The Structure of Formlessness

Can a team be able to form like water and be highly structured at the same time? In fact, to succeed in a complex, uncertain environment it has to be. There are two ways for a team to move forward: by describing a specific result (capture this territory) or by choosing a purpose (gain the high ground). Choosing a hard result lends itself well to actions of a known form, but when the ground shifts around the team their actions suddenly become out of date. Striving for a purpose, on the other hand, lends itself to fluidity of action in the face of change, and in turn relies on the structure of the team: its ability to acquire, distribute, and coordinate resources.

Understanding structure comes not from a snapshot of what the team members are doing, but from a higher level systems-thinking approach that reveals the purpose, elements, and interconnections of the team. A well designed system flows like water through any environment, and it does not simply survive the landscape but actively carves new channels towards its purpose. Survival is necessary and implies adaptation, which implies a process of adaptive learning. But to dominate the environment by producing new and unique high ground requires an enhancement of the ability to create: a process of generative learning. To adapt is to hold a solid defense, and to generate is to run an effective offense.

If a systems level view holds the purpose, elements, and interconnections of the team to be a constant, the question then becomes: what then is changing and being learned? It must be the behaviors, or routines, of the team members. Routines are the fuel that drive the system towards its purpose, and as long as that fuel burns it doesn’t need to be from the same source it was yesterday. These routines must be able to be modified and replaced whenever they aren’t serving the purpose of the team, and this can happen in two distinct ways. To adapt the team must bring in information on the environment, and to learn adaptively the team members must modify their behaviors to hold their position (feed-back). To generate the team must apply themselves out into the environment, and to learn in a generative way the team members must spark innovative new behaviors from within (feed-forward). When the environment is changing rapidly and routines quickly go out of date, learning of both types becomes the only system property towards which its structure must be oriented.

What are the properties of a team system that effectively learns? Again, these properties should be instilled in the elements and interconnections of the system, and not in any individual routines. Peter Senge, author of The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization proposed that the elements of the team, or the individuals, must possess Personal Mastery: an understanding of and an ability to shape themselves towards learning. Jocko Willink, author of Extreme Ownership, described the mindset that effective team leaders must have in order to enable effective teams. Leaders who master themselves in these ways enable the entire team to safely practice personal mastery:

Extreme Ownership: The leader takes responsibility for the actions of the entire team. The mindset that “there are no bad teams, only bad leaders”, allows the leader to stay focused on what needs to be better communicated about the purpose to achieve effectiveness. Shifting the focus off of blame and onto resolution allows team members to do the same, increasing their ability to build personal mastery.

Believe: The leader must “align his thoughts and vision to that of the mission”. Belief comes from and understanding of “why” the purpose has been chosen, and fosters a strong foundation on which individuals can build their mindsets by “shining through to those below”.

Check the Ego: The leader must have the humility to admit fault, allow the team members to full contribute the results of their personal mastery, and to honestly and objectively assess the performance of themselves and the team. Team members in this environment increase their personal mastery over their own faults, ands learn to merge their actions towards team performance.

To address the properties of the system interconnections that enable learning, we can consult the other disciplines described by Senge: Mental Models, Team Learning, Shared Vision, and Systems Thinking. These systems level concepts describe the ways in which the system elements relate to each other to drive learning. These disciplines can be paired with Willinck’s “Laws of Combat”, which describe the ways in which behaviors are carried out as they flow through these interconnections:

Mental Models (Law of Combat: Simple): Mental models are used to grasp situations and suggest the behaviors needed for action. Simplicity is key to the effectiveness and longevity of mental models, because they can be easily shared and are not overly specialized to the environment.

Team Learning (Law of Combat: Cover and Move): Individuals are part of a team, and that team must learn together in order to stay aligned and effective. By keeping an awareness of how their behaviors fit into the larger context, individuals cover one another and allow each other to move safely and in sync with the larger purpose.

Shared Vision (Law of Combat: Decentralized Command): Although the leader must set the purpose, they cannot effectively choose the behaviors of all team members in a fluid environment. By fostering a shared vision, the “Commander’s Intent”, individuals can make rapid decisions that increase the flexibility and effectiveness of the whole.

Systems Thinking (Law of Combat: Prioritize and Execute): When the environment is complex and many threats are present, it is critical to prioritize and execute on their resolution. However, threats are attacked best not at their face but at their root. Systems thinking allows for prioritization of the structural causes of threats, neutralizing them where they originate to allow the team to evolve past them permanently.

These system properties facilitate continuous learning when the purpose is clear and adaptive and generative learning are held in balance. Over-adaptation leads to over-specialization of routines and fragility when the environment changes, and an excess of innovation breaks apart the rhythm and coordination of routines that may already be working effectively.

In addition, the routines applied must never compromise the integrity of the system structure (the elements and interconnections) in pursuit of the purpose, for the structure is what gives the team its resilience. In this sense, results are subordinate to resilience if the team is to survive and thrive in the long term.

Lastly, the purpose of the team should always be embedded within a systems-level strategy. According to Richard Rumelt, author of Good Strategy, Bad Strategy, the most effective strategy is to apply strength to weakness, adapting and generating routines that consolidate the strengths of the team while “imposing exorbitant costs” on the behavior of the competition. When the team is actively shifting the ground underneath them to the high position while causing the opposition to drive themselves downward, they become a formless opponent who cannot be countered in the same manner twice.

When the leader of a team effectively communicates the purpose by mastering themselves: taking responsibility, uncovering the “why”, and checking their ego, they allow the members that make up the team to thrive. When the team fosters the disciplines of mental models, team learning, shared vision and systems thinking by focusing on simplicity, the team context, decentralized decision-making, and prioritization of structural threats, they drive continuous learning from both the environment and themselves. By holding the resilience of the structure above any specific behavior or result and operating a systems-level strategy of strength-to-weakness, the team maintains continuously changing advantages that form like water to the competitive environment. This then, is the structure of formlessness.

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