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117-686: The term sociotechnical systems was coined by Eric Trist , Ken Bamforth and Fred Emery , in the World War II era, based on their work with workers in English coal mines at the Tavistock Institute in London . Sociotechnical systems pertains to theory regarding the social aspects of people and society and technical aspects of organizational structure and processes. Here, technical does not necessarily imply material technology. The focus

234-514: A mutualistic relationship. The flowers have nectar suited to the birds' diet, their color suits the birds' vision and their shape fits that of the birds' bills. The blooming times of the flowers have also been found to coincide with hummingbirds' breeding seasons. The floral characteristics of ornithophilous plants vary greatly among each other compared to closely related insect-pollinated species. These flowers also tend to be more ornate, complex, and showy than their insect pollinated counterparts. It

351-448: A mutualistic relationship between the species. Such relationships can be of many different types. Flowers appeared and diversified relatively suddenly in the fossil record, creating what Charles Darwin described as the "abominable mystery" of how they had evolved so quickly; he considered whether coevolution could be the explanation. He first mentioned coevolution as a possibility in On

468-560: A change in one partner puts pressure on the other partner to change in response. Hot spots are areas of strong reciprocal selection, while cold spots are areas with no reciprocal selection or where only one partner is present. The three constituents of geographic structure that contribute to this particular type of coevolution are: natural selection in the form of a geographic mosaic, hot spots often surrounded by cold spots, and trait remixing by means of genetic drift and gene flow . Mosaic, along with general coevolution, most commonly occurs at

585-560: A coevolutionary approach to architecture has been defined as a design practice that engages students, volunteers and members of the local community in practical, experimental work aimed at "establishing dynamic processes of learning between users and designers." In his book The Self-organizing Universe , Erich Jantsch attributed the entire evolution of the cosmos to coevolution. In astronomy , an emerging theory proposes that black holes and galaxies develop in an interdependent way analogous to biological coevolution. Since year 2000,

702-409: A common morphology and color because these are effective at attracting the birds. Different lengths and curvatures of the corolla tubes can affect the efficiency of extraction in hummingbird species in relation to differences in bill morphology. Tubular flowers force a bird to orient its bill in a particular way when probing the flower, especially when the bill and corolla are both curved. This allows

819-412: A comparatively high degree of control can be exercised over the complex and moving "figure" of a production sequence, since it is possible to maintain the "ground" in a comparatively passive and constant state". On the other hand, many activities are constantly faced with the possibility of "untoward activity in the 'ground'" of the 'figure-ground' relationship" The central problem, one that appears to be at

936-536: A delegation of responsibility could help employees stay motivated as they would feel appreciated and belonging thus keeping them in their current organization. Leadership is key as employees would prefer following a structure and knowing that there is opportunity to improve. When Mumford analysed the role of user participation during two ES projects A drawback that was found was that users found it difficult to see beyond their current practices and found it difficult to anticipate how things can be done differently. Motivation

1053-476: A flower is, to approach it, and to identify where to land and finally to feed. Secondly, flowers attract insects with patterns of stripes leading to the rewards of nectar and pollen, and colours such as blue and ultraviolet, to which their eyes are sensitive; in contrast, bird-pollinated flowers tend to be red or orange. Thirdly, flowers such as some orchids mimic females of particular insects, deceiving males into pseudocopulation . The yucca , Yucca whipplei ,

1170-462: A goal.” Sociotechnical theory was pioneering for its shift in emphasis, a shift towards considering teams or groups as the primary unit of analysis and not the individual. Sociotechnical theory pays particular attention to internal supervision and leadership at the level of the "group" and refers to it as "responsible autonomy". The overriding point seems to be that having the simple ability of individual team members being able to perform their function

1287-609: A grant from the Rockefeller Foundation in February 1946, and a new Tavistock Clinic became part of the newly formed National Health Service . Many of the group went into formal Psychoanalytic training . Trist was much influenced by Melanie Klein , who visited the Tavistock, as well as by his colleagues John Bowlby , Donald Winnicott , Wilfred Bion and Jock Sutherland . Though close to Wilfred Bion during

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1404-492: A growing number of management and organization studies discuss coevolution and coevolutionary processes. Even so, Abatecola el al. (2020) reveals a prevailing scarcity in explaining what processes substantially characterize coevolution in these fields, meaning that specific analyses about where this perspective on socio-economic change is, and where it could move toward in the future, are still missing. In Development Betrayed: The End of Progress and A Coevolutionary Revisioning of

1521-641: A key figure in Behaviourism in Boston. After witnessing some disturbing experiences during the Depression , he became politically interested for the first time, and read Karl Marx . Trist returned to the UK in 1935 with his first wife Virginia Traylor (b. 11 Sep 1909, m. 6 Jul 1935 Manhattan, New York) (a granddaughter of John Henry Traylor ), her mother and sister. Trist met Oscar Adolph Oeser , who headed

1638-459: A kind of evolutionary process. Changes in hardware, an operating system or web browser may introduce new features that are then incorporated into the corresponding applications running alongside. The idea is closely related to the concept of "joint optimization" in sociotechnical systems analysis and design, where a system is understood to consist of both a "technical system" encompassing the tools and hardware used for production and maintenance, and

1755-461: A large number of employees each do a small operation to assemble a product, the employees are organized into small teams, each of which is responsible for assembling an entire product. These teams are self-managed, and are independent of one another. In the mid-1970s, Pehr Gyllenhammar created his new “dock assembly” work system at Volvo ’s Kalmar Plant . Instead of the traditional flow line system of car production, self-managed teams would assemble

1872-646: A larger workload initially, but it is crucial that requirements can be determined and accommodated for prior to implementation as it is central to the systems success. Due to its mutual causality (Davis, 1977), the STS approach has become widely linked with autonomy, completeness and job satisfaction as both systems can work together to achieving a goal. Enid Mumford (1983) defines the socio-technical approach to recognize technology and people to ensure work systems are highly efficient and contain better characteristics which leads to higher job satisfaction for employees, resulting in

1989-505: A long proboscis. More generally, flowering plants are pollinated by insects from different families including bees , flies , and beetles , all of which form a broad guild of pollinators which respond to the nectar or pollen produced by flowers. Mosaic coevolution is a theory in which geographic location and community ecology shape differing coevolution between strongly interacting species in multiple populations. These populations may be separated by space and/or time. Depending on

2106-411: A long-term goal such as becoming a professional writer or a more short-term goal like learning how to spell a particular word. Personality invariably refers to more or less permanent characteristics of an individual's state of being (e.g., shy, extrovert, conscientious). As opposed to motivation, emotion refers to temporal states that do not immediately link to behavior (e.g., anger, grief, happiness). With

2223-634: A macrosocial level. Analysing and designing sociotechnical systems from a work system perspective and eliminates the artificial distinction of the social system from the technical system. This also eliminates the idea of joint optimization. By using a work system lens in can bring many benefits, such as: The social network perspective first started in 1920 at Harvard University within the Sociology Department. Within information systems social networks have been used to study behaviour of teams, organisations and Industries. Social network perspective

2340-474: A new perspective for their legal regulation. Multi-directional inheritance is the premise that work systems inherit their purpose, meaning and structure from the organisation and reflect the priorities and purposes of the organisation that encompasses them. Fundamentally, this premise includes crucial assumptions about sequencing, timescales, and precedence. The purpose, meaning and structure can derive from multiple contexts and once obtained it can be passed on to

2457-431: A number of different ways of achieving joint optimization. They are usually based on designing different kinds of organization, according to which the functional output of different sociotechnical elements leads to system efficiency, productive sustainability, user satisfaction, and change management. Sociotechnical refers to the interrelatedness of social and technical aspects of an organization . Sociotechnical theory

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2574-412: A relaxation of the myriad of control mechanisms found in more classically designed organizations. Greater interdependence (through diffuse processes such as globalisation) also bring with them an issue of size, in which "the scale of a task transcends the limits of simple spatio-temporal structure . By this is meant conditions under which those concerned can complete a job in one place at one time, i.e.,

2691-442: A second species, and vice versa. This is not always the case. Another evolutionary mode arises where evolution is reciprocal, but is among a group of species rather than exactly two. This is variously called guild or diffuse coevolution. For instance, a trait in several species of flowering plant , such as offering its nectar at the end of a long tube, can coevolve with a trait in one or several species of pollinating insects, such as

2808-414: A second-generation development of STS theory, deliberations are patterns of exchange and communication to reduce the equivocality of a problematic issue; for example, for systems engineering work, what features to develop in new software. Deliberations are not discrete decisions—they are a more continuous context for decisions. They have 3 aspects: topics, forums, and participants. The WST and WSM simplifies

2925-438: A sense of fulfilment to improving quality of work and exceeding expectations. Mumford concludes that the development of information systems is not a technical issue, but a business organization issue which is concerned with the process of change. Some of the central principles of sociotechnical theory were elaborated in a seminal paper by Eric Trist and Ken Bamforth in 1951. This is an interesting case study which, like most of

3042-519: A solid basis upon which emerging sociotechnical research built. The ETHICS (Effective Technical and Human Implementation of Computer Systems) process has been used successfully by Mumford in a variety of projects since its idea conception from the Turners Asbestos Cement project. After forgetting a vital request from the customer to discuss and potentially fix the issues found with the current organisation, she gave her advice on making

3159-409: A system. The system was not received well and Mumford was told they already had been using a similar system. This is when she realised a participative based approach would benefit many future projects. Eric Trist Eric Lansdown Trist (11 September 1909 – 4 June 1993) was an English scientist and leading figure in the field of organizational development (OD). He was one of the founders of

3276-410: A technique for making people more aware of the effect they have on others, which some claim as the beginning of political correctness . This would later influence the direction of much of work at the Tavistock Institute , in the direction of management and, some would say , manipulation, rather than fundamental research into human behaviour and the psyche. It was a partnership between Trist's group at

3393-470: Is an approach to management development, where an individual is moved through a schedule of assignments designed to give him or her a breadth of exposure to the entire operation. Job rotation is also practiced to allow qualified employees to gain more insights into the processes of a company and to increase job satisfaction through job variation. The term job rotation can also mean the scheduled exchange of persons in offices, especially in public offices, prior to

3510-422: Is founded on two main principles: Therefore, sociotechnical theory is about joint optimization , that is, designing the social system and technical system in tandem so that they work smoothly together. Sociotechnical theory, as distinct from sociotechnical systems, proposes a number of different ways of achieving joint optimization. They are usually based on designing different kinds of organization, ones in which

3627-413: Is generally agreed that plants formed coevolutionary relationships with insects first, and ornithophilous species diverged at a later time. There is not much scientific support for instances of the reverse of this divergence: from ornithophily to insect pollination. The diversity in floral phenotype in ornithophilous species, and the relative consistency observed in bee-pollinated species can be attributed to

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3744-627: Is known as the Red Queen hypothesis . The Red Queen hypothesis predicts that sexual reproduction allows a host to stay just ahead of its parasite, similar to the Red Queen's race in Through the Looking-Glass : "it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place". The host reproduces sexually, producing some offspring with immunity over its parasite, which then evolves in response. The parasite–host relationship probably drove

3861-475: Is not the only predictor of group effectiveness. There are a range of issues in team cohesion research, for example, that are answered by having the regulation and leadership internal to a group or team. These, and other factors, play an integral and parallel role in ensuring successful teamwork which sociotechnical theory exploits. The idea of semi-autonomous groups conveys a number of further advantages. Not least among these, especially in hazardous environments,

3978-558: Is on procedures and related knowledge, i.e. it refers to the ancient Greek term techne . "Technical" is a term used to refer to structure and a broader sense of technicalities. Sociotechnical refers to the interrelatedness of social and technical aspects of an organization or the society as a whole. Sociotechnical theory is about joint optimization , with a shared emphasis on achievement of both excellence in technical performance and quality in people's work lives. Sociotechnical theory, as distinct from sociotechnical systems, proposes

4095-475: Is pollinated exclusively by Tegeticula maculata , a yucca moth that depends on the yucca for survival. The moth eats the seeds of the plant, while gathering pollen. The pollen has evolved to become very sticky, and remains on the mouth parts when the moth moves to the next flower. The yucca provides a place for the moth to lay its eggs, deep within the flower away from potential predators. Hummingbirds and ornithophilous (bird-pollinated) flowers have evolved

4212-504: Is required for it to be achieved. Returning to socio-technical values, objectives; principals may provide an answer. Mumford reflects on leadership within organisations, because lack of leadership has proven to be the downfall of most companies. As competition increases employers have lost their valued and qualified employees to their competitors. Opportunities such as better job roles and an opportunity to work your way up has motivated these employees to join their rivals. Mumford suggests that

4329-507: Is something of a buzzword and its varied usage can be unpicked. What can be said about it, though, is that it is most often used to simply, and quite correctly, describe any kind of organization that is composed of people and technology. The key elements of the STS approach include combining the human elements and the technical systems together to enable new possibilities for work and pave the way for technological change (Trist, 1981). The involvement of human elements in negotiations may cause

4446-637: Is the analysis of how a task is accomplished, including a detailed description of both manual and mental activities, task and element durations, task frequency, task allocation, task complexity, environmental conditions, necessary clothing and equipment, and any other unique factors involved in or required for one or more people to perform a given task. This information can then be used for many purposes, such as personnel selection and training , tool or equipment design, procedure design (e.g., design of checklists or decision support systems ) and automation . Job design or work design in organizational development

4563-484: Is the application of sociotechnical systems principles and techniques to the humanization of work, for example, through job enrichment . The aims of work design to improved job satisfaction, to improved through-put, to improved quality and to reduced employee problems, e.g., grievances, absenteeism. Deliberations are key units of analysis in non-linear, knowledge work. They are 'choice points' that move knowledge work forward. As originated and defined by Cal Pava (1983) in

4680-448: Is the coevolution of a host and a parasite . A general characteristic of many viruses, as obligate parasites , is that they coevolved alongside their respective hosts. Correlated mutations between the two species enter them into an evolution arms race. Whichever organism, host or parasite, that cannot keep up with the other will be eliminated from their habitat, as the species with the higher average population fitness survives. This race

4797-479: Is the notion of minimal critical specification. This principle states that, "While it may be necessary to be quite precise about what has to be done, it is rarely necessary to be precise about how it is done". This is no more illustrated by the antithetical example of "working to rule" and the virtual collapse of any system that is subject to the intentional withdrawal of human adaptation to situations and contexts. The key factor in minimally critically specifying tasks

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4914-708: Is the often felt need on the part of people in the organisation for a role in a small primary group. It is argued that such a need arises in cases where the means for effective communication are often somewhat limited. As Carvalho states, this is because "...operators use verbal exchanges to produce continuous, redundant and recursive interactions to successfully construct and maintain individual and mutual awareness...". The immediacy and proximity of trusted team members makes it possible for this to occur. The coevolution of technology and organizations brings with it an expanding array of new possibilities for novel interaction. Responsible autonomy could become more distributed along with

5031-525: Is the opposite of job enlargement, which simply would not involve greater authority. Instead, it will only have an increased number of duties. The concept of minimal critical specifications. (Mumford, 2006) states workers should be told what to do but not how to do it. Deciding this should be left to their initiative. She says they can be involved in work groups, matrices and networks. The employee should receive correct objectives but they decide how to achieve these objectives. Job enlargement means increasing

5148-412: Is the responsible autonomy of the group to decide, based on local conditions, how best to undertake the task in a flexible adaptive manner. This principle is isomorphic with ideas like effects-based operations (EBO). EBO asks the question of what goal is it that we want to achieve, what objective is it that we need to reach rather than what tasks have to be undertaken, when and how. The EBO concept enables

5265-500: Is the role of the facilitator to “keep the members interested and motivated toward the design task, to help them resolve any conflicts”. Mumford states that although technology and organizational structures may change in industry, the employee rights and needs must be given a high priority. Future commercial success requires motivated work forces who are committed to their employers’ interests. This requires companies; managers who are dedicated to creating this motivation and recognize what

5382-492: Is the term usually given to any instantiation of socio and technical elements engaged in goal directed behaviour. Sociotechnical systems are a particular expression of sociotechnical theory, although they are not necessarily one and the same thing. Sociotechnical systems theory is a mixture of sociotechnical theory, joint optimisation and so forth and general systems theory. The term sociotechnical system recognises that organizations have boundaries and that transactions occur within

5499-438: Is useful for studying some of the emerging forms of social or organisational arrangements and the roles of ICT. Recent work on Artificial Intelligence considers large Sociotechnical Systems, such as social networks and online marketplaces, as agents whose behaviour can be purposeful and adaptive. The behaviour of recommender systems can therefore be analysed in the language and framework of sociotechnical systems, leading also to

5616-545: The Hymenoptera (wasps, bees and ants) and Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths) as well as many types of Diptera (flies) and Coleoptera (beetles)—evolved in conjunction with flowering plants during the Cretaceous (145 to 66 million years ago). The earliest bees, important pollinators today, appeared in the early Cretaceous. A group of wasps sister to the bees evolved at the same time as flowering plants, as did

5733-508: The Rocky Mountains , red squirrels and crossbills (seed-eating birds) compete for seeds of the lodgepole pine . The squirrels get at pine seeds by gnawing through the cone scales, whereas the crossbills get at the seeds by extracting them with their unusual crossed mandibles. In areas where there are squirrels, the lodgepole's cones are heavier, and have fewer seeds and thinner scales, making it more difficult for squirrels to get at

5850-831: The Tavistock Institute for Social Research in London. Trist was born in 1909 in Dover , Kent , England of a Cornish father, Frederick Trist, and a Scottish mother, Alexina Trist nee Middleton. He grew up in Dover experiencing dramatic air raids in the first world war , and attended the local county school . He went to Pembroke College, Cambridge , in 1928, where he read English Literature, graduating with first-class honours. Influenced heavily by his don I. A. Richards he became interested in Psychology , Gestalt psychology , and Psychoanalysis , and went on to read psychology under Frederic Bartlett . At that time (1932/3) Trist has said he

5967-634: The 1990s Trist wrote a three-volume account of the Tavistock, along with Hugh Murray and Fred Emery, The Social Engagement of Social Science . He died on 4 June 1993 in Carmel, California. By his second wife, Beulah J. Varney, he had one son and one daughter. Trist was heavily influenced by Kurt Lewin , whom he met first 1933 in Cambridge, England. Kurt Lewin had moved from studying behaviour to engineering its change, particularly in relation to racial and religious conflicts, inventing sensitivity training ,

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6084-756: The Future (1994) Richard Norgaard proposes a coevolutionary cosmology to explain how social and environmental systems influence and reshape each other. In Coevolutionary Economics: The Economy, Society and the Environment (1994) John Gowdy suggests that: "The economy, society, and the environment are linked together in a coevolutionary relationship". Computer software and hardware can be considered as two separate components but tied intrinsically by coevolution. Similarly, operating systems and computer applications , web browsers , and web applications . All these systems depend upon each other and advance through

6201-766: The Graduate School of Business Administration at UCLA . In 1969 he joined Russell L. Ackoff in the Social Systems Science Program (S-cubed) at the Wharton School , the University of Pennsylvania . He taught there until 1978 when he became an emeritus professor. In that same year he joined the Faculty of Environmental Studies, York University, Toronto where he initiated a program in future studies and taught there until 1983. In

6318-622: The Lepidoptera. Further, all the major clades of bees first appeared between the middle and late Cretaceous, simultaneously with the adaptive radiation of the eudicots (three quarters of all angiosperms), and at the time when the angiosperms became the world's dominant plants on land. At least three aspects of flowers appear to have coevolved between flowering plants and insects, because they involve communication between these organisms. Firstly, flowers communicate with their pollinators by scent; insects use this scent to determine how far away

6435-688: The Origin of Species , and developed the concept further in Fertilisation of Orchids (1862). Modern insect-pollinated (entomophilous) flowers are conspicuously coadapted with insects to ensure pollination and in return to reward the pollinators with nectar and pollen. The two groups have coevolved for over 100 million years, creating a complex network of interactions. Either they evolved together, or at some later stages they came together, likely with pre-adaptations, and became mutually adapted. Several highly successful insect groups—especially

6552-497: The Tavistock, and Lewin's at MIT that launched the Journal ' Human Relations ' just before Lewin's death in 1947. It was the wartime experiences of Trist and his various associates that created what became known as 'the Tavistock group', which formed a planning committee to meet and plan the future of the Tavistock after the war. The Tavistock Institute was formed, with Trist as deputy chairman, and Tommy Wilson as chairman, with

6669-450: The age and stamina of the individuals concerned". Human redundancy speaks towards the flexibility, ubiquity and pervasiveness of resources within NEC. The second issue is that of complexity . Complexity lies at the heart of many organisational contexts (there are numerous organizational paradigms that struggle to cope with it). Trist and Bamforth (1951) could have been writing about these with

6786-612: The bird to avoid these flowers. Each of the two subfamilies of hummingbirds, the Phaethornithinae (hermits) and the Trochilinae , has evolved in conjunction with a particular set of flowers. Most Phaethornithinae species are associated with large monocotyledonous herbs, while the Trochilinae prefer dicotyledonous plant species. The genus Ficus is composed of 800 species of vines, shrubs, and trees, including

6903-412: The collection of statistics and the analysis of relevant documents. These will provide important comparative data that can help approve or disprove the chosen hypotheses. A common approach to participative design is, whenever possible, to use a democratically selected user design group as the key information collectors and decision makers. The design group is backed by a committee of senior staff who can lay

7020-406: The colonies are fully dependent on these hybrids to survive, it is also mutualistic. While there is no genetic exchange between the species, they are unable to evolve in a direction where they become too genetically different as this would make crossbreeding impossible. Predators and prey interact and coevolve: the predator to catch the prey more effectively, the prey to escape. The coevolution of

7137-494: The conceptualization of traditional complicated socio-technical system (STS) approach (Alter, 2015). Extending the prior research on STS which divides social and technical aspects; WST combines the two perspectives in a work system and outlines the framework for WSM which considers work system as the system of interest and proposes solutions accordingly (Alter, 2015).     The Work System Theory (WST) and Work System Method (WSM) are both forms of socio-technical systems but in

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7254-607: The controlling factor when new work systems are implemented. So in order to be classified as 'Sociotechnical', equal attention must be paid to providing a high quality and satisfying work environment for employees. The Tavistock researchers, presented that employees who will be using the new and improved system, should be participating in determining the required quality of working life improvements. Participative socio‐technical design can be achieved by in‐depth interviews, questionnaires and collection of data. Participative socio-technical design can be conducted through in-depth interviews,

7371-426: The core principles that sociotechnical theory subsequently became. “The key elements of the STS approach include combining the human elements and the technical systems together to enable new possibilities for work and pave the way for technological change. Due to its mutual causality, the STS approach has become widely linked with autonomy, completeness and job satisfaction as both systems can work together to achieving

7488-495: The cultivated fig, defined by their syconia , the fruit-like vessels that either hold female flowers or pollen on the inside. Each fig species has its own fig wasp which (in most cases) pollinates the fig, so a tight mutual dependence has evolved and persisted throughout the genus. The acacia ant ( Pseudomyrmex ferruginea ) is an obligate plant ant that protects at least five species of "Acacia" ( Vachellia ) from preying insects and from other plants competing for sunlight, and

7605-455: The development of yet new resistant crop plant varieties, producing an ongoing cycle of reciprocal evolution in crop plants and diseases that continues to this day. Coevolution as a major topic for study in nature expanded rapidly from the 1960s, when Daniel H. Janzen showed coevolution between acacias and ants (see below) and Paul R. Ehrlich and Peter H. Raven suggested how coevolution between plants and butterflies may have contributed to

7722-489: The direction of the shift in pollinator preference. Flowers have converged to take advantage of similar birds. Flowers compete for pollinators, and adaptations reduce unfavourable effects of this competition. The fact that birds can fly during inclement weather makes them more efficient pollinators where bees and other insects would be inactive. Ornithophily may have arisen for this reason in isolated environments with poor insect colonization or areas with plants which flower in

7839-415: The diversification of species in both groups. The theoretical underpinnings of coevolution are now well-developed (e.g., the geographic mosaic theory of coevolution), and demonstrate that coevolution can play an important role in driving major evolutionary transitions such as the evolution of sexual reproduction or shifts in ploidy . More recently, it has also been demonstrated that coevolution can influence

7956-443: The ecological conditions, the interspecific interactions may be mutualistic or antagonistic. In mutualisms, both partners benefit from the interaction, whereas one partner generally experiences decreased fitness in antagonistic interactions. Arms races consist of two species adapting ways to "one up" the other. Several factors affect these relationships, including hot spots, cold spots, and trait mixing. Reciprocal selection occurs when

8073-502: The eggs and young of the host and thus having a strong negative impact on the host's reproductive fitness. Their eggs are camouflaged as eggs of their hosts, implying that hosts can distinguish their own eggs from those of intruders and are in an evolutionary arms race with the cuckoo between camouflage and recognition. Cuckoos are counter-adapted to host defences with features such as thickened eggshells, shorter incubation (so their young hatch first), and flat backs adapted to lift eggs out of

8190-503: The end of incumbency or the legislative period. This has been practiced by the German green party for some time but has been discontinued. Motivation in psychology refers to the initiation, direction, intensity and persistence of behavior. Motivation is a temporal and dynamic state that should not be confused with personality or emotion. Motivation is having the desire and willingness to do something. A motivated person can be reaching for

8307-519: The entire car. The idea of worker directors – a director on the company board who is a representative of the workforce – was established through this project and the Swedish government required them in state enterprises. Job enrichment in organizational development, human resources management, and organizational behavior , is the process of giving the employee a wider and higher level scope of responsibility with increased decision-making authority. This

8424-623: The evolutionary fitness of the sexes is counteracted to achieve maximum reproductive success. For example, some insects reproduce using traumatic insemination , which is disadvantageous to the female's health. During mating, males try to maximise their fitness by inseminating as many females as possible, but the more times a female's abdomen is punctured, the less likely she is to survive, reducing her fitness. The types of coevolution listed so far have been described as if they operated pairwise (also called specific coevolution), in which traits of one species have evolved in direct response to traits of

8541-409: The external complexity by 'reducing' the internal control and coordination needs. ...This option might be called the strategy of 'simple organisations and complex jobs'". This all contributes to a number of unique advantages. Firstly is the issue of "human redundancy" in which "groups of this kind were free to set their own targets, so that aspiration levels with respect to production could be adjusted to

8658-531: The famous article, "Some Social and Psychological Consequences of the Longwall Method of Coal Getting." This article highlighted aspects of the miners organisation that today would be termed lean or agile . Trist also collaborated with Fred Emery on developing the socio-technical systems approach to work design . Coevolution In biology, coevolution occurs when two or more species reciprocally affect each other's evolution through

8775-474: The flowering plants and pollinating insects such as bees , flies , and beetles . There are a suite of specific hypotheses on the mechanisms by which groups of species coevolve with each other. Coevolution is primarily a biological concept, but researchers have applied it by analogy to fields such as computer science , sociology , and astronomy . Coevolution is the evolution of two or more species which reciprocally affect each other, sometimes creating

8892-444: The flowers of Mimulus cardinalis may function primarily to discourage bee visitation. In Penstemon , flower traits that discourage bee pollination may be more influential on the flowers' evolutionary change than 'pro-bird' adaptations, but adaptation 'towards' birds and 'away' from bees can happen simultaneously. However, some flowers such as Heliconia angusta appear not to be as specifically ornithophilous as had been supposed:

9009-410: The following passage: "A very large variety of unfavourable and changing environmental conditions is encountered ... many of which are impossible to predict. Others, though predictable, are impossible to alter." Many type of organisations are clearly motivated by the appealing "industrial age", rational principles of "factory production", a particular approach to dealing with complexity: "In the factory

9126-592: The form of work systems. Also, the Work System Method encourages the use of both socio-technical ideas and values when it comes to IS development, use and implementation. The evolution of socio-technical design has seen its development from being approached as a social system exclusively. The realisation of the joint optimisation of social and technical systems was later realised. It was divided into sections where primary work which looks into principles and description, and how to incorporate technical designs on

9243-988: The foundations and subsequently oversee the project. Alter describes sociotechnical analysis and design methods to not be a strong point in the information systems practice. The aim of socio-technical designs is to optimise and join both social and technical systems. However, the problem is that of the technical and social system along with the work system and joint optimisation are not defined as they should be. Standalone, incremental improvements are not sufficient to address current, let alone future sustainability challenges. These challenges will require deep changes of sociotechnical systems. Theories on innovation systems; sustainable innovations; system thinking and design; and sustainability transitions, among others, have attempted to describe potential changes capable of shifting development towards more sustainable directions. Autonomous work teams also called self-managed teams, are an alternative to traditional assembly line methods. Rather than having

9360-461: The group allows problems to be solved locally without propagation through a larger social space, thus increasing tempo. Another concept in sociotechnical theory is the "whole task". A whole task "has the advantage of placing responsibility for the ... task squarely on the shoulders of a single, small, face-to-face group which experiences the entire cycle of operations within the compass of its membership." The Sociotechnical embodiment of this principle

9477-736: The last two years of the war, Trist was chief psychologist at the Headquarters of the Civil Resettlement Units (CRUs) for repatriated prisoners of war, working to schemes devised by Tommy Wilson and Wilfred Bion. He described this as "probably the most exciting single experience of my professional life". Following the death of his first wife and marriage to Beulah J. Varney (b. 1st quarter 1925, m. 2nd quarter 1959, Middlesex , England), in July 1966 Trist moved to America as Professor of Organizational Behavior and Social Ecology in

9594-422: The late 1800s studied other examples of how interactions among species could result in reciprocal evolutionary change. Beginning in the 1940s, plant pathologists developed breeding programs that were examples of human-induced coevolution. Development of new crop plant varieties that were resistant to some diseases favored rapid evolution in pathogen populations to overcome those plant defenses. That, in turn, required

9711-468: The managers to "...manipulate and decompose high level effects. They must then assign lesser effects as objectives for subordinates to achieve. The intention is that subordinates' actions will cumulatively achieve the overall effects desired". In other words, the focus shifts from being a scriptwriter for tasks to instead being a designer of behaviours. In some cases, this can make the task of the manager significantly less arduous. Effects-based operations and

9828-569: The military, with an environment of increased (and increasing) complexity: "The first option is to restore the fit with the external complexity by an increasing internal complexity. ...This usually means the creation of more staff functions or the enlargement of staff-functions and/or the investment in vertical information systems". Vertical information systems are often confused for "network enabled capability" systems (NEC) but an important distinction needs to be made, which Sitter et al. propose as their second option: "...the organisation tries to deal with

9945-444: The nest. Antagonistic coevolution is seen in the harvester ant species Pogonomyrmex barbatus and Pogonomyrmex rugosus , in a relationship both parasitic and mutualistic. The queens are unable to produce worker ants by mating with their own species. Only by crossbreeding can they produce workers. The winged females act as parasites for the males of the other species as their sperm will only produce sterile hybrids. But because

10062-409: The notion of a "whole task", combined with adaptability and responsible autonomy, have additional advantages for those at work in the organization. This is because "for each participant the task has total significance and dynamic closure" as well as the requirement to deploy a multiplicity of skills and to have the responsible autonomy in order to select when and how to do so. This is clearly hinting at

10179-423: The nub of many problems that "classic" organisations have with complexity, is that "The instability of the 'ground' limits the applicability ... of methods derived from the factory". In Classic organisations, problems with the moving "figure" and moving "ground" often become magnified through a much larger social space, one in which there is a far greater extent of hierarchical task interdependence. For this reason,

10296-523: The plant to place pollen on a certain part of the bird's body, permitting a variety of morphological co-adaptations . Ornithophilous flowers need to be conspicuous to birds. Birds have their greatest spectral sensitivity and finest hue discrimination at the red end of the visual spectrum , so red is particularly conspicuous to them. Hummingbirds may also be able to see ultraviolet "colors". The prevalence of ultraviolet patterns and nectar guides in nectar-poor entomophilous (insect-pollinated) flowers warns

10413-605: The population level and is driven by both the biotic and the abiotic environment. These environmental factors can constrain coevolution and affect how far it can escalate. Coevolution is primarily a biological concept, but has been applied to other fields by analogy. Coevolutionary algorithms are used for generating artificial life as well as for optimization, game learning and machine learning . Daniel Hillis added "co-evolving parasites" to prevent an optimization procedure from becoming stuck at local maxima. Karl Sims coevolved virtual creatures. The concept of coevolution

10530-409: The prevalence of sexual reproduction over the more efficient asexual reproduction. It seems that when a parasite infects a host, sexual reproduction affords a better chance of developing resistance (through variation in the next generation), giving sexual reproduction variability for fitness not seen in the asexual reproduction, which produces another generation of the organism susceptible to infection by

10647-441: The primary task of relating the group to the wider system falling explicitly to a group leader. This principle, therefore, describes a strategy for removing more traditional command hierarchies. Carvajal states that "the rate at which uncertainty overwhelms an organisation is related more to its internal structure than to the amount of environmental uncertainty". Sitter in 1997 offered two solutions for organisations confronted, like

10764-399: The problem was hypothesized to be the adoption of a new form of production technology which had created the need for a bureaucratic form of organization (rather like classic command-and-control). In this specific example, technology brought with it a retrograde step in organizational design terms. The analysis that followed introduced the terms "socio" and "technical" and elaborated on many of

10881-455: The process of natural selection. The term sometimes is used for two traits in the same species affecting each other's evolution, as well as gene-culture coevolution . Charles Darwin mentioned evolutionary interactions between flowering plants and insects in On the Origin of Species (1859). Although he did not use the word coevolution, he suggested how plants and insects could evolve through reciprocal evolutionary changes. Naturalists in

10998-585: The psychology department at the University of St Andrews , Scotland , and went on to study unemployment in Dundee . At the outbreak of the second world war Trist became a clinical psychologist at the Maudsley Hospital , London, treating war casualties from Dunkirk . He recalls how, in 1940, in the London blitz , "some very frightened people came out of their rooms, ran all over the grounds and we had to go and find them." The Maudsley, at Mill Hill,

11115-534: The relationships between socio and technical elements lead to the emergence of productivity and wellbeing, rather than all too often case of new technology failing to meet the expectations of designers and users alike. The scientific literature shows terms like sociotechnical all one word, or socio-technical with a hyphen, sociotechnical theory , sociotechnical system and sociotechnical systems theory . All of these terms appear ubiquitously but their actual meanings often remain unclear. The key term "sociotechnical"

11232-456: The same parasite. Coevolution between host and parasite may accordingly be responsible for much of the genetic diversity seen in normal populations, including blood-plasma polymorphism, protein polymorphism, and histocompatibility systems. Brood parasitism demonstrates close coevolution of host and parasite, for example in some cuckoos . These birds do not make their own nests, but lay their eggs in nests of other species, ejecting or killing

11349-433: The scope of a job through extending the range of its job duties and responsibilities . This contradicts the principles of specialisation and the division of labour whereby work is divided into small units, each of which is performed repetitively by an individual worker. Some motivational theories suggest that the boredom and alienation caused by the division of labour can actually cause efficiency to fall. Job rotation

11466-619: The seeds. Conversely, where there are crossbills but no squirrels, the cones are lighter in construction, but have thicker scales, making it more difficult for crossbills to get at the seeds. The lodgepole's cones are in an evolutionary arms race with the two kinds of herbivore. Both intraspecific competition , with features such as sexual conflict and sexual selection , and interspecific competition , such as between predators, may be able to drive coevolution. Intraspecific competition can result in sexual antagonistic coevolution , an evolutionary relationship analogous to an arms race , where

11583-419: The selective pressures drive an evolutionary arms race between the species involved. Pairwise or specific coevolution , between exactly two species, is not the only possibility; in multi-species coevolution , which is sometimes called guild or diffuse coevolution , several to many species may evolve a trait or a group of traits in reciprocity with a set of traits in another species, as has happened between

11700-453: The semi-autonomous group, and its ability to make a much more fine grained response to the "ground" situation, can be regarded as "agile". Added to which, local problems that do arise need not propagate throughout the entire system (to affect the workload and quality of work of many others) because a complex organization doing simple tasks has been replaced by a simpler organization doing more complex tasks. The agility and internal regulation of

11817-487: The situation of the face-to-face, or singular group". In other words, in classic organisations the "wholeness" of a task is often diminished by multiple group integration and spatiotemporal disintegration. The group based form of organization design proposed by sociotechnical theory combined with new technological possibilities (such as the internet) provide a response to this often forgotten issue, one that contributes significantly to joint optimisation. A sociotechnical system

11934-481: The sociotechnical systems that emerge throughout the organisation. A 1990s research interest in social dimensions of IS directed to relationship among IS development, uses, and resultant social and organizational changes offered fresh insight into the emerging role of ICT within differing organizational context; drawing directly on sociological theories of institution. This sociotechnical research has informed if not shaped IS scholarship. Sociological theories have offered

12051-490: The species is occasionally (151 visits in 120 hours of observation) visited by Trigona stingless bees. These bees are largely pollen robbers in this case, but may also serve as pollinators. Following their respective breeding seasons, several species of hummingbirds occur at the same locations in North America , and several hummingbird flowers bloom simultaneously in these habitats. These flowers have converged to

12168-487: The structure and function of ecological communities, the evolution of groups of mutualists such as plants and their pollinators, and the dynamics of infectious disease. Each party in a coevolutionary relationship exerts selective pressures on the other, thereby affecting each other's evolution. Coevolution includes many forms of mutualism , host-parasite , and predator-prey relationships between species, as well as competition within or between species . In many cases,

12285-493: The system (and its sub-systems) and between the wider context and dynamics of the environment. It is an extension of Sociotechnical Theory which provides a richer descriptive and conceptual language for describing, analysing and designing organisations. A Sociotechnical System, therefore, often describes a 'thing' (an interlinked, systems based mixture of people, technology and their environment). Social technical means that technology, which by definition, should not be allowed to be

12402-526: The team(s) themselves. The key to responsible autonomy seems to be to design an organization possessing the characteristics of small groups whilst preventing the "silo-thinking" and "stovepipe" neologisms of contemporary management theory. In order to preserve "...intact the loyalties on which the small group [depend]...the system as a whole [needs to contain] its bad in a way that [does] not destroy its good". In practice, this requires groups to be responsible for their own internal regulation and supervision, with

12519-434: The tree provides nourishment and shelter for the ant and its larvae. Such mutualism is not automatic: other ant species exploit trees without reciprocating, following different evolutionary strategies . These cheater ants impose important host costs via damage to tree reproductive organs, though their net effect on host fitness is not necessarily negative and, thus, becomes difficult to forecast. Host–parasite coevolution

12636-436: The two mutually imposes selective pressures . These often lead to an evolutionary arms race between prey and predator, resulting in anti-predator adaptations . The same applies to herbivores , animals that eat plants, and the plants that they eat. Paul R. Ehrlich and Peter H. Raven in 1964 proposed the theory of escape and radiate coevolution to describe the evolutionary diversification of plants and butterflies. In

12753-544: The view that socio-technical design is by which intelligence and skill combined with emerging technologies could improve the work-life balance of employees, it is also believed that the aim is to achieve both a safer and more pleasurable workplace as well as to see greater democracy in society. The achievement of these aims would therefore lead to increased motivation of employees and would directly and positively influence their ability to express ideas. Enid Mumford's work on redesigning designing human systems also expressed that it

12870-539: The war, Trist later wrote that he was glad he did not join Bion at this point, because "he left groups in the 1950s – which flummoxed everybody – and got completely absorbed in psychoanalysis", adding, "that was when the cult of Bion – a wrong cult in my view – became established." Trist and the Tavistock became involved in industrial projects until 1951, and was given the Lewin Award in 1951. The family discussion group

12987-488: The winter. Bird-pollinated flowers usually have higher volumes of nectar and higher sugar production than those pollinated by insects. This meets the birds' high energy requirements, the most important determinants of flower choice. In Mimulus , an increase in red pigment in petals and flower nectar volume noticeably reduces the proportion of pollination by bees as opposed to hummingbirds; while greater flower surface area increases bee pollination. Therefore, red pigments in

13104-416: The work in sociotechnical theory, is focused on a form of 'production system' expressive of the era and the contemporary technological systems it contained. The study was based on the paradoxical observation that despite improved technology, productivity was falling, and that despite better pay and amenities, absenteeism was increasing. This particular rational organisation had become irrational. The cause of

13221-569: Was a teaching hospital, and Trist attended seminars and met people from the Tavistock Clinic , whom he was keen to join. Opposed by his boss, Sir Aubrey Lewis , who wouldn't let him go, he joined the Tavistock group in the army, as a way of getting free, and was replaced by Hans Eysenck . Trist went to Edinburgh and worked on the War Office Selection Boards (WOSBs) , with Jock Sutherland and Wilfred Bion . For

13338-681: Was formed, and John Bowlby did his world-famous studies on mother-child separation and the establishment of family systems therapy . With cooperation and contributions from Kurt Lewin in the USA, the publication of Human Relations , the Tavistock Journal began, and Trist commented that this gave the Tavistock credibility in the USA, saying, "its articles wouldn't have been accepted by any of the other British psychological journals". In 1949, his organizational research work, studying work crews in at Elsecar Collieries , with Ken Bamforth, resulted in

13455-422: Was found to be another challenge during this process as users were not interested in participating (Wagner, 2007). Process improvement in organizational development is a series of actions taken to identify, analyze and improve existing processes within an organization to meet new goals and objectives. These actions often follow a specific methodology or strategy to create successful results. Task analysis

13572-702: Was introduced in architecture by the Danish architect-urbanist Henrik Valeur as an antithesis to "star-architecture". As the curator of the Danish Pavilion at the 2006 Venice Biennale of Architecture, he created an exhibition-project on coevolution in urban development in China; it won the Golden Lion for Best National Pavilion. At the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Newcastle University ,

13689-623: Was very interested in articles by Kurt Lewin . When Kurt Lewin (who was Jewish ) left Germany as Adolf Hitler came to power, he travelled to Palestine via the USA, stopping off in England, where Trist briefly met him and showed him around Cambridge . Trist graduated in Psychology in 1933, with a distinction, and went to Yale University in the USA and again met Lewin, who was at Cornell University and then Iowa . He visited B. F. Skinner ,

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