Adam Zeiner

...we’ve been trained to think of organizations as homogenous and mechanistic, with a clear set of rules, a command-and-control structure, and the ability to leverage hierarchy to get things done quickly by issuing top-down directives to reallocate resources to meet objectives.

This matters because services designed and optimised for the current system can have the effect of further entrenching it — by introducing additional forces and interests to ‘keep things the way that they are’. This isn’t to dismiss their value — systems change is slow and uncertain, and in the meantime it’s essential we deliver the most effective... See more

If you’re part of the map-building process there’s no better tool for organizing your team’s research and keeping everyone on the same page. [...] However… I f you’re not part of the map-building process, systems maps can be exhausting to interpret.

As a consultant focused on the org design of design orgs, I work across a variety of contexts—established businesses (banks, retail); software as a service (enterprise software); scale-ups (pre-IPO and growing); start-ups. And repeatedly over the past couple of years, I’ve found myself drawing some variation of the following generic digital product... See more

For those that aren’t familiar, a boundary object is an artefact (thing, concept, discourse, process, etc.) that can hold a diversity of incomplete perspectives and enable communication and collaboration amongst those stakeholders despite that incompleteness.