The Conceptual Integrity of The Corporation: The Manifesto
Preamble: Inspiration from The Masters
What happens when Peter F. Drucker’s Concept of The Corporation meets Frederick P. Brooks, Jr.’s The Mythical Man-Month “Conceptual Integrity”?
Around the same time Drucker penned The Theory of the Business, Brooks was writing No Silver Bullet: Essence and Accident in Software Engineering and issuing the second edition of his seminal book, The Mythical Man-Month. One can imagine Peter meeting Fred and an integration of their collective theses; we’d have even greater quality products and we’d have more-engaged workers and workplaces. An opportunity?
Success in the digital transformation era mandates more integration, greater engagement, and a common decision-making framework…at all levels. It’s the workers closest to the customer who are making decisions on behalf of the organization, mostly decisions in software code. Consistency of method is required.
The Conceptual Integrity of The Corporation is a synthesis of Drucker’s Theory of the Business (ToB) and Brooks’ Conceptual Integrity (CI). It’s a melding of business architectural principles — doing right things, with emphasis on the importance of knowledge workers, and computer/software architectural principles — doing right things, with emphasis on simplicity and straightforwardness; both implored consistent and continuous management of change, knowing what to leave in and what to leave out.
This is a tribute to the memory of Dr. Peter Drucker and the continuing legacy of Dr. Frederick Brooks, The Conceptual Integrity Manifesto; a meta-framework for making decisions, decisions of validation.
Brooks’ elusive “silver bullet” has by and large been resolved in the “accidental” (later termed incidental), (software) construction portion of the equation; e.g., Agile, open source, integrated development environments. It is in the “essence”, the “mental crafting of the conceptual construct” (Brooks) where Drucker and Brooks converge. CoC explored the social aspects of the productive work environment and observed the conundrum of “Brooks’ Law” (before it became “law”) and advocated horizontal decision-making. Brooks’ thesis doesn’t explicitly consider people first, however, in applying an architect’s conceptual integrity mindset, and teaching and entrusting that mindset in others and in micro and macro decision-making, results a win-win for organizations and associates whether high-tech or otherwise.
Continuous decision-making, that is, continuous validation of the organization’s conceptual integrity, results in doing more right things (essence) and less waste — doing right things right (incidental) and in not doing wrong, wasteful things right. In essence, your ladder will be “leaning against the right building” (Drucker) and you’ll be able to recognize and move it quickly if not.
The Manifesto: The Map
In Linchpin, author/systems thinker, Seth Godin, goads us into “making a map” for others. The map and its pieces have been researched and many of its proofs with objective evidence confirmed by others. 80% of the work is leverageable; 20% of the remaining creative work, learning, and customization is, as they say in Ontario, CA, “yours to discover”. Or, recently, it’s “a place to grow”.
A Conceptual Integrity Framework (CIF):
Step 0 (zero): Don’t throw out anything you’re already doing!! Agile? Keep doing it! CMMI? Keep doing it! 6-Sigma? Keep doing it! Don’t know or nothing? Start here: start with validation! Remember, doing more decisions of validation will lead to less verification (and wasted verification). The “secret” (Peter Thiel’s Zero to One) and the paradox of doing more with less: doing more (validation) results in doing less (verification) and less overall.
- Define your conceptual integrity with inspiration and guidance from Simon Sinek’s Start With Why and Find Your Why. Your “why” leads the way to your conceptual integrity.
- Once you’ve found your why, apply Miller’s Law — the magical number of seven plus or minus two — using it to define your 7 +/- 2 one-word Conceptual Integrity Attributes (CIAs). Use the Pareto principle as espoused in Richard Koch’s The 80/20 Principle to refine down to your “about 7” CIAs.
- Once you’ve defined your attributes, your CIA1-CIAn, develop your CI/validation checklist of questions. Ask: What is the potential impact of <doing something (or not doing something)>? In considering each of your CIAs; the total impact on your product’s/organization’s conceptual integrity. Impacts consider customers, associates, and the organization’s reputation. (For an example of “Bailey’s Law of TRACS”, see Time for the FDA to Update its Thinking on Validation? or an update in ASQ Software Quality Professional — June 2019.)
- Now, for every decision, implicit (micro) and explicit (macro), ask the questions; develop the mindset and the habit. “What is the potential impact…?” Allow yourself to exercise Daniel Kahneman’s “system 1” and “system 2” from Thinking, Fast and Slow, being aware that your immediate (system 1) reaction is often incorrect or too narrowly focused and that waiting on your methodical (system 2) analysis will more often yield a better outcome. Caution: Avoid groupthink and “what you see is all there is”/WYSIATI (Kahneman) by applying “Janusian thinking” thereby challenging the directly opposing viewpoint. It’s our human nature to imagine only the good impacts, but the potential bad impacts can be elusive and sometimes devastating. (See Dorie Clark’s Stand Out and Albert Rothenberg’s original paper for more on Janusian thinking. Also, Dorie’s Chapter 5, Create a Framework, inspired this meta-framework.) (In TF&S, also see section The Illusion of Validity.)
- Now, in considering alternatives and impacts, “Farrell’s Law of 3 Alternatives”: for every needed-solution (requirement, feature, bug/problem fix, acquisition consideration, <a thing to do>), posit 3 alternative solutions: 1) a good, finite quick fix/minimum viable product (Eric Ries, The Lean Startup); 2) a long-term better alternative; 3) a best infinite alternative. Optionally, Alternative 0 (Zero)) the do-nothing alternative, a documented decision/choice as to why it’s not worth pursuing…at this time.
- Make the decision, document it, communicate it, and…revisit it. Build your knowledge-base. (See Ray Dalio’s Principles; collect and then connect your “dots”.)
- Make the plan, then Execute the plan. Expect iteration. (See Safi Bahcall’s Loonshots; actively manage your “dynamic equilibrium”, the recursive validation to verification phase transitions. Drucker’s ToB spec#4: “The theory of the business has to be tested constantly.”)
In summary, when problems occur or opportunities present, don’t delay. Apply the CI framework — ask your 7 questions; think fast; think slow; think Janusian; consider 3 solutions — then decide!
Embrace conceptual integrity thinking and actions — continuous validation — as your new organizational culture. Most of all, protect your associates, and their dignity, by consistently applying the framework and entrusting them to do so as well.
The Possibility
Vision: Products achieving true validation and valuation; validation beyond quality
Outcome: Valid and validated products if and only if valid and validated workers; win-win
Formula: Quality = Validation & Valuation; no longer only Verification & (then) Validation
(ɔ)2019 Conceptual Integrity Group LLC
Gregory Keyes is Chief Validation Officer at Conceptual Integrity Consulting, located near Rochester, NY USA. He assists companies and organizations in applying the Conceptual Integrity Framework to their decision-making, design/development, and organization development practices. He is author/curator of The (In)Validator’s Dilemma publication. Connect with him on LinkedIn or greg@conceptualintegrityconsulting.com.
This article also appears on LinkedIn.
