1. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches1 IT & organizational evolution Joel Adler Ph.D.

2. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches2 Objectives Improve current practices for IS planning and IS Development Concentrated focus on managing IT driven organizational change Address both currently common, and emerging organizational structures spawned by B to B E-Commerce

3. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches3 Why this is needed IT projects fail consistently Best practices often don’t help such as, more user involvement more complete requirements specs Not much guidance available on coordination of organizational change Deeper problem may be related to: Some organizations are inherently “emergent”, others increasingly so, facilitated by IT and Telecoms

4. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches4 A complexity glossary “Emergent” organizations are complex systems “Complex systems” are “chaotic” & behave unpredictably “Complexity/Chaos theory” explains some unpredictable behavior “Agility” is the ability to adapt to unpredictable change Limitless B to B e-commerce partnerships become “interprises” Interprises are emergent “Web enabled enterprises” are often seen as “Emergent”

5. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches5 IT driven organizational change is a hard but sometimes tractable problem Coordinating technology arrival with organizational change while conducting business is hard Automating labor worked Some management science/OR has worked well ERP’s often fail Too much change at once, too inflexible Some B to C, E- commerce which involves limited internal change has worked

6. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches6 Planning velocity increasing IT and telecoms a reason, also global competition Confirmed by many sources in the 90’s Agility (adaptability to changing environment) more important than strategy a la M. Porter) for some Hatch & Zweig, 2001

7. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches7 Old problem even in non-emergent cases System range underestimated Insufficient drive to operating details Insufficient stakeholder conversion Inconsistencies with reward system Silver bullet syndrome Everyone is doing it so it must be good Technical oversell Customers & suppliers ignored

8. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches8 Shift in paradigms that IT has wrought, McElroy, 1999 Mass customization replacing scale economies No company can be all things for all customers So companies must team up core competencies opportunistically and temporarily morph into “interprises” to offer customization. Power of interprise is agility and ability to thrive on uncertainty and change. New IT mission is to facilitate agility for enterprise and to support interprise (B to B) E-commerce Not if, but when and how

9. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches9 The emergent IT organization, Truex et al, 1999 For emergent organizations Embedded IS create “stable systems drag” that inhibits agility & interprise formation. If systems need to be replaced they already have created stable systems drag Objective must be continuous redevelopment/maintenance of core IS IT must support and promote organizational emergence. IT best practices must be revised dramatically in ways orthogonal to current best practices!!!

10. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches10 ISD goals for Emergent Organizations, Truex et al Always analyze User satisfaction incomplete Constant requirements negotiation Incomplete & usefully ambiguous specs Continuous redevelopment Adaptability orientation

11. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches11 IT organization in Emergent Organizations, Truex et al Technologies Easily maintainable specs Object technologies Open system interconnection/interoperability architectures Very high level easily changeable code Practices No boundaries between user and developer End user developed disposable code Operational prototypes Highest reward for maintenance not new projects

12. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches12 The next IT fad? The hype is already beginning, Next killer app is B-to-B E-business E-Marketing, E-R&D, E-distribution, E- procurement, E-intelligence, E-forecasting..(see Meta group site) However it won’t be for everyone and it won’t be easy!

13. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches13 Will there be immunity from emergence? Yes, but for what industries and why and will it eventually wear off? Immune industries? Capital intensive, highly regulated, requiring large scale customer re-learning, Basics-food, shelter, transportation, defense, commodities… Least immune industries? Pure information or knowledge based Financial Services, Insurance, publishing…

14. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches14 Technical tools for emergent organizations 1: Open interfaces with content standards 2: Knowledge management tools for coopitition 3: OOPS for limitless process granularity 4: Very high level/fast development tools Current technology OK for simple process orgs Otherwise more advanced tools are needed e.g. Model driven architectures, Metamodelling, Adaptive Object Models, Knowledge Sharing Management…

15. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches15 Are there technical thresholds that need to be overcome? More for industries/companies with significant embedded systems Less for loosely connected entities

16. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches16 We must conclude In the absence of immunity, IT paces change and companies or parts of companies will become emergent New technology will enable more emergence Many large organizations will be hybrid enter/interprises therefore current and new best IS practices will need to coexist

17. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches17 Categories for investigation/research Case studies of IT facilitated emergent organizations Future prevailing business organizational structures Immunity and susceptibility to emergence by industry New business opportunities derived from emergence New management/leadership priorities Facilitating technologies and their timetables Requirements and specifications Best practice guidelines

18. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches18 Research To develop best practices Case studies Diagnostic tools Industry analyses Practice guidelines Etc.

19. January 2002 Ackoff Center for Advancement of Systems Approaches19 New IT Business Opportunities? Interprise opportunity and discovery brokers Interprise (B to B) IT Intermediation services High granularity process objects libraries Super high level programming New interoperability software (middleware)