If you’re familiar with this subject, let me know what it means to you. Here are my current thoughts. Self-organizing work groups are spontaneous groups, created from within, to accomplish work of the moment. Regardless of how the group may appear to have started, groups come fully into the self-organizing space the moment group members recognize that they:
- get more from the group’s spontaneity than they do from their individual planning
- generate energy together and are more creative, adaptive, resilient, and fearless thanks to the group
- find their work more rewarding, impactful, and fun (most days) because of the group
- are accomplishing more than they as individuals imagined or planned
- see the group itself as leader and teacher (group members demonstrate learning and leadership moving around within the group and some call the group leaderless or leaderful saying “We don’t need a leader.” or “We’re all leaders.”)
- are grateful and feel lucky to be part of the group
That is, the group comes fully into the self-organizing space when the group becomes self-aware–through its group members–that the group itself is something unique, special, and important.
These groups are powerful in part because they communicate so much without words. They demonstrate more through group members’ energy, laughter, enthusiasm, diversity, growing closeness, and relative fearlessness than they do with words, and diverse nearby others are drawn to them because of it. Whether they talk about it or not, nearby others drawn to the group notice that the group is different, pay closer attention, recognize the group in themselves, and try self-organizing at the group level for themselves.
These groups distinguish themselves in another important way. Other groups allow individuals to believe that it’s primarily individual plans, strengths, talents, attributes, background, and expertise—and the details of what people do as individuals—that sets them apart. These groups don’t. People in them may start out believing that their individual expertise and background matters most, but they rapidly recognize that the group itself allows them to imagine and be more than they used to be. People in these groups recognize this quickly and quickly begin giving credit to the group itself, other group members, nearby others, the people who came before them, and to the people the group serves. As they do so, people and groups around them recognize them as leaders. Many recognize individual group members as leaders; those working most closely with them, like group members themselves, recognize the group itself as the leader.
Self-organizing groups appear to form around the eternal (that is, around things that persist across human experience, such as love, friendship, laughter, joy, fellowship, and passion) and can, therefore, themselves be very long lasting. Self-organizing work groups–those that form to get specific work-of-the-moment done–have a shorter life span. They form to get work done, and when that work is accomplished, they dissolve as quickly as they formed. But although their life as a work group is over, they don’t really end. Within larger self-organizing groups, work groups that form appear to simply dissolve back into the larger self-organizing group but members may emerge in different combinations again later as self-organizing work groups. They (as a whole or in parts) may also evolve into self-organizing groups. That is, a group that first recognized itself as a work group may finish their work together but maintain their friendships and continue to help each other, as needed, long after the lifetime of the work group. Essentially, evolving into a self-organizing group centered on friendship.
Since 2004, I’ve worked only in/with/as self-organizing groups and work groups (14,000+ research hours). I get to watch again and again as an amazing collective self is brought forth by flawed individuals working in flawed organizations, departments, districts, divisions, and systems. These groups surprise individuals, including group members themselves, and demonstrate that we have access to more potential together than can be recognized by our individual selves. For seven years now, my work has involved getting to say both “Wow!” and “Thank you” every day. I have my own self-organizing groups and work groups to thank for that. How lucky am I?!
Hello Lori,
This is an inspirational post. It sums up the simple rules of effective teams and their emerging self-organizing. Go happy with work. Work happily with others. Make sure that it is more beneficial to work as a team rather than individually. Celebrate successes. Simple rules, but who abides by simplicity?
Hi Ali, so nice to meet you. In answer to your question, the groups I study (30 so far) do this, that’s why I study them. 🙂
All the best wishes to you and your groups!
Lori
Hi Lori, so nice to meet you too. In no way I meant you do not abide by simple rules. What I meant is that people tend to ridicule simple creative ideas; by the same pattern some people tend to mock simple rules. I find the reason is the tendency to see see simple rules in isolation over the short term. Visualizing their interaction over extended times lead to the emerging behaviors. It is the dimensions of interaction space and time that make the difference. Your work maturely covers these dimensions
Hi Ali, you didn’t imply that.
I like what you say about space and time. I’m still so early in the stages of thinking about that myself. For me the experience comes first and my thinking trails along behind and shows up at the point when I’ve had so much experience that it practically screams at me “Hey, think about this!” I recognize that I’m compelled to study these groups in part because of their intriguing relationship to time. Within them time stands still (“We just had more time then the people around us,” “We could do anything together,” and “I feel like I was in a flow state for 2 years.”) and time flies (“This is so much fun, where did the four hours go?”). Within my own self-org groups we’ve been so interested in our work together that we show up early, stay late, and have often had the building auto-off lights remind us to go home at 9 p.m. as the whole building went dark around us. Interesting, too, the way that these groups persist. Either long after the “lifetime” of the groups themselves–through the deep bonds that last among group members–or (I’m just learning) they simply don’t end. I’m studying a men’s friendship group right now that has 110+ members, meets 52 weeks/year, and has done so for more than 20 years. When asked “How does somebody know when it’s time to let go of the group?” several of them laughed and said, in unison, “They die! [collective laughter].”
I’m even earlier in thinking about the space component. At this point I know that 2D organizational charts don’t mean much to me any more personally. And I’ve caught myself saying “In the larger organizations/communities around the groups I study, there doesn’t appear to be a top and bottom. These groups move and have impact in all directions. Organization seems to happen from the inside out, not top down or bottom up.” I said this not because I’d thought about it much, but because I experience it as part of these groups again and again.
How gracious of you to attach the word “mature” to the Collective Self work. From my perspective, what you’re seeing is the maturity of the groups I study and am part of. Learning, teaching, leadership, and maturity lives within them. As an individual, I’m lucky: lucky to have snagged a front row seat and even more lucky that the groups often push and pull me out onto the dance floor to dance with them.
All the best,
Lori
Dear Lori,
I am moved by your thoughtful and emotional response. Even, you inspired me with a new key performance indicator that is derived from human actions and not a machine-type indicator.
Did I increase your Anxious to know more about this indicator? Well, I quote this from your response”, and have often had the building auto-off lights remind us to go home at 9 p.m. as the whole building went dark around us.” This is a true indicator of desirability. Performance equals desirability*ability. If desirability is high then we hope to get high performance. I envy those who work with you because they learn from each other; they exchange information and are willing to adopt a trial and error approach without the fear of getting punished.
Lori, I am privileged to exchange ideas with you
Ali, the privilege is all mine. How lucky I feel that you found the Collective Self site. Please come back and teach/learn as a self-org group with me again any time!
Best,
Lori