Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous.
VUCA is an acronym used by the US military to describe highly complex and unstable situations in the theatre of war.
The current COVID19 situation across the globe could be described as VUCA. The virus, like many military situations, is placing people in situations where they are forced to change behavior where the consequences are unpredictable, there is rampant uncertainty of what the future looks like and how we will be affected, the effects are highly complex and chaotic, and difficult to analyze and also there is a great deal of ambiguity about the information and there is no clear meaning.
VUCA is a system for raising awareness of a rapidly changing situation where information is incomplete and unclear. It is nowadays adopted as a style of leadership as it applies to the behavior of groups and individuals in organizations.
Originally coined by Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus in 1987 to describe general conditions and situations, it was adopted by the U.S. Army War College at the end of the cold war and then was adopted by strategic leadership in organizations.
The key of VUCA is seen in situations where it is difficult to predict an outcome, where our assumptions, generalizations, and stereotypes don’t produce the answer to what will happen next. When things and people behave uncharacteristically and cause and effect are not linear.
We have an unquenchable thirst to predict and to simplify so that we can deal with information. This is bourne out of our need to create meaning from patterns of events. stringing together event-patterns into “stories” is how we form our mindsets, our habits, our assumptions, and our beliefs.
VUCA is useful for:
· knowledge management and sense-making.
· For planning and readiness considerations.
· Functional responsiveness and impact models
· Recovery systems and forward practices.
· Systematic failures.
· Behavioral failures
It helps to anticipate issues and understand the consequences, issues, and actions where there may be complex variables and to interpret relevant opportunities and can be empowering.
VUCA is a key contextual tool for deciding how to behave in the future in complexity and uncertainty and planning boundaries and policy. VUCA assists in managing risk and solving complex problems by viewing the conditions under which decision can, and are, made.
Volatility.
The world is constantly changing and in recent times those changes are more unstable every day. The nature of change is becoming more dramatic and happening faster and faster. It becomes impossible to predict cause and effect. People behave uncharacteristically with unexpected reactions. Our normal generalizations and stereotypes don’t fit the situation. We use generalizations, assumptions, and stereotypes in most everyday situations so that we don’t have to re-assess and re-analyze each and every instance. They are our mental shortcuts, that save thinking time and mental energy. A situation becomes volatile when these norms don’t conform to expectations.
For instance, If a doctor approaches you in a white lab-coat that probably conforms to the expectation that this is someone with the correct authority and their advice is worth listening to. However, if the same person approaches in their running gear, you may have to re-assess how you accept the advice he gives you.
COVID 19 Virus
Uncertainty.
Where information is unknown or unavailable. When we don’t know something or it is unclear as to how it will behave or pan out. When the causes are not clear or apparent. The lack of predictability produces surprising effects and, as with Volatility, we are unable to predict the outcome. Our sense of awareness and understanding of unanticipated interactions causes anxiety and stress. This may also be due to a lack of sufficient information, thereby prompting the need to discover more.
We tend to group things into manageable categories, again so that we can predict their behavior. There is a thinking efficiency that needs to categorize. We do this in hierarchical ways. For instance, we may categorize or group a whole nation as having a particular attitude, say, The French. Then we may sub-categorize those who are french and support Paris St. Germain football club. We may further sub-categorize into age, hair color, gender, background, etc. The uncertainty comes when things don’t fit into expected categories.
If we imagine that we see a person, in a war zone, carrying a gun, but with no identification, we would be uncertain whether they are friend or foe.
This may be why people who behave unpredictably, may hold more power over us than people whose behavior we can’t determine. Uncertainty of someone else’s behavior means that we are unable to determine how we will react and behave.
Management is about control. VUCA helps to identify what is not in control.
Complexity
Complexity
Many systems and situations are complex and interconnected. Multiple components may be interdependent and the resulting system that emerges cannot be explained as the sum of its parts. Complexity occurs where it’s not clear what causes an effect, where there are multiple influences and components and where we are unable to predict.
Complex systems make control and understanding difficult. We categorize to simplify and to understand. As Richard Feynman said; “If you can’t explain it in simple terms, you don’t understand it”.
In recognizing highly complex situations we are forced to categorize and simplify to gain control. People are highly complex multi-layered beings. We categorize and stereotype to be able to understand and deal with information in bite-sized chunks.
Complex systems are confusing because we cannot get sufficient control and predictability to be able to understand them.
Tweedledum & Tweedledee - Tenniel
Ambiguity
When the information about something is know, but the meaning is not clear or has multiple meanings we have ambiguity. Even if normal information is available and we cannot clarify the meaning then decision-making is difficult and tends to be reactive, based on what we assume we know.
Ambiguity leads to an assumed answer because we need closure and completion. We need to find satisfactory explanations for situations and systems. So we create patterns from events so that we can understand a situation. We base these assumptions on available and past information.
It is very rare for things to completely clear and precisely determined. Not everything fits into easy categories, not everything is black and white.
Modern organizations face more contradictory and paradoxical information that challenge value systems, ethics and morality. Ambiguity leads to assuming an answer to categorize.
VUCA encourages organizations to become adaptable and flexible in rapidly changing circumstances.
A balanced approach to risk.
It encourages a balanced approach to risk. Very few companies are immune to disruption and uncertainty which suggests that they must innovate and become nimble to maintain their market share.
Innovation involves risk, it involves stepping outside of “the way things have always been done” to taking on a risk-tolerant, open mindset balanced with the risks involved.
The things that got you there in the past probably won’t get you there in the future. The world has changed and organizations should become comfortable with uncertainty. All innovation, by its nature, is uncertain and involves risk. Particularly risk of failure.
Refining problems to get them into the realm of the manageable
If we assume that change is constant it follows that taking on new skills and knowledge is essential. Most people don’t get on well with change because it is a leap into the unknown which involves risk and uncertainty.
But, as Darwin said,
“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is most adaptable to change”.
Bill George, a senior fellow at Harvard business School refers VUCA to the modern leadership skills required to thrive in a VUCA situation, he calls this VUCA 2.0
Vision
Understanding
Courage
Adaptability
Alexander the Great
Let’s hope that a solution to COVID19 is found soon.
Be safe.
Be well.
C.