Subject: Managing Complex Organizations in a Complex World

From: "NECSI Executive Education" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 2001 04:22:46 -0500

MANAGING COMPLEX ORGANIZATIONS IN A COMPLEX WORLD:

    Leadership in Rapidly Changing Business Environments -
             Learning and Adapting in Time
 
NECSI Executive Education Programs
 
May 31-June 1, 2001
Charles Hotel, Harvard Square, Cambridge, MA

Speakers:

YANEER BAR-YAM, NECSI and Harvard University
TOM PETZINGER, JR., Author, The New Pioneers, and CEO LaunchCyte
PETER SENGE, Society for Organizational Learning and 
             MIT Sloan School of Management
JOHN STERMAN, MIT Sloan School of Management

This is a two-day practical experience on working with chaos and 
complexity - in the global economy, in national markets, in 
business to business interactions and within the organization 
itself. We will use new insights and concepts from the field of 
complex systems to discuss innovative ways to survive and thrive 
in today's new/old economy.

Information and registration: http://necsi.org/education/exec/

Objectives: 

We will identify the key properties of successful complex 
organizations - their structure, dynamics, information flows, 
and relationships - and the essential roles of leadership in 
responding to the rapidly changing complex world. Participants 
will leave prepared to pay attention to new information, ask new 
questions, make better decisions - to identify the right time to 
adapt quickly and when to stay as they are.

Approach:

The presenters will interact with participants in exploring the 
key concepts of managing organizations as complex systems. 
Questions are welcome and discussion time will be a key part of 
the program. Speakers will present a cutting-edge perspective on 
managing business as it is - human and complex.

Audience:

This seminar is created for key decision makers and those who 
advise them - executives, senior management, public 
administrators, management consultants, organizational 
development professionals and business educators.

Results:

At the end of the seminar participants will be able to:

* Identify key success factors in rapid and early adaptation to 
changes in the business and political climate 
* Value critical organizational connections - know when to 
create them and when to cut them 
* Gain insights and skills to make better decisions in uncertain 
situations 
* Manage the use of new tools - including simulation and system 
modeling - to analyze the behavior of complex organizations

Speakers:

YANEER BAR-YAM is President of the New England Complex Systems 
Institute, Chairman of the International Conference on Complex 
Systems, Managing Editor of InterJournal, and author of Dynamics 
of Complex Systems (1997), the only textbook to address the 
entire field of complex systems. Bar-Yam uses complex systems 
concepts to understand how organizations and patterns of 
behavior arise, evolve, adapt, and how we can use multiscale 
representations to relate fine and large scale, short and long 
term perspectives. Applications are to the relationship of 
structure and function and meeting complex challenges at all 
scales.

THOMAS PETZINGER, JR., the author of "The New Pioneers: The Men 
and Women Who Are Transforming the Workplace and Marketplace", 
spent 22 years at The Wall Street Journal as a weekly columnist, 
beat reporter, investigative reporter, bureau chief, and 
Washington ecomomics editor. From 1995 to 1999 he wrote the 
paper's Front Lines column, a weekly exploration of 
entreprenurial ideas and management trends. He also edited the 
paper's special edition for Jan. 1, 2000. Petzinger's earlier 
books are Oil & Honor: The Texaco-Pennzoil Wars" (Putnam, 1987) 
and "Hard Landing: The Epic Contest for Power and Profits that 
Plunged the Airlines into Chaos" (Random House, 1995). Petzinger 
is applying his knowledge of complex systems in the new economy 
as founder, director, and CEO for LaunchCyte, a biotechnology 
incubator.

PETER M. SENGE is a Senior Lecturer at the Massachusetts 
Institute of Technology and Chairperson of the Society for 
Organizational Learning (SoL), a global community of 
corporations, researchers, and consultants dedicated to the 
"interdependent development of people and their institutions." 
He is the author of the widely acclaimed book, The Fifth 
Discipline: The Art and Practice of The Learning Organization 
(1990) (over 750,000 in circulation) and co-author of three 
field books, The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook: Strategies and 
Tools for Building a Learning Organization (1994), and The Dance 
of Change: The Challenges to Sustaining Momentum in Learning 
Organizations (1999), and Schools That Learn: A Fifth Discipline 
Fieldbook for Educators, Parents, and Everyone Who Cares About 
Education(2000). Harvard Business Review has identified The 
Fifth Discipline as one of the seminal management books of the 
past 75 years. The Journal of Business Strategy named Dr. Senge 
as one of the 24 people who had the greatest influence on 
business strategy over the last 100 years.

JOHN D. STERMAN, Standish Professor of Management at the MIT 
Sloan School, author of Business Dynamics: Systems Thinking and 
Modeling for a Complex World (2000), specializes in systems 
thinking for corporate and public policy, behavioral decision 
theory, nonlinear dynamics, and economic dynamics. Sterman uses 
system dynamics - a framework for understanding complex 
situations - to examine how people approach complex decisions 
and discover why dysfunctional dynamics persist in 
organizations. Using management "flight simulators" that Sterman 
and his students have developed, managers can design effective 
policies to improve the long-term performance of their 
organizations. Recent applications include the semiconductor, 
automotive, and computer industries; and issues from growth 
strategy to process improvement and product development.

For more information and registration see: 
http://necsi.org/education/exec/

Executive Education Programs
New England Complex Systems Institute
24 Mt. Auburn St.
Cambridge, MA 02138
http://necsi.org/education/exec/

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