"The Fifth Discipline"

About the author

Peter Senge is a senior lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management and the founding president of the International Society for Organizational Learning and SOAO China. Senge is known as one of the most innovative world-class management and leadership thought masters. He was selected as one of the top ten influential management figures by Business Week and is known as the "Father of the Learning Organization."

About this book

"The Fifth Discipline" was called one of the five influential business masterpieces by the Financial Times. Peter Senge proposed the concept of "learning organization" in "The Fifth Discipline" published in 1990, and has continuously enriched the company's cases. This book not only drove the rapid development of the U.S. economy in the past decade, but also triggered a management wave to create learning organizations.

Core content

The author Peter Senge points out in this book that each of us actually has the nature of active learning, but the traditional management model suppresses this nature. , turning potential people into mediocre screws, and in turn causing the entire organization to lose its ability to evolve independently. The key to an organization's long-term competitiveness lies in its ability to proactively learn and evolve faster and better than its competitors. From this, he proposed the concept of learning organization and systematically elaborated on the five practices required to build a learning organization.

Foreword

Hello, welcome to listen to this book every day. What we are going to interpret in this issue is a classic in the field of management called "The Fifth Discipline." The author Peter Senge pointed out in this book that each of us actually has the nature of active learning, but the traditional management model suppresses this nature, turning potential people into mediocre screws, and then It also makes the entire organization lose its ability to evolve independently. The key to an organization's long-term competitiveness lies in its ability to proactively learn and evolve faster and better than its competitors. From this, he proposed the concept of "learning organization".

At first glance, you may think that this is a common point of view. Doesn’t it just emphasize “learning”? But please note that the learning organization here does not mean various forms of training, but means that everyone in the organization is full of enthusiasm and ability for learning, and this group of people can constantly inspire each other when they are together. Innovation and trial and error drive the entire organization to continuously evolve. So how can we create such an organization? Peter Senge pointed out that the key is to return from the part to the whole, and to cultivate a global and systemic view within the organization. Why do you say that? Listen to me and explain to you.

You may be familiar with the term "decomposing goals". Since childhood, we have been taught to break down problems. This obviously makes complex problems easier to deal with, but invisibly, we A huge price was paid. At what cost? It means losing the sense of connection with the whole and not understanding the series of consequences of one's own actions. When we want to get a glimpse of the whole picture, we have to work hard to reorganize the scattered fragments in our hearts and try to piece together a whole, but it is like gluing a broken mirror back together. We try hard to see the truth in the mirror, but In the end, I found that I couldn't see clearly. After working hard for a while, I simply gave up.

Peter Senge was aware of this problem when he was studying management more than 20 years ago. The ideas and tools he proposes in this book are designed to break the illusion that the world is created by individual, unrelated forces. Only by breaking this old pattern can the organization you belong to evolve from a rigid group that seems to be in harmony with each other to a living and healthy intelligent body.

Yes, the "Fifth Discipline" we are going to talk about today is actually an old book published in 1990, but it is still a classic in the field of management and has huge practical significance. Many today's entrepreneurs believe that the views in the book hit the mark and go straight to the point of pain. Especially in the Internet era full of variables, the concepts proposed by the author can still effectively solve the stubborn diseases and shortcomings in business management, and can help reshape and activate the vitality of the organization. , which has very important guiding significance.

Part One

What are the stubborn diseases and shortcomings that still plague the development of enterprises today? The author raised this question at the beginning and gave his own answer. If you were asked to describe the management methods of most companies around you, they would probably be somewhat similar.

In this book, the author summarizes several basic characteristics. You can compare them to see if your own organization has the same problems.

First, it is goal-oriented. It also relies heavily on measurement and evaluation, excludes intangible indicators, and pays special attention to the quality of short-term performance evaluation. To put it bluntly, it only looks at KPIs; the management is responsible for setting goals, and the people below will do it one by one. Secondly, there is a special emphasis on obedience and the belief that management is control. Managers often use simple agreement and discipline to suppress various potential conflicts and regard diversity as a problem. The result is that the organization becomes homogeneous; third, it pays attention to right and wrong. What does it mean? That is, managers pay attention to solving specific technical problems, which are often either right or wrong. Fuzzy system problems are often turned a blind eye, or indeed invisible; fourth, individuals in the organization are overly competitive and distrustful of each other. From the perspective of managers, there will be no breakthroughs and innovations without competition; fifth, there is a lack of wholeness, and the entire organization is dismembered. This problem can also be understood as being caused by the above four problems.

How is it? Does your organization also have these problems to some extent? This is actually caused by the once popular management system. Edward Deming, the pioneer of the quality management revolution, once reflected that the management system he created was actually very destructive. Self-respect, dignity, curiosity, and the joy of learning are intrinsic motivations we are born with. Just as Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory says, everyone has the motivation to seek respect and self-realization, and has the ultimate pursuit of transcending themselves. But unfortunately, the external forces that destroy these intrinsic motivations appear when we are toddlers. From the little red flowers in kindergarten, to the scores and rankings in school, and even in the workplace, there are still various evaluations and gradings. Good performance is rewarded, and poor performance is punished.

With the abuse of quality management systems, management by objectives, quota bonuses and business plans, these combined turn almost everyone in the organization into a screw, while also wearing down people. Inner motivation to learn. It can be said that the core problem of this popular management system is that everything becomes mediocre. Because of the lack of collective wisdom and vitality, people have to work harder and harder. To use popular words nowadays, many organizations and individuals in organizations are using behavioral efforts to cover up laziness in thinking.

How will a person’s work status be affected if he is tortured in such an organization for a long time? Being short-sighted, obsessed with short-term events, unresponsive to changes in the system, unaware of small dangers, afraid of trial and error, content with repeating the same work, becoming incompetent, content with mediocrity, etc., are all considered It’s a cliché. But in addition, there are some problems that you may not have thought of. Let me talk about them with you.

First of all, one of the most direct consequences is that employees in such companies are often used to "sweeping the snow on their own". This is because they only focus on their own positions and do not pay attention to the differences between different positions. Lack of perception and responsibility for causal connections.

Secondly, what is more fatal to the development of an enterprise is that employees often look for external reasons and think that "the opponent is external". This is actually a by-product of the previous problem. Lacking a systemic understanding of the organization as a whole, they fail to see the impact of their actions outside of their position, and when those actions have systemic consequences that in turn harm them, they make the mistake of It is believed that these new problems are caused by external factors and caused by others. So do you think this issue will just lead to mutual blame and wrangling within the organization? Not really. Different competitors in the same industry, or even different industries, are actually a system and will affect each other. If we cannot find key leverage points from within, we will never be able to effectively address systemic problems, both external and internal.

Not only that, the author also pointed out that the lack of overall perspective can also give employees the illusion of initiative. This is a continuation of the above question. If we always think that "the enemy is outside", then many active behaviors are essentially offensive battles against external enemies and are a passive reaction. Only when we realize that we are part of the problem can we mount a truly positive response. This initiative is the result of our rational thinking, not the product of emotions.

At this point, we have learned about the problems that are still common in traditional organizations today, and how employees in companies with such problems will be adversely affected. Did you find that the root cause of all problems lies in the lack of system view.

Part 2

Is it possible to break the thinking dilemma created by this management system? Of course there is. In order to deal with this situation and make a rigid organization come alive and become an "artificial intelligence" that can learn independently, Peter Senge proposed the "Five Disciplines". He believes that in order to break the limitations of people's thinking caused by the old management model, five exercises must be done. They are: self-transcendence, mental model, shared vision, team learning and systematic thinking. These words may sound a bit unfamiliar, but what do they mean? Next, I will explain it to you one by one.

The first discipline is self-transcendence. This practice is from a personal perspective. If your organization wants to be particularly capable of learning, first everyone on the team must be capable of learning. And what is the first step to enable individuals to learn? You just have to be motivated to study hard, right? Self-transcendence means that you must have the desire to constantly surpass your own abilities, and have the enthusiasm and motivation to learn. For example, you are not satisfied with your existing skills in the professional field, you are not satisfied with your management capabilities, etc. Only with the motivation of these dissatisfactions can you invest your energy in continuous improvement. If you ask many people what they want, they might say I want my mother-in-law to move out of the house, or I want to work less overtime. Have you ever noticed that they only ask for things they don’t want, but never go after what they really want? Therefore, the transformation from being content with the status quo to self-transcendence is the first ability we need to cultivate.

The second ability to cultivate is mental model. The word mental model is rarely used in our daily life. What does it mean? What it actually means is that everyone has some fixed thoughts, opinions, and ways of thinking about the world. Different people’s perceptions and interpretations of the world are actually different in their brains, and all your actions and practices All are produced under the influence of your mental model.

For example, your understanding of the retail industry may be completely different from Jack Ma’s understanding of the retail industry. why is that? The reason is that the mental models between the two of you are different in the field of retail. Li Xiaolai once gave an example to illustrate the impact of mental models on people. He said, what is stupidity? It is stupid to take the same action every time but expect different results. The reason why people behave the same way every time is that your mental model has not changed. Therefore, if you want to significantly improve your behavior and enhance your abilities, what you really need to change is your mental model and make your way of understanding and understanding the world more reasonable. This is the key. If you can have the desire to study hard and constantly reflect on your own mental model, then your personal learning ability will be initially developed

The third practice is to have a common vision. Shared vision actually talks about how to build enthusiasm for learning from the team level, that is, everyone has to think in the same place, and everyone in the team has a common goal, so that the team can be motivated to learn. . As the saying goes, "People are a gang when we are together, and we are a team when our hearts are together." Otherwise, if we shoot here and there, the team will definitely suffer from serious internal friction. Therefore, if a team organization needs to learn, the first step is to let everyone achieve a common understanding and have a common goal.

Many companies have slogans such as corporate vision and common goals posted on their walls, but in the end they often become just slogans that have nothing to do with their daily work. A vision like this will certainly not inspire enthusiasm. Therefore, the author said that only by turning this common vision into something that everyone recognizes and is willing to support from the bottom of their hearts can you truly motivate everyone. Of course it is not easy to do this. You need to communicate in depth with each member of the team. However, if you do not spend such energy and thought, the team's enthusiasm for learning will not be sustainable in the long-term work. Therefore, establishing a shared vision is the third discipline of the learning organization.

The fourth discipline is team learning. After having a common vision that everyone agrees with, everyone still needs to be able to realize this vision.

Most of the situations we encounter are that each person in the team may have an IQ of over 120, but the combined IQ of the entire team is less than 60 points. The fourth discipline is actually to solve this problem. Team learning actually allows everyone in the team to show their own mental models, communicate with each other, and inspire each other, so that the team can learn and improve quickly.

The previous four exercises sound quite complicated, and they require patience and time to do, otherwise they would not be called exercises. However, the logic behind these exercises is actually very clear and simple. These four practices are actually solving two things: first, clarifying vision and stimulating enthusiasm. For individuals, it is a practice of self-transcendence, but for the team, it is a practice of sharing a common vision; second, training Reflective learning ability, for individuals, requires deep reflection on their own mental models in order to truly make rapid progress; for teams, everyone needs to show their own mental models, inspire each other, run into each other, and work together. progress. These four practices constitute a method for individuals and teams to learn and progress together.

Having said this, do you feel that these four exercises are already complete? If the team can do it, everyone will make great progress. So why is there a fifth practice? This is the core essence of this book, the fifth discipline, which is systems thinking. Although we mention the fifth practice last, in fact, the fifth practice is the basis of the first four practices in a sense. Our level of systematic thinking also determines the degree to which the first four practices can achieve the final results. Therefore, this is why this book, although it talks about the five disciplines, is titled "The Fifth Cultivation".

Part 3

How can we master and apply the ability of systems thinking? We got a book read in the App called "Persistence is a Habit", and that book mentioned that it actually takes a long time to develop cognitive habits. To cultivate a cognitive system such as systematic thinking, you must also be prepared for long-term training. However, if you know the training methods and tools, you can get twice the result with half the effort. Fortunately, the book "The Fifth Discipline" teaches us exactly such methods and tools. Let’s talk about methods first and then tools.

The way to practice systems thinking is simply to find relationships. How to find a relationship and what relationship to find? This does not mean asking for favors or asking for secrets, but our usual habit of solving problems is to find the cause, while systems thinking is to sort out the relationships between various things in the system. For example, why can the car start? You might say, because I stepped on the accelerator and refueled. This is the way of thinking about finding reasons. But if you switch to system thinking, it doesn’t explain it like this. It looks for relationships: if you think of the car itself as a system, then in this system, there is a relationship between the car’s speed, accelerator, and brakes. The greater the speed, the greater the brake, the slower the speed.

You see, this is to find relationships. When we analyze all problems, we can find the relationships between them. You might say, ah, we have to look for this relationship in everything, so when will we be able to find it? You really don’t have to worry about this problem. The author summarized it. In the final analysis, there are only three kinds of relationships among the seemingly complicated things in this world. Yes, there are only three kinds, namely: positive feedback, negative feedback and delay.

Let’s look at positive feedback first. Positive feedback is like a snowball, a structural pattern that gradually escalates. For example, customers who are satisfied with a new product will take the initiative to share it with other potential customers, and after using it, potential customers will continue to share it with more people, making the product a hit. Of course, this amplification effect can also manifest in bad ways. For example, if there is news that a certain stock is about to plummet, it will cause panic in the market and trigger a wave of selling. What we usually call virtuous circles, Matthew effects, etc. are all manifestations of positive feedback.

Although positive feedback will gradually amplify the original development trend, it will not amplify endlessly. This is because there is also negative feedback at play. Negative feedback is a self-regulatory mechanism, mainly used to maintain a certain goal. But compared to positive feedback, negative feedback is very subtle and difficult to identify. Once there is a situation of "busy and busy but things stay the same" at work, it means that some kind of negative feedback is at work. This happens often in reforms. Traditional standards and methods are a kind of goal, and various resistances will always drag reforms back to the starting point. If the role of negative feedback is ignored, reform will spin in circles.

In this case, a leader with leadership skills will identify the source of resistance and take action based on invisible habits and standards.

It should be noted that action does not produce immediate results, there is a delay between the two. We often say that "efforts always pay off." The word "total" indicates the delay between action and result. It can be said that almost all feedback has a delay. For example, today's investment is for tomorrow's return; the medicine you have taken must wait for the gastrointestinal digestion before it can take effect, etc. However, it is easy for people to overlook this. Some people see a hot-selling product on the market and immediately invest in production. However, the delay between start and completion often causes investors to lose good opportunities.

Whether it is positive feedback, negative feedback or delay, they are only the basic modules of the system operating mode and the basic method for us to find relationships between things. Mastering this method, we can conduct a simple analysis of the problem. But if you want to solve the problem, you still need to find a suitable entry point. If you find this point, even small actions can sometimes lead to lasting improvements. Just like the steering wheel of a car, you can turn the car with little effort. This is the power of the lever. The point where leverage comes into play is called the leverage point.

The key to finding leverage points is to learn to observe the structural patterns behind events. These patterns, which the authors call "fundamental patterns of the system," are simple laws behind complex problems. By identifying more basic patterns, you can see more leverage points for dealing with difficulties and challenges. Several basic models are mentioned in the book. Let’s take a look at the most common and important “burden-shifting model”.

The burden-shifting model means that when it is difficult to fundamentally solve the problem, some other short-term and quick-effective methods are adopted. Although these methods seem to be very efficient, they only alleviate the superficial symptoms and do not change the underlying problems. They may even make the underlying problems more and more serious.

The burden-shifting model is also very common in life. When faced with pressure, some people will consider drinking to drown their sorrows. On the surface, it may seem that the stress is relieved, but in fact, drinking to drown their sorrows makes them more miserable, which does not help in solving the problem at all. From this point of view, the burden-shifting model feels a bit like an ostrich mentality. In business management, it is also common for many managers to shift burdens. For example, if managers assign a certain job to employees and it is difficult for employees to do it, they will personally intervene to deal with the problem, so that employees do not have the opportunity to gain the necessary experience and skills to do their jobs well. Those employees who are often replaced by managers will have their self-confidence and judgment significantly reduced. At the same time, they will develop a serious sense of dependence on their superiors and become increasingly unable to perform their jobs. To effectively respond to the shifted burden model, we must combine strengthening fundamental solutions with weakening symptom relief measures. For those who use alcohol to reduce stress, they should dare to face pressure to solve problems and avoid unnecessary alcohol abuse. For business managers, they should turn themselves into coaches and guides rather than problem solvers, so as to help employees improve their professional skills.

In short, if you want to master the ability of systems thinking, you must learn to discover the relationship between various things in the system, and then apply the basic model of the system to find the lever effect point and find out the essence of the problem. and solutions to make the right decisions.

Summary

At this point, the core content of this book has been introduced to you. Let’s briefly review it at the end.

At the beginning, we introduced what Peter Senge calls a learning organization. For example, it is like an "artificial intelligence" that can learn independently, an organization that can evolve automatically. of intelligence. The reason why Peter Senge proposed such a concept was because the mainstream management methods at that time were actually very destructive. It wiped out people's innate enthusiasm for learning and suppressed people's pursuit of self-realization and self-transcendence. Intrinsic motivation, if things go on like this, individuals in the organization will become mediocre and develop various bad work habits. Of course, this is not actually a problem of a certain organization. From school to the workplace, from the East to the West, in the current human society, there are actually various resistances that hinder our true learning everywhere.

Of course, while pointing out the problem, Peter Senge also proposed five practices as a solution. These practices include: self-mastery, mental models, shared vision, team learning, and systems thinking.

Among them, the fifth practice is in a sense the basis of the first four practices. Our level of systematic thinking also determines the degree to which the first four practices can achieve the final results.

So how can we master and apply the ability of systems thinking? The core method is to use positive feedback, negative feedback and delay to find the relationship between various things, and then apply the basic model of the system to find out the lever effect point, find out the essence of the problem and the key to the solution, and then make The right decision.

In fact, the five practices proposed by Peter Senge, whether they are self-transcendence, mental models, shared vision, team learning, and systematic thinking, are all based on the human perspective. to solve various problems encountered in organizational development. No matter how correct the strategy and tactics are, if there is no one to implement them, they will be just a piece of paper; similarly, if there is a lack of capable people, a first-rate strategy will only become second-rate, third-rate or even inferior. Peter Senge's five disciplines are to identify the key factor of "people" in management. By broadening horizons, setting goals, team learning and other means, we can create a learning organization and continue to promote the development of the team organization through individual progress. Achieve a combination where the whole is greater than the parts. For modern enterprise organizations driven by innovation, this is undoubtedly a life-saving medicine, which can greatly release the unlimited potential of people and give full play to the overall advantages of the team. At the same time, this is why this book is a classic.