When there is no right answer
Decisions in Complexity.
A day for senior leaders facing wicked problems: making sense of complexity and deciding well when the way ahead is unclear.
- Level
- Immerse
- Learning time
- 9 hours
- Where
- Complexity, decisions and innovation
- Price
- £249
When you step up to a higher level, what you paid in the last 12 months for lower-level courses inside the bigger course comes off its price, in proportion to how much of each is inside it, whichever topic it's from. Courses at the same or a lower level don't give credit against each other. A Focus course or above always costs at least £15. Read the full terms
Certificate of Completion, or Certificate of Completion and Assessment with a short assessment
Overview and Outcomes.
Who It's For
Senior leaders facing wicked problems and uncertainty
Overview
Some of the hardest problems in public service have no single right answer, and treating them as if they do makes things worse. This programme begins by naming the world leaders actually face, using VUCA, Rittel and Webber's wicked problems and Snowden and Boone's Cynefin framework. It then turns to acting well inside that world: Weick's sensemaking, probe, sense, respond, and Gary Klein's research on how experts decide under pressure. Janis on groupthink, the Delphi Method and problem structuring methods strengthen how groups decide together, before the day closes with risk culture, ISO 31000, stress testing strategy and design thinking as a disciplined way to explore.
Aims
The aim is to help senior leaders make sense of complexity before reaching for a solution, and to decide well when certainty is not coming. It develops the judgement to match the response to the kind of problem, to use dissent and diverse expertise deliberately, and to act, notice and adjust with confidence rather than false decisiveness.
In summary, you will be able to:
- Diagnose whether a challenge is clear, complicated, complex or chaotic using Cynefin and wicked problem thinking, and choose a response that fits.
- Apply sensemaking, probe, sense, respond and problem structuring methods to make progress on a messy issue where the way ahead is unclear.
- Design group decision processes that use structured dissent, expert forecasting and risk testing to protect your team from groupthink and wishful strategy.
What you'll develop
By the end of this Immerse, you will be able to:
- Distinguish volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, and identify which of the four mainly responds to more information.
- Explain how Weick's sensemaking reverses the conventional analyse, decide, act sequence, and identify when careful analysis still fits better.
- Explain why best practice and good practice fail in the Complex domain, and distinguish probe, sense, respond from the act, sense, respond needed in chaos.
- Describe groupthink and identify its four symptoms while a decision is still open.
- Identify the signs that a situation needs problem structuring before any option is chosen.
- Explain how anonymity, controlled feedback and iteration each remove a specific distortion in group judgement.
- Explain the eight principles of ISO 31000 and test your own organisation against them.
- Explain what makes design thinking human centred, empathy driven and non-linear, and compare the Double Diamond, d.school, IDEO and IBM models.
Built from 7 parts.
9 hours of learning.
- 01Naming the world we lead inCynefin framework and complexity for leadersBitesize · VUCA, Uncertainty and Complexity2 modules
- 02Probe, sense, respondSensemaking in complex systems with CynefinBitesize · VUCA, Uncertainty and Complexity2 modules
- 03When the way ahead is unclearLeading through complexity and uncertaintyBitesize · Leadership1 module
- 04The value of a dissenting voiceGroupthink and problem structuring methodsBitesize · Solving Complex Problems and Decision Making2 modules
- 05Calm heads, clear callsNaturalistic decision making and Delphi methodBitesize · Solving Complex Problems and Decision Making2 modules
- 06Risk as part of the planRisk culture and risk in strategyBitesize · Strategic Risk2 modules
- 07Starting with peopleDesign thinking principles and processBitesize · Creativity and Innovation1 module