Where’s the fun in this?
It’s really not fun, but socially speaking, it is very interesting when noticed and observed carefully. Many times in professional settings we set up ourselves and our teams based on illusionary goals. The illusion being that there are only two goal-states, working or not-working. There is so many more than two. Due to strong sports American genre, society has been hurtling towards the winner/loser philosophy for quite some time. By removing the middle space, we create a winner at the loser’s expense and stop the ‘everyone can win’ idea from existing. Today’s power comes from the ability to see the middle space and to frame the bandwidth available to push the needle forward. For those of us that see this space, it’s interesting.
Disfunction as defined
This is not the definition of a biological DYSfunction, it’s the social structure type. Disfunction is a state in which there is a process or pattern occurring outside of its optimal or intended method. What makes disfunction interesting sociologically speaking, is the thought of something which is not working correctly or optimally but still somehow moves along. Thinking this way should bring about the next question of “If we only fix it a bit more, how much better or efficient will it become?”
Where’s the fun in this?
What makes disfunction interesting or fun, is the ability to see a process, a team, or social structure in its disfunctional state. The first step is to see it observationally. Usually disfunction is all around us and we ignore it as we move through our day. Most social human patterning disfunctions are right in front of us. Do people have the vision to see actual disfunction around them? Observe disfunction in your own environmental surroundings:
- That 3-legged dog hopping along in the street.
- The car emitting a huge plume of smoke on the highway.
- The people that say “Yes, but…”
- That Project Manager mis-using terms on a regular basis
- The team-mate who repeats the same update in your daily stand-up
- That guy who’s says “I know, but please, this once, just get it done…”
- The gal who says “I hear you, but keep doing it this way…”
- The owner who says, “We’re not sure why it’s not working, but continue to do what you were doing until you hear back from me.”
- After an aggravated call to customer service rep who doesn’t help you at all, ends the call by saying, “You’re very important to us, is there anything else I can help you with?”
It’s the small stuff
It’s good practice to keep your goals tight and binary but also keep an eye on the disfunctional aspects in your life, your work. If you see it, you can fix it. You’ll also have all the ideas on how to improve almost everything. The big secret is that everything around you are at some level of disfunction, you have to have an open mind to see it, communicate it before it gets bigger.
About the illustration
This illustration depicts the dark side of how we as individuals see disfunction. It’s often viewed as negatively as a dark specter. A lot of times to fix it is an easy pill. Visually the pill brings in color which here makes sense as there is a fractured opinion of how to fix a disfunctional element.
JVS 