Introspection In And Analysis Of Organizations

We launched our work on process and organization as ISO 9000, STD 2167a and other standards broadened their influence on software development in the late 1980s and early 1990s. These standards focused on process reproducibility, striving to reduce organizational performance variation more than on raising the mean. Such baselining is important to the quality techniques popularized by W. Edwards Deming [BibRef-Deming1986 ] based on statistical process control. A process can be improved if it can be understood; it can be understood only if it has a consistent structure [BibRef-Senge1990 ]; its structure can be consistent only after the first steps of process improvement have reduced process variability. We found that the process culture in most contemporary organizations has a strong focus on process documentation, but what is documented is often distant from day-to-day practice. The process cultures often ignored important variations in organizational behavior that are key to dealing with market uncertainties, or the uncertainties that arise in any process rooted in human intellect and instinct.