Editing Sociotechnical system (section)

==Principles==
Some of the central principles of sociotechnical theory were elaborated in a seminal paper by [[Eric Trist]] and [[Ken Bamforth]] in 1951.<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951">{{cite journal |last1=Trist |first1=E. L. |last2=Bamforth |first2=K. W. |title=Some Social and Psychological Consequences of the Longwall Method of Coal-Getting: An Examination of the Psychological Situation and Defences of a Work Group in Relation to the Social Structure and Technological Content of the Work System |journal=Human Relations |date=February 1951 |volume=4 |issue=1 |pages=3–38 |doi=10.1177/001872675100400101 |s2cid=145434302 }}</ref> This is an interesting case study which, like most of 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 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 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 a goal.”<ref name=":1"/>

===Responsible autonomy===
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".<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/> The overriding point seems to be that having the simple ability of individual team members being able to perform their function 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.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Siebold |first1=Guy L. |title=The Evolution of the Measurement of Cohesion |journal=Military Psychology |date=January 1999 |volume=11 |issue=1 |pages=5–26 |doi=10.1207/s15327876mp1101_2 }}</ref>

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, 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...".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=De Carvalho |first1=Paulo V.R. |title=Ergonomic field studies in a nuclear power plant control room |journal=Progress in Nuclear Energy |date=January 2006 |volume=48 |issue=1 |pages=51–69 |doi=10.1016/j.pnucene.2005.04.001 |bibcode=2006PNuE...48...51D }}</ref> 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 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".<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/> In practice,<ref>A. Rice (1958). ''Productivity and social organisation: The Ahmedabad experiment''.  London: Tavistock.{{page needed|date=October 2020}}</ref> this requires groups to be responsible for their own internal regulation and supervision, with 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.

===Adaptability===
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".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Carvajal |first1=Raul |title=Systemic-Netfields: The Systems' Paradigm Crisis. Part I |journal=Human Relations |date=22 April 2016 |volume=36 |issue=3 |pages=227–245 |doi=10.1177/001872678303600302 |s2cid=145457622 }}</ref> Sitter in 1997 offered two solutions for organisations confronted, like 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".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=de Sitter |first1=L. Ulbo |last2=den Hertog |first2=J. Friso |last3=Dankbaarl |first3=Ben |title=From Complex Organizations with Simple Jobs to Simple Organizations with Complex Jobs |journal=Human Relations |date=May 1997 |volume=50 |issue=5 |pages=497–534 |doi=10.1177/001872679705000503 |hdl=2066/25883 |s2cid=220642374 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> 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 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"<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Clarke |first1=David M. |title=Human redundancy in complex, hazardous systems: A theoretical framework |journal=Safety Science |date=November 2005 |volume=43 |issue=9 |pages=655–677 |doi=10.1016/j.ssci.2005.05.003 }}</ref> 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 the age and stamina of the individuals concerned".<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/> 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 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."<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/>

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 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".<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/> On the other hand, many activities are constantly faced with the possibility of "untoward activity in the 'ground'" of the 'figure-ground' relationship"<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/> The central problem, one that appears to be at 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".<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/>

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.<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/>  For this reason, 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 the group allows problems to be solved locally without propagation through a larger social space, thus increasing tempo.

===Whole tasks===
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."<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/> The Sociotechnical embodiment of this principle 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".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Cherns |first1=Albert |title=The Principles of Sociotechnical Design |journal=Human Relations |date=August 1976 |volume=29 |issue=8 |pages=783–792 |doi=10.1177/001872677602900806 |s2cid=145391062 |doi-access=free }}</ref> 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 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 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".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Storr |first1=Jim |title=A Critique of Effects-Based Thinking |journal=The RUSI Journal |date=December 2005 |volume=150 |issue=6 |pages=32–35 |doi=10.1080/03071840509441981 |s2cid=144906980 }}</ref> 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.

===Meaningfulness of tasks===
Effects-based operations and 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"<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/> 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 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 pattern|spatio-temporal structure]].  By this is meant conditions under which those concerned can complete a job in one place at one time, i.e., 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.<ref name="Trist & Bamforth 1951"/> 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.