February 11, 2023

A Holistic View of Work

People, Business Consultant, People Capability Professional

When it comes to the performance of the people on the inside of your organization, there is no skimping on knowing the details of how work actually gets done. I mean “actually”. Not as imagined, nor as planned, but really knowing how your people normally pull it all together to create the needed outcomes.

Going to see and getting exposed to normal work as it is being performed is a good way to appreciate the challenges that are yet unrecognized - and usually assimilated into successful work outcomes. It gets us away from a focus on the person, and builds the organization’s capacity to succeed.

There are official ways of studying work - ergonomics is literally defined as the “study of work” and the discipline provides tools and techniques for getting to the heart of worker’s interfaces – both the tangible object interactions – the software used, the hardware used, and the less tangible objects like the rules, policies and their implementation and interpretation. Historically ergonomics has focussed on the micro level, the human-machine (or human-software) level, but the critical importance of considering human factors beyond the human-machine interface has been well-highlighted and is called “Marco-ergonomics”. [1]

Although there is no substitute for knowing how work is actually performed, for better or for worse, we don’t want to get myopic, too focussed on the details of the most inner level. Obviously if you are having a conversation and realize you don’t really know how work is actually done, and how all the aspects of work are supporting, or not, the performance and success of your people, then find that out first.

But then, take a step to the outer level because the details are often constrained or over shadowed by a wider context and influences that exist within an organization. We can’t succeed in the inner level without knowing what influences the outer level is having. Just like we can’t hover in the outer levels without knowing how work gets accomplished - the purview of the inner level. Once you have the details, use the outer level to frame the conversations that are likely focussed on some aspect of the inner level.

When you have knowledge of the inner level, and a handle on the outer level, you are getting close. But here is the kicker, the final step to keep pace with an organization that is operating dynamically. Connect all the layers and see how the interactions migrate across levels. Go down-and-in, then step back and look-out-and-up. Understand how the outer levels constrain and enable inner level details.

"Moving between layers effectively is often difficult for colleagues when their head is full and the next task is looming. Creating the conditions to help make this achievable in, what is often a limited, and sometimes impossibly short, time is also challenge.

However, a shared, straightforward language helps as does the style of facilitation to impart this language to each and every colleague thus activating a whole wave of self-discovery!"

Martin Johnson, Creator of BIG PICTURE®

The lower levels are nested in and shaped by outer level. You need “cross-level” understanding. Work crosses over – back and forth – enabling and constraining - and so there is value is looking at problems from multiple perspectives – the perspective of time, from different actors and different locations under different leaders. Use both qualitative and quantitative information.

What does that really mean? It means you can re-design your software interface to remove extraneous data requests (inner level), but miss the importance of how people are interacting with their customers to sustain their loyalty.

Macro-ergonomics makes no clear distinction between physical, cognitive and organizational because it all loops around each other, weaving in constraints, enabling outcomes and emerging values in a dynamic and often complex manner.