Sir. Karl Popper, in one of his lectures, elaborates about the presence of two types of systems – the clocks and the clouds.
Clocks:
At one end of the spectrum are Clocks. Clocks are those systems that can be taken apart to understand how they function and assembled back together and when done right, will continue to function the way they were designed.
They are predictable. They can be simple or complex but with enough time and skill, we can understand each and every part of the system, their role in the system and how they interact with the other parts, so that we understand how the whole system works.
And once understood correctly, we know that it will continue to work in the exact same way as long as it is a self contained system.
This is also why, if something goes wrong in such a system, we can take it apart, find what is wrong, correct it and put it all back and the system is back to functioning as it was expected.
That is how, we get predictable outcome.
Clouds:
At the other end of the spectrum are “Clouds”. Clouds are systems that are emergent in nature.
They constantly keep changing depending on multiple variables. They are inherently unpredictable. One can’t take these systems apart to understand its constituents, the interaction between them and put them back in ways such that they behave the same way.
While there are parts of these systems that might behave like clocks, but the entire system, when put together behaves like clouds.
Now the question is the following:
What does this have to do with us, as leaders?
Everything!
Everyday we are expected to make decisions and solve problems.
All of us have been taught to deal with “clocks” all our lives. So, we tend to assume every situation, every challenge, every problem to be towards the “clock” side of the spectrum.
We are always trying to figure out a way to control, if not all the variable, atleast the most important variables. We try to break down the problems into smaller chunks and try and solve them, assuming that when we do all that, we would have solved the original problem.
However, in the world that we live in, we tend to face “Cloud” like systems much more than we do “Clock” like systems.
Most problems that we encounter (including all problems that involve people!), behave more like “cloud”systems. They are emergent. They continuously change. They are unpredictable in unpredictable ways. They are interconnected. You can not replicate them.
And every connection could potentially change the nature of the problem in an unpredictable way. The problem arises when we try to engage with “Cloud” like systems assuming them to be “Clock” systems and when we are unable to get the desired results. We then get frustrated. The more frustrated we are, the harder we try. The harder we try, the worse are the results.
To address these Cloud systems, what we need to do is to seek, sense and respond to signals; to dance with the system, metaphorically speaking. We need to stop trying to control the variables. We need to stop trying to take things apart to understand the system, instead, we need to try and understand the interplay between the parts and how that is impacting the system we are working with.
In conclusion:
The reason this matters is because, knowing this allows us to be responsible (response able) about how we approach any situation. We need to take a pause, try to understand what kind of a system are we dealing with – is it a clock or a cloud. Once we have identified this correctly, we can then deal or engage with the system accordingly.
This one small pause and reflection can save us a great deal of time, energy, resources and heartache.
