Towards a Participative ‘Second – Order’ Research Design. Consultancy and Research Experiences at Draeger Safety UK

Jim Brown, Draeger Safety UK Ltd, Ulswater close, Kitty Brewster Estate, Blyth Northumberland, NE24 4RG,

Petia Sice,Northumbria University, School of Informatics, Pandon Building, Camden Street, Newcastle Upon Tyne, NE2 1XE,

Abstract

This paper presents an approach to research design based on theoretical perspectives from systems thinking and complexity science, and reflections on practice in research and consultancy at Draeger Safety UK. The underlying assumptions are grounded in interpretation of insights from autopoiesis, non-linear dynamics and studies of the role of language in dialogue. It is argued that a participative ‘second’ order research design is needed to bring into consideration the importance of language in creating reality and to engage organisational actors as researchers in evolving the learning capability of organisations.

Background

Draeger Safety UK is based in Blyth, Northumberland. It manufactures breathing apparatus for the search and rescue services and is a market leader in the UK and a major international player.

Because of the need to remain competitive and because of their reputation for quality, communication and knowledge sharing is recognised as being an important issue within Draeger. Despite this, and although over the years the company has introduced a variety of communication practices, knowledge sharing continues to be raised as an issue for improvement within various employee surveys. The most likely cause for this dissatisfaction is that the various knowledge sharing practices have been introduced, without general consultation with the workforce and in a somewhat ad-hoc manner. It was this experience that led Draeger management to enter into a joint research programme with Northumbria University to explore and suggest improvements to Draeger Safety communication and knowledge sharing practices.

The programme set out to answer two questions:

1. How do we conduct the process of enquiry in a systemic way?

2. What is the systemic framework of reference used in analysis and recommendations for improvement?

This paper outlines the process of enquiry and its underlying assumptions. It is based on theoretical perspectives from systems theory and complexity science, and reflections on practice in research and consultancy work at Draeger Safety UK.

Underlying Assumptions

Both authors have a research background in systems thinking and managing of complexity. Thus, their perspective is inevitably influenced by the insights of the systems methodologies, as well as autopoiesis, chaos theory and complexity. Such a perspective promotes opportunity, but at the same time implies an inevitable blindness. Thus, in order to recognise and give form to this blindness, it is important to clarify (briefly) the underlying assumptions upon which their view of knowing and acting in a situation are based.

Avoiding fragmentation

The most basic cognitive operation we perform as observers is the operation of distinction. It is through the operation of distinction that we specify a unity as an entity distinct from its background (Maturana and Varela 1987). We characterise both the unity and the background with the properties with which the distinction endows them and specify their separability. If the observer applies the operation of distinction recursively and, thus, distinguishes the components within the unity, he redefines it as a ‘composite unity’, i.e. a system. It is through our human way of being that we perceive the world in terms of systems. The autopoietic epistemological perspective suggests that cognition (the distinctions we make) is conditional to embodiment. The act of cognition is a matter of interacting with the world, in the capacity in which one is able to interact, and not simply the act of processing what is objectively to be ‘seen’. Thus, systems are epistemological qualities and not definitions of how things actually are or occur. The problem is that our thought is pervaded with differences and distinctions and this leads us to look on these as real divisions, so that the world is seen and experienced as actually being broken up into fragments (Bohm 2000). This ‘fragmentation’, however, does not have an absolutely objective existence since our distinctions are epistemological qualities, not ‘true’ realities.

Different observers make different distinctions and thus perceive and describe systems, and therefore, their boundary and their structure differently. The observer has to be accounted for as part of any explanation. Nevertheless, systems have become the means by which we explore and describe the consistency of situational behaviour. Therefore, descriptions of system structures are useful tools and, if some form of agreement can be reached with regard to ‘what a system does’ then it is possible to communicate about its structure and boundaries with greater (in relative terms) coherence. Therefore language needs to take account of a systemic vocabulary.

The evolving-order

When making sense of a situation we look to identify the things that matter and the relationships between them, i.e. the system and its structure, which we describe as the order of things. At any given stage it is possible to describe a certain order as relevant and appropriate. The problem, however, is that in practice we often act as if the order that we perceive is a given or absolute reality. Very often social groups and societies work with categories of distinction upon which they implicitly agree, and because these categories are valid for the majority, they are accepted as if they have some sort of objective existence. This is dangerous because when the context of enquiry changes and new perceptions of order are needed, the mind tends to cling to these old perceptions since these are what have been accepted. Such implicit conventions of order, when held fixed, stifle creativity. Moreover, they can lead to a breakdown in communication between the supporters of the new emerging perceptions of order and the stabilised or well-accepted perceptions of order. This, of course, is because we tend to reinforce our concepts and beliefs as though they are absolute and in so doing we choose to fragment ‘the world’ from ourselves, without recognising that we are participants in its creation.

What we need to remember is that our concepts and their meanings are moulded by the activities of our everyday life within our social group or society. When the context of this society changes new categories are needed. Thus, working with the old set of concepts within the new context will more often than not result in inappropriate behaviour. In essence, our ordering of ‘reality’ influences how we live and our life together gives meaning to our concepts. It becomes clear, therefore, that we should adopt fluid rather than fixed perceptions of order. This implies that the definition of a system is a dynamical activity. It involves both objective and subjective reality and the cycle of perception and action, that unites them. Indeed, the definition of the system is likely to change in a whole host of ways when new distinctions are identified and become relevant. Thus, any attempt to freeze the definition of any system stifles creativity. It constrains knowing by forcing new explanations to be built on frozen categories, as though these were absolute truths given in nature rather than specified by us. Systemic language should continuously evolve and reinvent itself. This implies that order is also dynamic and that our perceptions of order change in the continuous cycle of interaction between the subject and the object of knowing.

Our Western culture embraces the perception of static order. Consequently, we implicitly believe that we can find an order that explains behaviour; or that we can conjure and implement an order that generate the behaviour that we want to achieve. It is the assumed position that the World is governed by orders that we call laws. And, if we discover these laws we can explain, manage, control and even create systems to obey them: God has created the Universe according to his order, thus, it is the job of the managers to create and govern organisations according to their understanding of order. Authors such as Nicolis and Prigogine, however, consider such a premise to be a misconception. They contend that man must have looked for the power of creation in the wrong place and, because of this, created the domination of one person’s will over the others; and an order of human enterprise where control and rigid structures are the norm. The power of creation, as studies in deterministic chaos have shown, lies within what is being created, within the building blocks and their communication with each other. There is no one to build nature, thus we must give to its very elements - the microscopic activity, a description that accounts for the building process (Nicolis and Prigogine 1989). Moreover, in the case of human enterprises these elements (and the description of the building process) lie in the people (no matter what their seniority) that inhabit them (Prigogine and Stangers 1984).

Developing awareness

Whilst doing and reflecting are inseparable from the process of knowing, we should realise that there is another form of action that (although often unappreciated within Western culture) is equally important to knowing the World: The action of examining personal experience, or as Varela puts it ‘the act of becoming aware’ (Depraz, Varela and Vermersch 2003). While Eastern traditions such as Buddhism have developed the act of ‘becoming aware’ as part of their meditative practices, within western culture, exploring personal experience has been neglected as an action fundamental to knowing. Our experience of the world is born in our interactions with the environment and these are validated by our embodiment. These, experiences represent irreducible first-person ontology (Searle 1993). Thus, we cannot explain experience ‘on the cheap’, by assuming a third person or objective viewpoint. What is required is to recognise that both first-person and third person accounts, and their interplay, are necessary in order to do justice to the quality of our knowing. This is where many philosophical investigations of experience have had difficulty, since in general they deal with the issue of exploring human experience as one of pure reflection (Chalmers 1993, Heidegger 1958). Enactive cognitive science points to an alternative: what is needed, is a disciplined act of cultivating our capacity ‘of becoming aware’ of the sources of our experience and, thus, opening up new possibilities in our habitual mind stream.

In Varela’s (2003) work, this action of becoming aware is punctuated by three ‘gestures’:

(1) Suspension – a conscious transient suspension of beliefs about the thing being examined;

(2) Redirection – turning ones own attention from the object to its source, backwards towards the arising of the thoughts themselves; and,

(3) Letting go - changing ones attitude from looking for something to letting it come.

To be successful organisations should be looking to develop the quality of awareness (often a new capacity) of their members, because the cultivation of the capacity ‘of becoming aware’ is the basis for human creativity and success: As the Japanese philosopher Kitaro Nishida (1990) puts it, ‘the burst of insight is a quality of experience sustained in one’s spiritual practice’.

Language: Communication and Co-creation

In the previous section we have argued that the cultivation of awareness is an important aspect in the enhancement of the quality of our knowing. To end there, however, would limit our understanding of the scope of this knowledge to a one of private ascertainment. To be of greater benefit this gain in our awareness must be expressed explicitly in language, to form communicable items. Moreover, it is clear that once these descriptions are made public they become part of the environment and, thus, shape our experiences as much as the gain in awareness that shaped them (Sice and French 2004). Thus, again, it becomes clear that the mind and the world that we bring forth through our languaging together are not separate, but exist in continuous co-determination. It is this reciprocal relationship, between experience and language, that organisations need greater cognisance if they wish to promote creativity and innovation. From the autopoietic perspective, language is not a tool to reveal an objective world; rather language is a venue for action, coupling the cognitive domains of two or more agents. It is through languaging that we coordinate our actions and create our world. Because of this, we have a responsibility to create communication practices that will allow, at least transiently, the coexistence of different understandings as we develop and explore our language together. Bohm (1998) suggests that a new type of dialogue is needed in human communications. The basic idea of Bohm’s dialogue is to be able to talk while suspending your opinions, holding them in front of you, while neither suppressing them nor insisting upon them, not trying to convince but simply to understand, without having to make any decisions or saying who’s right who’s wrong.

This view is also supported by the theory of autopoiesis. Maturana and Varela (1980) suggest that it is the dynamics of the structural coupling of the interacting organisms that determines the interactions, although it might seem to the observer that it is the meaning (of a word) that determines them. Thus, it is not agreeing on a particular meaning that is operationally valid in communication but rather engaging in and expanding the interactions between the communicating entities. The form of dialogue suggested by Bohm encourages opening up and engaging ourselves in listening without a particular purpose, listening for the purpose of hearing what is it that is being said, whilst trying to consciously suspend our assumptions and judgements. This type of interaction we shall call meditative listening. It is building awareness of what there is to be heard without focusing it through the lenses of our judgements and assumptions. This implies that we are perfectly aware that our opinions and judgements presuppose our world and our understanding and it is the way we as humans make meaning of this world. However, opening up as an action of developing awareness, listening without a particular purpose of solving a problem or defending an opinion, this meditative listening increases our chances of becoming sensitive and, thus, able to hear the prejudices of actors outside of ourselves. That will create a new frame of mind in which there is a common consciousness (Bohm and Peat 2000).

The Process of Enquiry. Towards a Participative ‘Second-Order’ Research Design.

As we are restricted by the sequential nature of the narrative, we have chosen to first describe the process of enquiry and then present our reflections on practice, although in real life the design of the process of enquiry is based on insight from theory and practice and has been continually revised and amended.

The process outlined is iterative. It is a closed cycle of exploring, reflecting and developing language in dialogue.

Thus, it is conceived as a ‘second order’ research design. By which we mean that the process of enquiry involves understanding, not only of ones own perceptions of a situation (first order understanding), but also, understanding of others’ worldviews, second order understanding (analogous to Heinz von Foersters (1979) second order cybernetics). In the proposed process employees participate as researchers in their own right. It is not action research conducted by a third party, but research conducted by employees with input from a third party. This participative ‘second-order’ process of enquiry is shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. A Participative ‘Second Order’ Research Design

The individual stages 1-6 (Figure 1) are developed below:

1. Listen for situations of concern; develop awareness

Developing awareness must be recognised in its own right. This may include observing, experiencing and sensing as well as informal and formal communication practices (meetings, conversations, dialogue groups). This stage is important in the development of an understanding as to just what the situations (issues) of concern may be. As this understanding is taking shape, the researchers/consultants are listening for opportunities where the organisational actors may be willing to engage in further exploration of the situations of concern by forming volunteer research teams that may include employees, managers or external consultants. The choice of a team facilitator is important, as the team facilitator is responsible for creating the conditions for effective communication within the team and with other stakeholders.

2. Explore different understandings of situation of concern.

Several recognised research methods may be used in stage 2 - for example semi-structured interviews. Here, two researchers are more effective. One leads the interview with general questions whilst the other concentrates on peripheral matters, arising from the main questions. In this way, with few main topics, a richer picture can emerge allowing exploration and further analysis.

Dialogue groups with stakeholders are another approach; these sessions can be conducted by members of the project team or with the help of professional facilitation. Informal conversations and formal organisational meetings are also sources of research data. Intranet discussion forums allow individuals to partake in virtual discussion groups at time and place that suit themselves.

A mixture of the above methods suited to the situation and system can be employed to provide research material that is used to develop understanding of the situation of concern from multiple-perspectives.

3. Analyse multiple perspectives to outline the themes within the situation of concern and its systemic boundaries

The cross analysis of interviews by at least two researchers is used to identify emerging themes of concern and to identify the system boundaries as seen by the interviewees. Software tools may also be used to contribute to the language analysis, however such tools are seen as an assistance, rather than a necessity. However, whatever form of analysis is employed the outcomes should take the form of an agreement between the organisation members of the theme(s) of concern and the system boundaries.

4. Invite intra/inter dialogue around emerging themes. Deeper understanding of assumptions/mental models

Stage 4 may include systems thinking development workshops to share insight into systemic analysis and issues for dealing with complexity.