Section 3: PRELIMINARY DIAGNOSIS IDENTIFICATION OF THE 5 SYSTEMS The Viable Systems Model is based on 5 systems which are seen as fundamental to viability. If all 5 systems are working well within you organisation, then you can say that the basic functions needed for viability are present. If they are not, then your organisation is not viable in the terms defined in this pack, and you will need to change your organisation to ensure viability. The purpose of the Preliminary Diagnosis is to identify the 5 systems needed to ensure viability, and to draw them on a large VSM diagram which represents the parts of your organisation in its totality. If any are not present, they will need to be designed and added to your organisational structure. If any existing parts of your organisation do not fit into one of the 5 Systems, then they are not crucial for viability and may be unnecessary. Preliminary Diagnosis - How it Works I was told this story by a colleague (referred to as GB) who lectures in Management Studies, and who uses the VSM as a tool in his consultancies. It gives such a clear picture of the use of Preliminary Diagnosis that I decided to include it at this point. He was telephoned one morning in connection with the proposed amalgamation of several businesses into an alliance designed to enable the member companies to combine their strengths, and thus compete more effectively in exporting their products. The group had done some preparatory work, but needed advice quickly. A meeting was scheduled for 2.00 pm that afternoon. Usually, a consultant needs several days to assess the situation and gather the background which is essential for sound advice. This was clearly impossible. So, GB arrived for the first meeting with a large piece of paper on which was drawn the outline of the VSM, that is the Operational units and Systems 2, 3, 4 and 5. As the meeting proceeded, he began to ask questions about the proposed organisation and to fill in the boxes in his VSM diagram. Operational units: the member companies. And so on. After the proposed organisation had been described, some of the boxes were empty and GB began to probe "How do you intend to ensure that the member companies work together in a more effective manner - won't you need someone to examine the various possibilities and to look for synergy?" Basically, he was looking for something to write in the System 3 box. This is the essence of the Preliminary Diagnosis. You define a function, look for the bits of your own enterprisewhich does it, and write it in on the relevant part of the diagram. The VSM is so thorough in its model of how a business works, that GB's clients were overwhelmed with "his" insight and made aware there were several aspects of the organisation they had completely overlooked. And all of this without any preparation. In your case, assuming you are looking at an existing business, the insights are unlikely to be so staggering. Problems with viability will have arisen and been dealt with, and somewhere the functions needed for viability will have been implemented. The question is - are they adequate? But whatever the context, you will be mapping your own organisation onto a VSM diagram, and this process is bound to affect the way you look at your enterprise.
# Step 1: DEFINE THE SYSTEM TO BE DIAGNOSED PURPOSE: To clarify the boundaries of the System-in-Focus. During the diagnosis which follows, there are times when it's easy to lose track of exactly what is being studied. So its essential to begin the Preliminary Diagnosis with a clear statement of the organisation (or the parts of the organisation) you are looking at. Throughout this guide, this will be referred to as the System-in-Focus. 1.1 Sketch some Recursions. You may well have done some of this already in the recursion-games suggested in Appendix 1. If not choose a shape (square, circle. dodecahedron ....) and write in it "ME". Then draw a larger shape around the ME, and draw in the next recursion upwards in which you are embedded. Perhaps it is "bicycle repair shop". Again put a larger shape around this one, and write in "maintenance division". And so on. During this process you may want to add other units within the original set of nested recursions, rather like opening a Russian doll to find several identical smaller dolls. For example "ME" will inevitably have "SAM", "SUE", "ARTHUR" and "MARY". Play with these diagrams until you have a clear idea of what's going on. A complete mapping will be completely over-the-top, (all 15,000 employees??) but it should be complete enough to have at least one complete recursion at each level. Like most of the exercises which follow the way this works will depend entirely on context. A small work-team will be described adequately by a simple diagram. The social economy of Chile involved fourteen recursions and weeks of work. At the very least, it's essential to map the recursions immediately above and below your system-in-focus. 1.2 Define your System-in-Focus. Look at your diagram of the various recursions. The System in Focus might be your whole co-op or one department or it may be a proposed federation of co-ops. But whatever, you have to be clear about what you are concentrating on. Later there may be lots of diagrams at various levels, and its easy to get distracted into the details of any one of these. Ideally you should have a huge notice board with (for example) SYSTEM-IN-FOCUS: Co-op Federation pinned to it to ensure you are clear about your current focus of attention. 1.3 Write down the Purpose of the System-in-Focus. At this point, a statement of the PURPOSE for the System-in-Focus should be written down below its name. This will help to clarify several issues as the diagnosis continues. Currently, this is being referred to as the Mission Statement, although Aims and Objectives is an equally clear way of expressing it. Again the point of this is clarity. Once the system-in-focus is defined with a name and a purpose, it's much easier to keep your attention on the relevant issues. (The issue of purpose is not as simple as it first appears, and for those of you who wish to read further there is a provocative bit of The Heart of Enterprise in which Beer discusses his ideas. The essence is that Purpose can only be defined as "What a system actually does". It's of no use having a purpose of "Bringing down the Capitalist Monster" if what you actually do is sit around and drink coffee all day. What matters is what actually happens. Beer therefore concludes that the purpose of the British railway system is to dissuade him from travelling by rail.) 1.4 List the various parts of your System-in-Focus. Before starting the Diagnosis and the identification of the systems needed for viability, you should list all the parts of the System-in-Focus as you see them. The list should be exhaustive as it will be referred to throughout the Preliminary Diagnosis. It will contain the Operational parts, the accounting functions, the management functions and so on. In compiling the list, keep one eye on your sketch of the various recursions and ensure that the
items on the list refer only to the system-in-focus. It's likely that your first list will need revision and that one or two items will belong to another recursion. Check it carefully. As the Preliminary Diagnosis proceeds, you will be able to take the items on your list and allocate them to one or other of the 5 systems within the Viable Systems Model. Thus, the list will gradually disappear. If your organisation is perfectly Viable, the list will disappear completely and there will be 5 well defined systems giving the basis for viability. If not, either • some new jobs may have to invented or • some existing jobs are not needed for viability and can therefore be considered as redundant. Step 2: DRAW THE VIABLE SYSTEM MODEL IN OUTLINE PURPOSE: To depict the overview of your System-in-Focus in its totality. The diagnosis of your organisation will proceed by drawing a large diagram which will represent your System-in-Focus as a whole system. At this stage, the outlines of the three main parts of the VSM - Operation, Metasystem and Environment - will be sketched in. Between them they represent the overview of your System-in-Focus in its totality. The diagram represents your system-in-focus interacting with its environ- ment. The Operation carries out the system's basic activities. It will consist of several Operational units. It is the muscles, the production units, the parts that generate wealth. The Metasystem is there to provide a service to the Operational units. It is there to hold the organisation together. It is the brain, the regulator, the management. The details of the what goes on within each of these three shapes will be filled in as the diagnosis proceeds. The job at this point is to draw the VSM in outline as an overview of your system-in-focus interacting with its environment. DRAWING THE VSM - from Step 2 - drawing the outlines 2.1 Get the biggest piece of paper you can find. I've used A1 technical drawing paper, but more recently lining wallpaper which is cheap and so you can rip up diagrams you don't like and start again. 2.2 Write in big letters SYSTEM IN FOCUS: MISSION: (or if you'd rather ... use Aims and Objectives) 2.3 Draw the Metasystem as a big diamond and the Operation as a matching ellipse and the Environment as an amoeboid shape. Make all of these as large as you can. Notes: 1. There is a tendency to see this diagram as hierarchical. The Boss over the Workers. From my experience, (and from discussions with Beer) this is completely wrong. The Metasystem is there to service the Operational elements. It has a different perspective, or over-view, as it has to consider the collection of Operational units in its entirety, but the need to have power over the people in the Operation is strictly limited to its job of cohesion. It can only wield power if the system is in danger of breaking apart. 2. Everything which will be drawn on this diagram must refer to the System-in-Focus. At a later stage you may want to delve further into the workings of each Operational element, so you will drop a level of recursion, define a new system-in-focus and start again. For the time being the diagnosis will concentrate upon the System-in-Focus you have defined.