Ultra-Processed Narratives and Nutritionally-Poor Agility
The great thing about the fast food franchises is that when you order a product in one outlet in a chain, you will get more or less the same product as if you order it in another outlet, in another part of the country, or another part of the world. Thus, a branded burger is more-or-less-the-same wherever you go, as is a piece of fried chicken or a given style of taco. There’s a downside though: in order to make them more-or-less-the-same, the food goes through processing which homogenises the product so that the texture and taste is the same even when the raw ingredients are heterogeneous. As with all things: processing of food has its benefits (uniformity of product, improved shelf-life and freshness, ease of preparation and handling), but it also has downsides (concerns about nutritional content, can lead to restricted taste and texture preferences, limits peoples ability to make food from scratch, and improvise with ingredients, seasonings and textures in the kitchen). However, as I often remind people worried about what they’re eating, “any food is better than no food”.
A good friend contacted me to say that a client was worried about the proliferation of narratives about agility in their organisation. In particular, the client is concerned that the narratives coming from a significant cohort of coaches are interfering with each other, either causing attenuation (loss) of desired messages or amplification of undesired messages. The client wanted to know how they could “tidy up” their narratives to ensure that unapproved ideas weren’t contaminating their organisational grand narrative, and to ensure that the organisation grand narrative is being heard. In short they want everyone “on message”.
My immediate response to this was to be concerned that overly processed homogeneous narratives will “taste” artificial to the people hearing them. Narratives which just say the same thing repeatedly instead of having diverse narratives about mixed contexts with different outcomes are highly controlled and controlling. This is obviously useful if you want to churn out the same product time after time. However, not all businesses are fast food outlets, and we should expect a health range of processes and approaches to delivering with agility. Just as the occasional ultra-processed fast food meal is nothing to worry about, in some circumstances, ultra-processed, cookie-cutter agility might be appropriate. But if your diet does not consist of a diversity of foodstuffs, you would expect this might cause malnutrition; likewise, if the agility you help create in different contexts is always bland, beige and deep-fried, this is likely impoverishing the business and inhibiting it’s ability to develop and grow in healthy ways.
People know that one size doesn’t fit all, that there needs to be local adaptation, and that context matters. As a result, they will rebel against one-size-fits-all narratives. They also inhibit local innovation and exploration: if everyone is singing from the same hymn sheet there’s no room for harmonies or interpretation in the individuals expression of the music. So whilst controlling narratives have their place to establish enabling constraints, we also need to give people permission to go off-script where appropriate to enable true agility. Otherwise, to further mix the metaphor, it’s just painting by numbers.
Churning out identical organisational patterns following the same process time after time, with identical temporal cycles, doesn’t nourish the agility of the organisation; just as a restricted diet can have consequences for human health, restricted agility will almost certainly have consequences for firms. Organisations need different departments and teams operating at different heartbeats, using different approaches and ideas, and, most importantly, feeling supported in experimenting with different tools and processes with work in their context. The temporal and workload patterns of narrative and work for a finance department are radically different to those of a marketing departments, which are radically different to those of software engineering or order fulfilment departments. And whilst in an un-narrated, unconstrained environment this could be a recipe for chaos, identifying core organisational temporal heartbeats and central tools allows coordination and synchronisation whilst allowing local variation and taste preferences.
Indeed, one of the core jobs of agilists is to promote teams (at whatever level) examining their feelings, reactions and motivations as events occur (reflexivity) and to enable teams to become more than the sum of their parts (and narratives) when appropriate (transcendence). “It depends” is a core agility narrative, and homogenising the narratives inhibits dialogue and exploration in ideas. Instead, homogenous narratives drive pseudo-dialogue: although two or more people may be talking, they’re either echoing each other, or improvising around what the person with power has already said. Pseudo-dialogue inhibits agility by inhibiting reflexivity and the opportunities for transcendence.
How might you enable reflexivity and transcendence whilst still seeking to deliver a narrative which steers the ship towards agility? Consider introducing a narrative around the importance of diversity and heterogeneity in agility, of narratives, of people, and of processes and tools. Give people permission to have, create and explore different narratives, and to focus on core values whilst exploring different options in context. Such a narrative gives individuals permission to be themselves and authentic (within constraints). A narrative of heterogeneity invites people to examine who they are and why they’re doing what they’re doing, it helps to tip the balance towards emergent agility in the contextual moment. The narrative of diversity also encourages people to draw on a mix of voices, perspectives, styles and discourses, which creates an environment in which transcendence can occur, whilst also constraining it to moments when it’s appropriate.
Ultra-processed narratives and ultra-processed agility have their place. They’re convenient, handy, and to misquote myself, “any systematic process is better than no systematic process”. However, they leave little or no room for experimentation, improvisation and exploration, and can ultimately result in organisations which are unable to handle chronic or acute change. Instituting a mixed diet up front allows you to create an organisational capability of, well, agility to help detect, respond to, and be resilient in the face of change. So change things up, remember the importance of narrative heterogeneity and celebrate diversity of expressions of agility, and enjoy a mixed agile diet.
