Issue No. 550 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting required big help! So I recruited David Schmidt and my son, Jason, to help us think about a hot-off-the-press book on four workarounds that scrappy organizations leverage. (View our Zoom Review.) Fascinating, yet troubling! And this reminder: click here to download free resources from the 20 management buckets (core competencies), click here for over 500 book reviews, and click here for my review of Rising Together. (Plus, listen to Episode 3 of The Discerning Leader Podcast below.)
Strategies from the World's Scrappiest Organizations and the 3 Little Pigs!
You gotta love an author/professor from Oxford University’s Engineering Sciences Department and the Saïd Business School who spotlights the story of “The Three Little Pigs” to explain the thesis of his new book (just published on March 7, 2023).
If I were still a CEO, I’d buy four copies of The Four Workarounds—and schedule a four-hour team meeting. I’d leverage Paulo Savaget’s hilarious color commentary on “The Three Little Pigs” to explain his four workarounds. Then having previously delegated each of the four big ideas to four team members—I’d give each person 30 minutes to explain the concept of their assigned workaround.
And then, I’d sit back and look forward to the creativity oozing all over our organization’s most complex problems.
This is a compelling book, but—CAUTION!—it may irritate your worldview and core values, but please read it. I absolutely love the title and the subtitle:
Strategies from the World's Scrappiest Organizations
for Tackling Complex Problems
by Paulo Savaget
And speaking of core values, the subtitle reminded me of a brilliant core value at Seattle’s Union Gospel Mission when Jeff Lilley was their president. Of their seven core values, this was my favorite: “INNOVATIVE & SCRAPPY: We are creative and innovative in our efforts to accomplish our mission.”
For this interesting book, I invited my son and co-author, Jason Pearson, and my longtime friend and consultant/mentor, David Schmidt, to join me for a Zoom Review. Click here.
Pearson, Pearson, and Schmidt
on “The 4 Workarounds”
Click here to view our lively conversation.
As you’ll learn while viewing our Zoom Review, author Paulo Savaget features four types of “workarounds” that both for-profit and nonprofit organizations have leveraged to address their most vexing and complex problems. The four workarounds:
#1. Use a PIGGYBACK—when “there are other people or relationships that you can leverage.”
#2. Use a LOOPHOLE—when “there is a set of formal or informal rules that you dislike.”
#3. Use a ROUNDABOUT—when “there is a self-reinforcing behavior that can be influenced.”
#4. Use a NEXT-BEST—when “there are available resources that can be repurposed.”
Part I of the book (about 150 pages) gives stunning examples of how innovative business leaders, activists, and others have leveraged Piggybacks, Loopholes, Roundabouts, and Next-Best strategies to attack and solve very complex issues. He writes, “Workarounds are clever, unexpected, economical, and effective.”
In Part II, Savaget cleverly suggests how the Big Bad Wolf in “The Three Little Pigs” might use workarounds to satisfy his hunger for bacon! (LOL!) But he also notes how the pigs might respond with their own workarounds. A second example features Hilda, a German computer programmer, with a liberal worldview on immigration—and how she might use workarounds to help Syrian refugees to “become legally entitled to make a living” in spite of the German bureaucracy. (Pretty clever, actually.)
Caution! The author tilts toward fuzzy edges around values, ethics, and rules. In Part II, “Using Workarounds,” he urges us to “critically reflect on the value of deviance, zooming out to think about how workarounds can enable us to deviate effectively and gracefully from all sorts of conventions, from explicit rules to implicit norms.” He adds:
“We’ll explore how a workaround mindset necessitates a willingness to experiment quickly, fail productively, and repeat the process rather than conduct methodical assessments and define contingency plans.” (See also my review of Burn the Boats and why the author suggests you "Throw Plan B Overboard!")
You’ll have to listen to our Zoom Review for more. Even better—read the book with your team members. I would start with some brainstorming on the “case study” of either the three little pigs or Hilda, the German activist.
And note! Savaget complains, “My pet peeve is when people say that you must think outside the box, and then they follow a one-size-fits-all brainstorming approach. Not every creative activity needs Post-its and flip charts!” (Oh! That hurts!!)
You’ll appreciate and learn from:
THE PIGGYBACK. The author documents how ColaLife, a nonprofit that began work in Zambia, piggybacked their life-saving remedy (previously with no distribution channels) by “designing the medicine’s triangular packaging that fit between bottles in Coca-Cola crates.” (See photo.) Coke was widely available everywhere--so they piggybacked on Coke's delivery system. At the time, childhood diarrhea was the second leading cause of death in children under five in Sub-Saharan Africa.
THE LOOPHOLE. Brazil was the location for a creative workaround orchestrated during COVID by the governor of a Northeast Region state with seven million people. Desperate for ventilators from China (but with no direct flights from China to Brazil), Governor Flavio Dino, a former federal judge, fought regulations and budgetary limitations to save his people. At both U.S. and Germany refueling stops, the ventilators were confiscated. Dino’s workaround through Ethiopia involved an ingenious series of loopholes. (Legal? Be sure to read “Confronting the Morality of Loopholes.”)
THE ROUNDABOUT. Paulo Savaget, who holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge, is also a Gates Scholar. He writes, “Roundabout workarounds disturb and redirect positive feedback loops, which lead to self-reinforced behaviors.” I’ll spare you the details here of one nation’s attempt to discourage public urination, but you can enjoy our Zoom Review conversation to get the details—and learn how to tap into people’s belief systems to “spark changes in their behavior.” (Here’s a short video.)
THE NEXT BEST. In 1972, attorney Ruth Bader Ginsburg (1933-2020), argued a sexism case in the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, with her husband, Marty, a tax specialist. “On the opposing bench was the solicitor general—the Ginsburg’s former Harvard Law School dean.” What to do? “Notorious RBG,” who served on the U.S. Supreme Court from 1993 to 2020, used a “Next Best” strategy to win the case on appeal. A champion of women’s rights, RBG argued Moritz v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue on behalf of a man who was being discriminated against. “By arguing from the position of a man’s diminished rights, RBG…successfully set a historic precedent that unequal treatment on the basis of sex is unconstitutional.” (Tune in to our Zoom Review for more details.)
There’s so much more, such as the bullet-point “prompts” for all four categories. NEXT BEST: “How can resources be reassembled in unconventional ways?”
DON’T SKIP…the numerous innovations by nonprofits and why Pepsi’s PR backfired when they attempted to piggyback on the BLM movement. You can also learn how the author became a student of his boss (who “answered emails erratically”) and scheduled the perfect time for emails to arrive in his boss’s inbox (see page 245).
Savaget also urges us to “Be Messy” and suggests that “Coming up with workarounds is more like playing with Legos than completing a puzzle: you have building blocks, and your challenge is to build something.”
WARNING: Your values and worldview may not align with every example (pro-choice, divorce loopholes, immigration, etc.), but as we discuss in the Zoom Review—it’s important to understand your own value system and respond in creative, innovative, and ethical ways when you leverage these four workaround strategies.
PROMOTE YOUR WORKAROUND! In the Zoom Review, you'll hear Jason's suggestion to email your organization's workaround strategy to the author, so he'll have more examples for his students at Oxford and for his next book! Contact Paulo Savaget.
To order from Amazon, click on the title for The Four Workarounds: Strategies from the World's Scrappiest Organizations for Tackling Complex Problems, by Paulo Savaget. Listen on Libro (7 hours, 2 minutes). And thanks to the publisher for sending me a review copy.
YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS:
1) For more ideas on workarounds, I’ve seen creative leaders use Thinkpak: A Brainstorming Card Deck, by Michael Michalko. (Read my review.) This brainstorming card deck has 56 cards including two instructional cards, with four or five cards for each of the nine key processes, plus seven cards with creative ways to evaluate ideas. It’s a brilliant instant brainstorming system. But one more caution! It could be dangerous to your boring, status quo! The S.C.A.M.P.E.R. process leverages the nine principal ways of changing a subject: Substitute something. Combine it with something else. Adapt something to it. Modify or Magnify it. Put it to some other use. Eliminate something. Reverse or Rearrange it. Should we use this resource on one of our complex problems?
2) Is “Innovative and Scrappy” one of our core values? If not, should it be? Read more from Patrick Lencioni and the four categories of values in his insightful Harvard Business Review article, “Make Your Values Mean Something.” (Read my commentary here.)
Mastering 100 Must-Read Books - Part 2: Books-of-the-Year
Book #21 of 100:
Joy at Work
For your team meeting this week, inspire a team member to lead your “10 Minutes for Lifelong Learning” session by spotlighting Book #21 in Mastering 100 Must-Read Books.
Joy at Work:
A Revolutionary Approach to Fun on the Job
by Dennis Bakke
Books #6 through #21 spotlight 16 books that I named the Book-of-the-Year from 2006 to 2020. Joy at Work, a 2006 bestseller, describes Dennis Bakke’s radical approach for bringing joy into the corporate and nonprofit workplace.
• Read my review.
• Order from Amazon: Joy at Work
• Listen on Libro (9 hours, 28 minutes): 100% discount!
• Download the 100 Must-Read Books list (from John and Jason Pearson)
In 2006, I had the privilege of facilitating an all-day workshop at the Drug Enforcement Administration in Washington, D.C. The CFO of the DEA had invited his finance team to read Joy at Work—and then go deep on how the principles and values applied to their important work.
Why was I the facilitator? Dennis Bakke, the author, was not available and recommended me. I came away so impressed with the men and women at the DEA—and their heart for service and lifelong learning. Bakke’s book is a must-read. (Click here to listen to the first three minutes of his book and why his father advised Dennis not to attend Harvard Business School. LOL!)
BONUS! In 2013, Dennis Bakke wrote a follow-up business novel to Joy at Work—further fleshing out his approach to decision-making and delegation. The story, if you’re gutsy enough to read it, will convince you that “decision-making is simply the best way in the world to develop people.”
• Read my review.
• Order from Amazon: The Decision Maker: Unlock the Potential of Everyone in Your Organization, One Decision at a Time, by Dennis Bakke
• Listen on Libro (4 hours, 23 minutes): 100% discount!
The Discerning Leader Podcast, Ep. 3 (3/9/2023)
Listen to The Discerning Leader Podcast as Steve Macchia and Matt Scott, from Leadership Transformations, and John Pearson dialogue on the 10 phases of a spiritual discernment process—from Steve’s book, The Discerning Life: An Invitation to Notice God in Everything (John’s 2022 Book-of-the-Year). Click here for Season 25, Episode 3, "The Prayerful Process: Phases 4, 5, 6, and 7." (March 9, 41 minutes)
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JESUS REVOLUTION MOVIE!
My son, Jason, and I recently experienced the Jesus Revolution movie together. Two thoughts: 1) If you are a Christ-follower, definitely go see it. 2) If you are a seeker, definitely go see it. Experience it. Click here to read my review. (Read more book reviews on the Pails in Comparison blog.)
PEARPOD | TELLING YOUR STORY. Do you need help tackling your most complex problems? As the author of The Four Workarounds notes, sometimes you need an outsider looking in—to give fresh eyes and insights to sticky issues. We can help! Contact Jason Pearson at Pearpod (Design, Digital, Marketing, Social).
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