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Summary
How do we coordinate people for complex challenges? Certainly not with traditional work structures, designed to optimize for performance. Rather, we need new ways of working—new structures—that have been specifically designed to coordinate people for understanding. We'll look at a framework that can be used by teams, organizations, and other groups of humans working on complex problems. Stephen P. Anderson is a speaker and author who spends too much thinking about visual collaboration, how people learn, and board games; not necessarily in that order. Oh, and he’s on a mission: To make learning the hard stuff fun, by creating ‘things to think with’ and ‘spaces’ for generative play. This mission has led Stephen to MURAL, where he facilitates design strategy and innovation. Stephen's newest book, Figure It Out: Getting From Information to Understanding, has been described as both “required reading for designers and anyone else who needs to explain things” and a book that will “change the way you see the world.”
Key Insights
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Complex problems differ from complicated ones by having unknown variables, incomplete or damaged information, and dynamic participants.
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Traditional management methods often fail in complex challenges due to their rigidity and lack of flexibility.
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Cultivating shared language and standards prevents misunderstandings and improves coordination across diverse teams.
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Invisible environments like a shared vision and values deeply influence how people align and work together.
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Designing physical and virtual environments intentionally shapes behaviors and outcomes in collaborative work.
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Psychological safety is foundational to effective teams and is built through daily practices like empathy, candor, and trust.
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Too many Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) dilute focus; organizations should limit and live by as few as possible.
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Frequent organizational resets mean teams must rebuild trust and shared understanding repeatedly unless persistent structures exist.
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Metaphors, like gardening for culture and language, shape how people relate to abstract concepts and facilitate change.
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Accumulating multiple perspectives—including empathy and adopting contradictory views—enhances understanding and decision-making.
Notable Quotes
"The complexity of coordinating people is an entirely different beast than just working with information."
"This isn’t just about solving a puzzle, it’s about managing unknown puzzles with missing and duplicate pieces and people coming and going."
"Many managers know what to tell employees to do, but that approach probably doesn’t apply to complex problems."
"Until we clarify our language, we’ll agree on everything but actually disagree beneath the surface."
"Specialists would rather share their toothbrush than their language."
"The smartest person in the room is the room itself."
"Psychological safety comes from thousands of tiny habits practiced every day."
"A company’s sustainable competitive advantage is a culture that enables faster learning."
"When teams reorganize every 18 months, they start as infants, relearning trust and roles from scratch."
"We can change our own perspectives through assimilation or accommodation, shaping how we understand new information."
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