MOTM 48: Zone of Emergence/Appropriate Response

By October 29, 2024Design, MOTM

The Value Web Model of the Month 48 visual graphic

Wednesday, November 6, 2024

Join host Svenja Rüger with Rob Evans & Matt Taylor for a 90-minute live discussion.

Americas
8:00 AM – 10:00 AM PST/Los Angeles
10:00 AM – 12:00 PM CST/Chicago
11:00 AM – 1:00 PM EST/New York

EMEA
16:00 – 18:00 GMT/London
17:00 – 19:00 CET/Paris
18:00 – 20:00 EET/Helsinki
19:00 – 21:00 EAT/Nairobi

(Check your timezone here)

FREE ONLINE WORKSHOP
Register Here

How can we, as practitioners, become better at what we do in service of humanity?

We are pleased to announce that our 48th MG Taylor Model of the Month Workshop will be on November 6th. Join us as we explore new ideas and insights through collaborative and innovative approaches.

We would be delighted to have you participate in this beautiful experience of knowledge exchange, group work, and conversation. The facilitated session will last for 90 minutes, with an additional 30 minutes in which we will still be around for an informal discussion.

For this discussion, we will explore the Zone of Emergence and the Appropriate Response Models. (The model description links are below.)

Zone of Emergence 

The Zone of Emergence model identifies the essential conditions required to enable breakthroughs. This model is built on three key dimensions that must interconnect to create an effective system: Boundary Rules, Levels of Recursion, and Iteration.

It serves as a guide for cultivating “Group Genius,” where creative, collective insights emerge deliberately through structured human efforts, rather than by chance.

Emergence is the appearance of new, collective behaviors in large systems originating from complex interactions among their elements, where higher-level properties cannot be deduced from the lower-level components.

Boundary Rules refer to the guiding principles embedded in a system, crafted to optimize collaborative conditions and encourage innovative breakthroughs. These are precise guidelines defining inclusions and exclusions relevant to projects or relationships.

Levels of Recursion involve at least three tiers. These represent scales within a complex system where essential characteristics and capacities repeat in a fractal pattern, providing continuity across levels.

Iterations entail a minimum of three cycles. Each iteration is a complete developmental phase of an idea or product, designed to gather feedback and inspire cumulative improvements.

Appropriate Response 

The Appropriate Response model provides a way of comparing different designs and solutions and testing them against the elements necessary for a superior result. This model encourages us to consider these elements holistically, making them highly relevant to today’s needs. The six components are categorized by their functional attributes—Efficacious, Proper Scope, and True to Nature—and by the qualities of a living system: Anticipatory, Self-Correcting, and Sustainable.

Rather than a step-by-step process model, this is a reflective audit tool that prompts you to assess how well your design meets these criteria. It’s designed to guide you through a thorough evaluation, helping you examine your actions with greater clarity and intention. By breaking things down, it offers a way to gain a deeper understanding of what’s happening within a project or process.

To use this model, start with a specific object or topic—think of a project or solution—and apply the model’s questions to it. You can even use yourself as the subject:

  • How am I showing up?
  • Am I maintaining effectiveness?
  • Am I operating at the right scope?
  • Am I pushing myself to engage at the level these times require?
  • Should each element hold equal weight for an appropriate response, or do they need to be balanced differently?

The distinction between effective and efficacious is also central: effectiveness is about achieving a desired outcome in a specific instance, whereas efficacy is about a reliable approach that consistently produces desired outcomes over time.

In essence, this model serves as a comprehensive framework, guiding you through a thoughtful process to ensure you’re approaching your project or objective with the care and strategic insight needed for impactful results.

*This architecture of the model was assembled by Bryan Coffman.*

Join us next Wednesday, November 6th to discuss these two models and how they relate to one another.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Warmly,

Matt, Rob & Svenja

Click Here to Read the Zone of Emergence Model DescriptionClick Here to Read the Appropriate Response Model Description
Celebrating 47 Model of the Month Workshops
NOTE: This online workshop is free to all participants. Members of our TVW Learning Community on Mighty Networks will have access to the recording and resources, including all future and past MOTM series and TVW workshops.

Workshop Presenters

Svenja Ruger

SVENJA RUEGER

Münich, Germany | Facilitator | Process Designer

Svenja is a facilitator and designer of large-scale collaborative sessions. Her passion lies in building resilient communities and facilitating collaborative processes to solve complex challenges on a systems level. She cares a lot about the challenges the world is currently facing and wants to support connecting the dots in order to create impactful, meaningful solutions. She promotes listening to understand, not listening to speak, and holds the space for what is trying to emerge.

Rob Evans

ROB EVANS

New York & San Francisco | TVW Member since 2015

Rob Evans is recognized as one of the world’s best-known and most respected facilitators. He has taught thousands of leaders and facilitators in the private, public, and NGO sectors. The Collaboration Code®  is a book series curated by Rob Evans co-founder of Imaginal Labs. Book three in the series, Models: Frameworks for Transformation presents the entire set of models and terms of art in the MG Taylor Modeling Language, including many never-before documented models with illustrations by Kelvy BirdChristopher Fuller, and Kelly Adams.

Matt Taylor

MATT TAYLOR

Kansas City, USA | Designer | Inventor| Teacher| Facilitator

For over 60 years, Matt Taylor has focused his career on the application of architectural design methods to solving complex, systemic problems found at the intersection of physical environments, ecologies, organizational practices, and visionary ideas. This work involves business processes, tool-sets, and software programs, and includes their expression and utilization in the design, construction, and use of virtual and physical environments for collaborative work and sustainable creative living. The components of these environments, and the environments themselves, are designed and built in regard to their fit with, and long-term impact on, social-economic-ecological systems. The sum of his work is outlined in a System and Method co-invented with partner Gail Taylor. He is co-founder of the MG Taylor Corporation.

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