Today I came across this quite interesting video interview with Roger Martin (hat tip to Ralf Beuker), dean of the Rotman School of Management. What you must know (if you don’t already) is that the Rotman School is very design oriented and aims at bringing design to business.
Enjoy the video where Roger talks about the design & business overlap:
I very much apply what Roger says in my consulting work and I also taught it in my last workshops in Mexico.
What should “integrated thinkers” do to survive? I mean, there is so much opposing force to integrated thinking (at least as far as I have experienced) that it is very hard to be effective while doing it because people (management) just says NO.
This post is interesting because I recently saw an ad on the Economist which was like: “Say No to No” … curiosity, an open mind, and a willingness to say “yes” can change the world…or so.
But, management would say this is “fluf” and business problems require quick (often – crappy, old, same, lame) business decisions. What are your thoughts about this?
Amit, I think integrated thinking is actually taking off in more innovative organizations.
Take the “one bank strategy” of the Nr.2 Swiss bank Credit Suisse, for example. They are trying to integrate their 3 core areas of investment banking, private banking and asset management into a coherent whole.
I also believe that some top business schools are moving their curriculum away from the traditional departmental thinking (e.g. operations, marketing, strategy, IT) towards something more integrated. This would obviously only have an impact over the longer term.
An argument I often advance is that projects are likelier to succeed if other areas are integrated earlier in the process (e.g. IT). This is simply based on the fact that such an integration augments the buy-in of all parties involved and increases chances of a successful implementation…
Voilà, just some uncooked thoughts…
Amit, Alex, Arguments for integrative thinking can be found everywhere also, for example, in (classic) strategic management as promoted by Michael Porter. Porter states that the links to between value activities can be sources of strategic advantages and emphasizes the importance of trade-offs and fit.
[...] first heard of Roger Martin through an interview by Alexander Osterwalder. Having read Daniel Pink’s book A Whole New Mind, and with [...]