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Research_img1.gif Research
Play
Emerge
Identify
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Research_img2.gif Play
Playing Seriously
The bay windows of the conference room were open, and you could hear the children playing outside. It was mid- afternoon, and in sharp contrast to the animated discussions that had been pursued since the morning, the room was still and quiet. The strategy team of a large company was trying to define the characteristics of their own strategy-making process. This process, once defined, would provide the firm with a critical advantage over competitor firms, but rather than focusing on the process itself, the team was bogged down and struggling with its form and its outputs. In the moment of silent crisis, some team members were expressing frustration, others boredom, while others seemed unable to express anything at all.
Suddenly, one the team members jumped up, grabbed a chocolate bar and ripped it in half, exclaiming, "This is energy, this is what we need!" He slumped back, only to rise again even more furiously, bedazzling the group. Then he grabbed a soda bottle, shook it up and said, "This is passion, and we need passion in our process too!" After a few seconds of amazement, everyone began to scramble around, trying to find some new idea, some new kind of object that might allow them more effectively to construct a model of their own strategy process…
Sometimes we get so caught up in our activity that nothing else seems to matter. This involvement may lead us to change who we are and how we think about ourselves on the social and individual levels, as well as to transform our relationship to our material environment. This transformation is precisely what happened to the member of the strategy team mentioned above, when he playfully used his imagination to overcome the challenge of a frustrating situation. We believe that this kind of transformation is an essential component of play in organizations.
We at the Imagination Lab are interested in the play of adults in organizations. We believe that play in organizations goes beyond 'team building' exercises, beyond golfing with clients, beyond pretending to be a manager in simulated case studies, and even beyond playing solitaire to take a break when the boss isn't looking.
More precisely, we believe that adults in organizations play purposefully. These purposes may include: to bond and cooperate socially, to build new cognitive skills, to compete with each other and/or to express their affective emotions more freely. As adults, they also play with a strong sense of identity, and frequently they put this identity on the line as something that is constructed (or deconstructed) through the play activity. We find that adults in organizations play in a non-trivial manner, exhibiting much zeal and devotion, and that their play activity contributes directly to their ambitions and objectives.
We at the Imagination Lab are curious about how adults in organizations play in order to construct new knowledge, share meaning and transform their values and beliefs as they cope with emerging business challenges. We maintain that work and play are not fundamentally opposed, but rather complementary, and furthermore that play and work must co- exist in order for individuals and organizations to learn and survive through change. When adult play in organizations is important, purposeful and potentially transformative, we call it "Serious Play", and we are currently conducting research to investigate how organizations are transformed when they play seriously.
See related topics and documents
http://www.imagilab.org/research_themes_play.html
Research_img3.gif Emerge
Intending Emergence

The CEO of a major food packaging company hung up the phone. He had just received the third call from one of his senior managers asking him to resolve a difficult staffing problem. Apparently, the company's core values statement didn't provide a strong enough basis for managers to make such decisions on their own. Couldn't they develop anything more specific than the vague and generic values to help managers make fast and coherent decisions, without resorting to developing another set of rigid policy rules?
We all know that tiny events can sometimes set off chain reactions that lead to huge consequences. Chaos theory helps us understand why an offhand remark by Alan Greenspan of the US Federal Reserve can lead to a major "market correction", with grave results for companies around the world. But with such small triggers causing such vast changes, why doesn't everything just fall apart? What is the source of the order we see around us everyday? Emergence describes the process by which orderly patterns appear through the non-linear interactions of many decision-making "agents", rather than through coordination or instructions from a leader. Over time, something "new" can appear, such as "intelligence" emerging from interconnected neurons, the "Internet" emerging from networked computers, or the "market" emerging from interacting stock traders. The emergence concept is one of many being studied as part of a broader framework of research into how complex adaptive systems work.
We are exploring how the benefits of emergence can be intentionally fostered--not simply experienced by accident. Our research findings suggest that proximity, coherence, emotion, and rules of thumb (heuristics) might play important roles (see "Dealing with Surprises: Collaboration in the LEGO Mindstorms Team").
We are particularly interested in exploring simple, principle-like heuristics that guide rather than prescribe action (see "Organizational Heuristics: More than Simple Rules").We are informed by theories of complex adaptive systems, organizational science, knowledge, and social psychology.
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http://www.imagilab.org/research_themes_intend.html
Research_img4.gif Identify

Imagining Identity

Boardroom - Interview with CEO and COO of global high-tech consumer electronics manufacturer.
CEO says, "Our 5 core values are very, very important to the company. Everyone knows them."
COO adds: "They guide us, and tell us who we are. They're all over the place."
Seminar room of the same organization, 2 months later - Workshop with 10 individuals from company strategy department.
Person #1 - "But shouldn't we relate our discussion to the core values?"
Group Leader- "I think so. Perhaps. Well, I think I can remember them. Isn't one of them 'Trust each other'?" Silence for about 5 seconds.
Person #2 - "I think you're right. That's one of them." More silence.
Person #3, glancing around nervously before admitting - "I'm not sure what the others are."
Person #1 - "That's funny. I can't remember them either." Silence. People stare at the table.
Group Leader - "To be honest, I've never made a decision based on these values. Let's move on, shall we?"
The identity of who you are as an organization always consists of more than just "vision," "values," "brand," etc. Today globalization is chewing away at the association between nationality and corporation; disintermediation is resetting the relationship between buyer and seller; and virtualization is altering models of organizational culture and core values. Organizational identity in such circumstances is a continuous project of self-description.
Our practical and theoretical explorations of identity are inspired by sociology, psychology, anthropology, organizational studies, and theories of play. As "action researchers," we participate in efforts to "self-describe" and cultivate new ways for organizations to understand their identity.
The preliminary research findings are powerful. Each time a group describes itself, group members embrace new complexities, reflect new realities, recognize new relationships, and stake out a new sense of purpose. During our programs we have seen executives imagine their organization in many different and compelling ways, including:
    • a flotilla of ships sailing towards a vision of customer satisfaction
    • a castle guarding the gold of a propriety technology
    • an information surface of logic gates processing many inputs
Analysis of data from our research partners leads to the proposition that organizations should go "From Metaphor to Practice in the Crafting of Strategy."
Furthermore, we believe that the innovative strategies organizations develop as they imagine their own identity points to a profound relationship among "Organizational Identity, Imagination, and Strategy."

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http://www.imagilab.org/research_themes_imagine.html
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