High Performing Teams and Improved Collaboration through Biomimicry
In this article I contend that you will have a much better understanding of social systems (teams, groups, networks and communities) if you start to look at them through the unique lens of the well-established philosophical principles of living systems know as autopoiesis.
Continue readingUnderstand Teams and Communities better through Living Systems TheoryMany people have been enchanted by the amazing video “The March of the Penguins” and most know that they have no leader. However few people go on to ask the obvious next question “If they have no leader then how do they know where to go?”….
Continue readingPenguins reveal the true essence of bioteamsDr R Meredith Belbin, regarded as the father of “team-role” theory and one of the worlds foremost experts on teams, predicts that our organizational teams will evolve into more biologically inspired forms.
Continue readingBelbin on bioteamsFritjof Capra says organisations are not just like living systems – they are living systems!
Continue readingOrganisations are living complex systems claims physicistSunday Times Online, May 07, 2006 reports in Dolphins ‘know each other’s names’ that DOLPHINS may be even closer to humans than previously realised, with new research showing they communicate by whistling out their own “names”.
Continue readingDolphins know each others namesA significant body of research into evolution now indicates that survival of the fittest is only a part of the story. Life did not take over the globe by combat but by networking!
Continue readingCooperation not competition underpins evolutionThe seven habits of highly effective dolphins.
According to a excellent site dedicated to Dolphins at Western Illinois University (Illinois) Dolphin social behavior is one of the most complex and advanced in the animal kingdom and offers us a number of insights into effective bioteaming.
What is Teamwork? Although there are many different definitions, in nature the definition of ‘teamwork’ is very precise. There are four different types of “teamwork” in biological teams: Solowork, Crowdwork, Groupwork and Teamwork itself. A bioteam knows how and when to use all four forms – the choice depends on the specific task at hand.
Continue readingNatures four teamwork systemsYour teams are too big: break them up.
Newspapers sometimes run contests to see who can produce the best summary of a epic book in one hundred words or less. Here is my 100-word version of “The maximum team size for effective working” drawing from an excellent article by Christopher Allen entitled The Dunbar Number as a Limit to Group Sizes.
Pheromone-based messaging is the oldest and most evolved form of biological signalling. It uses chemicals to effect communications between animals and insects through smell and taste. There is an excellent opportunity for today’s virtual teams and mobile groups to re-organise the way they use their internet, email, messaging and presence-aware technologies to gain huge benefits from it.
Continue readingThe perfect mobile group communications system: adopt nature’s oldest signalling system