The ‘One Page Management System’ (OPMS)

1. The‘One Page Management System’(OPMS) An ‘Operating System for the Human Mind’ We can justify this bold claim through a live demonstration

2. A Mission is any challenging goal or objective that may require considerable effort, time, resources to accomplish OPMS is: The practical, effective means to accomplish Missions All kinds of Missions can be tackled more effectively through the OPMS: • Organisational Missions • Individual Missions • Societal Missions GSC - OPMS Presentation

3. No limitations as to Mission! • Just identify the Mission • Ask people involved some ‘trigger questions’ about the Mission - enable them to articulate and clarify their good ideas • ‘Structure’ (or organise) the ideas generated • Integrate everything so that it becomes a continuing process • Regular, steady work on Mission is required! GSC - OPMS Presentation

4. A picture of the OPMS GSC - OPMS Presentation

5. MISSION: “To enable each member of our staff to develop most effectively” System Tie-Line Mission A comprehensive system to help accomplish ANY Mission EVENTS /MILESTONES that may occur during progress towards Mission OPPORTUNITIES & Preparation Required to avail Opportunities to accomplish Mission STRENGTHS (available)STRENGTHS (required)that may help accomplishment of Mission BARRIERS / DIFFICULTIES / THREATS that may hinder/prevent accomplishment of Mission WEAKNESSESthat may HINDER/PREVENT accomplishment of Mission ‘Dimensionsabove System Tie Line FundamentalDimensions THINGS TO DO to accomplish Mission Represents any or all of the relationships in the system ‘System’Dimensions, derived from ‘Fundamental Dimensions’ ‘Dimensions below System Tie Line’ Finance ControlSystem ProductionSystem(s) InformationSystems Monitoring & EvaluationSystem(s) PlanningSystem MarketingSystem GSC - OPMS Presentation

6. OPMS - helps users develop a comprehensive view of any ‘Mission’ • Comprehensive view, crystallized onto a single page - regardless how large/complex the Mission may be! • We can always ‘drill down’ to any level of detail required! GSC - OPMS Presentation

7. OPMS - to help accomplish Missions effectively! • A uniquely powerful aid to problem solving and decision making • Create effective Action Plans, to enable accomplishment of any Mission of current interest GSC - OPMS Presentation

8. Some example Missions: “To enable each member of our staff to develop most effectively” “To increase turnover to Rs 2000 crores, with PAT of Rs 500 crores” “To ensure effective Knowledge Management in the organisation” “To reduce inventory held by 20% within six months” To make the best decisions continuingly in complex situations “To make the right investment decisions for our current needs” To become an expert at the ‘C’ computer language To become a top-level consultant within 3 years GSC - OPMS Presentation

9. OPMS - helps users articulate their ideas about any ‘Mission’ by asking them appropriate ‘Trigger Questions’: The Mission “What, in your opinion, are the THINGS TO DO to enable each memberto develop himself/herself for the needs of the organisation (and for himself/herself)?”

10. Responding to Trigger Questions: • To challenge each member of staff to develop himself/herself to maximum possible for his/her own and for organisation’s benefit • To make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in • To enable each person develop himself/herself as an individual AND as a member of the organisation • To provide all needed facilities for effective work and recreation • To provide effective counseling for perceived needs of staff • … (etc, etc) Elements articulated in natural language, no jargon needed - as they come to mind, no need to worry about ‘order’ All good ideas to accomplish the Mission Stage I: A process for generating and clarifying available ideas GSC - OPMS Presentation

11. On any relevant issue about which we are asked trigger questions - we ALWAYS have ideas! Because of ‘Stage 2’ (to be described), we have a process that GUARANTEES that every good idea, whenever it comes to mind, could be integrated into our Action Plans! The ‘secret’ is to make effective use of all good ideas, filter out the irrelevant or not-so-good ideas! The conventional approaches DO NOT adequately enable effective utilisation of the good ideas of people at all levels of the organisation The greatest demotivator is the feeling that our good ideas are not being adequately valued by the organisation An effective process is needed to ‘handle ideas’

12. Stage 2 - Idea Structuring! Both Stage 1 (Idea Generation & Clarification) and Stage 2 (Idea Organisation) are designed to make the best possible use of available ideas! Idea organising is something we are doing intuitively ALL the time - OPMS merely makes the process rigorous and scientific (or Idea Organising) this is the process that enables us toorganize our ideas to ensure that the right ones become available for action at any point of time. It is done through a process of modeling to show us, for instance, how the accomplishment of one idea or ‘element’ may help the accomplishment of another GSC - OPMS Presentation

13. Idea organising: suppose we have just two ideas - • To challenge each member of staff to develop himself/herself to maximum possible for his/her own and for organisation’s benefit (1) • To make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in (2) GSC - OPMS Presentation

14. To ‘structure’ them, we just ask ourselves a couple of questions: “Does the achievement of ‘Challenging each member of staff to develop himself/herself to maximum possible for his/her own and for organisation’s benefit’ (1) Such modeling questions help us articulate and clarify the linkages we perceive between the factors in our system HELP THE ACHIEVEMENT OF making our organisation a truly exciting place to work in (2) ?” Response: “YES”

15. “Does the achievement of The question is reversed: making our organisation a truly exciting place to work in (2) Such responses represent the relationships perceived by the modelers at a particular period in time - these perceptions could and often do change! HELP THE ACHIEVEMENT OF ‘Challenging each member of staff to develop himself/herself to maximum possible for his/her own and for organisation’s benefit’ (1)?” Response: “NO”

16. Make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in (2) “should contribute” No contribution Challenge each member of staff to develop himself/herself to maximum possible for his/her own and for organisation’s benefit (1) Model at this stage: We don’t show the ‘no contributions’ Accomplish (1) to enhance accomplishment of (2)! GSC - OPMS Presentation

17. Make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in (2) “should contribute” Challenge each member of staff to develop himself/herself to maximum possible for his/her own and for organisation’s benefit (1) Model at this stage: GSC - OPMS Presentation

18. Then, a third element is added to our model:

19. “should help accomplish” Make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in (2) To provide all needed facilities for effective work and recreation (3) Challenge each member of staff to develop himself/herself to maximum possible for his/her own and for organisation’s benefit (1) GSC - OPMS Presentation

20. Read bottom-upwards, in direction of arrows.THINK the elementsREAD the arrows as encountered! Stage II: An effective process for ‘organising all available ideas To enable each member of our staff to develop most effectively should help accomplish To make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in should help accomplish To help each person develop himself/herself as an individual To provide effective counseling for perceived needs of staff To challenge each member of staff develop himself/herself to maximum possible To provide all needed facilities for effective work and recreation Interpretive Structural Model The relationship is the heart of the matter! GSC - OPMS Presentation

21. The model is based on ‘transitivity’ of the relationship we’re working with: If ‘A’ ‘B’ AND if ‘B’ ‘C’ THEN ‘A’ MUST ‘C’ This property is already familiar to most of us through the transitive relationship “precedes”, which is familiar to us through PERT & Gantt Charts (the major modeling tools in ‘Project Management Software’) Because of transitivity, it is quite efficient to create these models, as we have to ask only a small fraction of the total number of possible questions where ‘A’, ‘B’, ‘C’ are ‘elements’ in the system under consideration and ‘ ’ represents a specific transitive relationship GSC - OPMS Presentation

22. Because of transitivity, we can generally create these ISMs by responding to just 15%-40% of all the possible questions between elements

23. There are many types of structures, each based on a specific transitive relationship. Particularly useful for ‘Action Planning' are ‘Intent Structures’ - structures comprised of ‘intents’ linked by the “should help accomplish”relationship These models can become as large as required to describe the most complex live situation! Over time, as we work on our Missions, our models may come to comprise hundreds or even thousands of elements! To enable each member of our staff to develop most effectively should help accomplish To make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in To help each person develop himself/herself as an individual To provide effective counseling for perceived needs of staff To challenge each member of staff develop himself/herself to maximum possible To provide all needed facilities for effective work and recreation Interpretive Structural Model GSC - OPMS Presentation

24. Even when we have thousands of elements integrated into our model, we shall be able to focus on a narrow band of elements in the full confidence that by so doing we are actually helping to accomplish everything else that needs to be done for the project! The model may keep on growing until the Mission is successful! THINGS TO DO Current focus GSC - OPMS Presentation

25. Interpretive Structural Model Another important attribute of such ‘Intent Structures’ To enable each member of our staff to develop most effectively Up WHY? Down HOW? To make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in WHY? To help each person develop himself/herself as an individual HOW? To provide effective counseling for perceived needs of staff To challenge each member of staff develop himself/herself to maximum possible To provide all needed facilities for effective work and recreation GSC - OPMS Presentation

26. To ensure effective handling of a task by people reporting to you, just enthuse them about the WHYs? of the task - then let them work out the HOWs? !!! UPthe model to find out“WHY?” DOWNthe model to find out “HOW?” To be able to discover the “HOW?” and the “WHY?” of things is probably the greatest motivator that exists! THINGS TO DO WHY? HOW? GSC - OPMS Presentation

27. “contributessignificantly to” Rewards include:i) Financial rewards…ii) Other rewards: working conditions, etc... My personal rewards Organisation’s profits My personal performance GSC - OPMS Presentation

28. Read bottom-upwards, in direction of arrows.THINK the elementsREAD the arrows as encountered! To enable each member of our staff to develop most effectively should help accomplish To make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in To help each person develop himself/herself as an individual To provide effective counseling for perceived needs of staff To challenge each member of staff develop himself/herself to maximum possible To provide all needed facilities for effective work and recreation Interpretive Structural Model Any such model can easily be translated into ‘standard prose’ very easily indeed! And this little model would translateinto nearly a full page of prose.Models of 30 to 40 elements may amount to 20 to 30 pages !Obviously, it is MUCH easier to read, understand and remember the model! GSC - OPMS Presentation

29. THINGS TO DO The prose translations of such models increase exponentially in size with increase of number of elements in the model! GSC - OPMS Presentation

30. The process helps develop clear linkages between individual’s aims to the organisation’s Mission! GSC - OPMS Presentation

31. “contributessignificantly to” Rewards include:i) Financial rewards…ii) Other rewards: working conditions, etc... Helps ensure that individual actually see & properly understand & appreciate the linkages between him/her and the organisation! My personal rewards Organisation’s profits My personal performance GSC - OPMS Presentation

32. Read bottom-upwards, in direction of arrows.THINK the elementsREAD the arrows as encountered! To enable each member of our staff to develop most effectively should help accomplish To make our organisation a truly exciting place to work in To help each person develop himself/herself as an individual To provide effective counseling for perceived needs of staff To challenge each member of staff develop himself/herself to maximum possible To provide all needed facilities for effective work and recreation Interpretive Structural Model Make clear to all the excitement of working at a exciting job, in an exciting company! GSC - OPMS Presentation

33. The processes underlying OPMS are quite unique in their power and universal applicability!. Whatever the issue (or Mission), this initial part of the OPMS process enables users to create an effective Action Plan, along with all needed systems, to accomplish the Mission. GSC - OPMS Presentation

34. “Should help achieve” (ISM) Usable at every stage of project - in particular, it’sperfect for exploration! Can handle all types of ‘elements’ within system, e.g. motivation, etc Co-relates with ‘effectiveness’ Ideas, Creativity, motivation, etc are effectively handled through “contributes” or “should help achieve” “Precedes” (PERT/Gantt) Useful when intricacies of system are somewhat known to us Can handle ONLY elements connected with time process Cannot handle ‘soft’ issues like “motivation” Co-relates with ‘efficiency’ A quick comparison of models using two specific relations: ‘Action Planning’ done through conventional Project Management software is bound to leave out many significant elements (and issues) GSC - OPMS Presentation

35. Actually, in order to properly understand our ‘whole system’ we need to use a number of relationships, each appropriate to its own time and place!

36. Some important transitive relationships in systems: • “helps achieve” (“contributes to”) - “aggravates” • “enhances”; “supports”; “leads to”; includes; “implies”; “should take priority over”; “facilitates” • “precedes” - for scheduling of anticipated events/milestones in a well-understood system - however, precedence is practically useless for working in systems of which significant parts are unknown • and many others Using appropriate relationships, we can cover ALL aspects of the systems we need to create GSC - OPMS Presentation

37. This is the tool that actually helps us create the OPMS! Another modeling tool in the OPMS ‘Field Representation’ (FR) Method

38. Constructing a Field Representation • First, we try to cleanse our minds from all pre-conceived categories... • Then, OPMS asks questions like… GSC - OPMS Presentation

39. (Elements from documents on “National IT Mission” formulated several years ago by Govt. of India) Field Representation & Profiling (contd.) (In the context of the kind of actions needed to overcome the barriers, etc.) “Is (B) Need to improve productivity of Indian software industry IN THE SAME CATEGORY AS (A) Our educational systems are not adequately effective ?” GSC - OPMS Presentation

40. Response “YES” would put element ‘B’ into the same category as ‘A’ -“NO” would put it into a different category…… as shown, next GSC - OPMS Presentation

41. A: Dimension 1 Our educational systems are not adequately effective B: Dimension 2 Need to improve productivity of Indian software industry Field Representation - after initial response Finally yielding models like the one illustrated at next slide... GSC - OPMS Presentation

42. Dimension titles provided later, AFTER insertion of elements into dimensions! GSC - OPMS Presentation

43. The ‘System Tie Line’ represents any or all of the relationships inherent in the system under consideration. GSC - OPMS Presentation

44. The elements are ‘linked’ by appropriate relationships as perceived by the users GSC - OPMS Presentation

45. The OPMS provides a facility to enable users write down prose translations of such visual linkages XYZ “XYZ” MAY TEND TO INCREASE THE SEVERITY OF “ABC” A comprehensive ‘network of relationships’ to be built up step-by- step, over time, to enable clear understanding of the system represented in the Field ABC GSC - OPMS Presentation

46. It takes a while to develop the skills needed to use the System Tie Line effectively to link different dimensions and elements together…It’s well worth our while to work towards developing these skills… GSC - OPMS Presentation

47. …because, as earlier claimed, Field Representations, over sufficient iterations, can be shown to satisfy a fundamental systems law, calledAshby’s Law of Requisite Variety GSC - OPMS Presentation

48. Ashby’s Law of Requisite Variety (Simple Simon’s version)… “The dimensions of a proposed solution to a problem must match the dimensions of the problem” (If too few dimensions, the solution won’t work – if too many, the solution would be too expensive or too complicated!) GSC - OPMS Presentation

49. The Field Representation processis found to be the ideal tool for handling complex projects - to help us integrate the parts into a whole ! GSC - OPMS Presentation

50. Because the OPMS is a model of models, it ensures the development in users of Chris Argyris’ grand concept of ‘double-loop learning’! On deeper examination, we find there are actually many more loops than just two - and we can handle them all through this process. We we could call our process ‘cybernetic learning’ The OPMS is a ‘model of models’ - it is comprised of ALL the models that are created in various relevant dimensions during progress towards the Mission - any Mission! Integrating all the models of all the work done towards any Mission into a single Field Representation creates a ‘One Page Management System’ (OPMS). GSC - OPMS Presentation