive management continues to evolve, and its record of success remains limited....
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In this highly insightful analysis of Western and Chinese concepts of efficacy, Francois Jullien subtly delves into the metaphysical preconceptions of the two civilizations to account for diverging patterns of action in warfare, politics, and diplomacy. He shows how Western and Chinese stategies work in several domains (the battle-field, for example) and analyzes two resulting acts of war. The Chinese strategist manipulates his own troops and the enemy to win a battle without waging war and...
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