Security Learning Cultures
In the West today, most change occurs in organizations through fear or desperation. Here are real problems with this. First, it means that change is inevitably episodic. When things are bad, you can get some change. As soon as the perception of imminent doom fades, so does the engine of change. Second, the more obvious human problem is that a lot of people in companies today are in a state of continual crises. Many organizations operate this way. It’s tough, it’s pretty stressful. It’s not the way most of us would choose to live our lives.
Peter Senge, MIT
Globe and Mail, December, 1992
Peter Senge, MIT
Globe and Mail, December, 1992
Overview
What has changed since Senge's 1992 comments? The realty might be that conditions have worsened as stress continues to rise in the workplace; and everything that goes with that. It contributes to things like more aggression, less ability to focus and depleted resilience to temptations.
For several years the hot multi-media button and government hyperbole was terrorism. This buzz has since quietened, affecting the level of vigilance. But the threat is still there. Lately its cyber security and active shooters. These layers of threats pile on top of age-old security problems including: occupational fraud, theft, corruption and other environmentally induced behaviors such as workplace sabotage, workplace violence.
ATRiM Group seeks out and works with like-minded subject matter experts with niche expertise. We apply complex systems thinking to security problems; exploring the relationships between all parts of critical infrastructure, where a change to one part may affect security in another part.
So, perhaps a question all of us concerned about security have to ask: Are there some self-organizing rules around the dynamics of human behavior that we need to learn and apply? Science is certainly making discovers in the natural world (i.e. universal power laws), and within this context that there is always an element of unpredictability.
For several years the hot multi-media button and government hyperbole was terrorism. This buzz has since quietened, affecting the level of vigilance. But the threat is still there. Lately its cyber security and active shooters. These layers of threats pile on top of age-old security problems including: occupational fraud, theft, corruption and other environmentally induced behaviors such as workplace sabotage, workplace violence.
ATRiM Group seeks out and works with like-minded subject matter experts with niche expertise. We apply complex systems thinking to security problems; exploring the relationships between all parts of critical infrastructure, where a change to one part may affect security in another part.
So, perhaps a question all of us concerned about security have to ask: Are there some self-organizing rules around the dynamics of human behavior that we need to learn and apply? Science is certainly making discovers in the natural world (i.e. universal power laws), and within this context that there is always an element of unpredictability.
A Designed Security Future
the ATRiM Group 2.5 day Search Conference opens with the selection of up to 30 employees across all levels of your organization to learn about turbulent and uncertain global security environments. This is the stuff of nonlinearity - a world allied with the sciences born out of the mathematics of Chaos. The participants evaluate the present state of their security systems with its inherited myths dominated by the linearity of classical physics and economics. They are introduced to new science and methodologies for designing a more effective and desirable security future state based in planning-in-action, learning cultures. Finally they develop a Phase 1 action plan to take their ideas back to their organization with the personal relationships to sustain inertia.
Those who did not participate in the search conference have no emotional connection to the work of the conference. An option is our film production capacity to produce upscale videos that capture the emotions and discoveries of the conference for viewing by non-participating employees back at the office, and for orientation of newly onboarding employees which captures the essence of your security mindset.
Those who did not participate in the search conference have no emotional connection to the work of the conference. An option is our film production capacity to produce upscale videos that capture the emotions and discoveries of the conference for viewing by non-participating employees back at the office, and for orientation of newly onboarding employees which captures the essence of your security mindset.
Planning-in-Action Workshops In Pursuit of the Ideal
"The conventional approach to planning, with its rigid time frames, its breakdown of planning tasks into sectors and regions, and its centralized and technocratic perspective on plan formulation and implementation is most unlikely to be effective in an increasingly turbulent environment."
Francisco Sagisti, Chief of Economic Planning, World Bank
Francisco Sagisti, Chief of Economic Planning, World Bank
Perhaps brought on with the closing of one Century and the advent of another; business cultures, communities and countries (1990s) began to adopt an innovative approach to planning that was designed to accelerate progress during turbulent times. Inspirational leaders in many domains were recognizing that what is appropriate for the future is no longer simply some form of the past repeated.
Planning-in-action is analogous to running a marathon that always includes a series of sprints, sometimes over unknown terrain, but with the end in mind; or climbing a mountain into the clouds while adapting to new conditions. Sometimes one can only plan the stretch that is immediately ahead and then making adjustments in keeping with a shared vision of a different future. There is an old saying: "It you don't want things to go wrong, stay at home on the couch and don't do anything." With security, breakdowns must be viewed as an opportunity to learn and grow and, thus, quickly declared.
ATRiM Group Action-Planning is a strategic prevention science methodology for helping your insiders tackle security problems with knowledge and confidence. They will become mindful of critical infrastructure as complex systems with many inter-related parts. Our facilitators provide timely "to-the-need" information from experience and science in a to help your insiders solve problems. We strive to create those "aha" moment of self-discovery that stick, while problem-solving team members are in the struggle to find future-state solutions in a security learning culture.
Planning-in-Action planning has a number of specific advantages:
Planning-in-action is analogous to running a marathon that always includes a series of sprints, sometimes over unknown terrain, but with the end in mind; or climbing a mountain into the clouds while adapting to new conditions. Sometimes one can only plan the stretch that is immediately ahead and then making adjustments in keeping with a shared vision of a different future. There is an old saying: "It you don't want things to go wrong, stay at home on the couch and don't do anything." With security, breakdowns must be viewed as an opportunity to learn and grow and, thus, quickly declared.
ATRiM Group Action-Planning is a strategic prevention science methodology for helping your insiders tackle security problems with knowledge and confidence. They will become mindful of critical infrastructure as complex systems with many inter-related parts. Our facilitators provide timely "to-the-need" information from experience and science in a to help your insiders solve problems. We strive to create those "aha" moment of self-discovery that stick, while problem-solving team members are in the struggle to find future-state solutions in a security learning culture.
Planning-in-Action planning has a number of specific advantages:
- It provides an opportunity for reflection.
- It brings people together generating sustainable cross-silo relationships.
- It clarifies objectives within the framework of the designed security future state
- It builds consensus.
- It creates post conference engagement, ownership and accountability.