OpenAgile Primer on Organic Growth

What does Organic Growth mean?
a process in which the results of that process are always valuable and functional, even from the beginning of the process, and in which the process allows the growth to adapt to changing conditions, e.g. a tree.

growing slowly and steadily, gaining capacity over time as you learn

Organic Growth is related to incremental and iterative delivery of value. Read as natural, organic growth of value. One increment of value delivery builds on the one before it and supports the one after it.

Concepts and information about Organic Growth
In the introduction of the Primer, list the purpose of this topic and the goal or problem that it addresses

This usage of "organic growth" is a broad concept. It is not limited to the definition used in finance, which contrasts organic growth with growth via mergers and acquisitions. See wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organic_growth

What is growing? In OpenAgile:
 * consultative decision-making is related to organic growth because you're finding the best _at the time_ solution
 * based in natural process - organic
 * planning is determined by the organic processes
 * gardening - plan, but adjust constantly; Trees have incisor cells that cut off the leaves - if they don't cut off, then the branch will die
 * if what you are doing is working, don't change it
 * experience builds
 * capacities as individuals
 * team capacities
 * value delivery
 * OpenAgile itself (processes)
 * we have to consider environment
 * not everything is timely
 * efficient processes
 * cohesive team
 * meeting the needs of changing requirements (what is valuable changes with time)
 * Capacity and value grow together

how does a path of service tie into organic growth?

Deep Concept, Explore with Growth Facilitator training
 * image and wording is good Connections within OpenAgile
 * good value drivers are the fruits of organic growth
 * building on the past - a base of value - value drivers are cumulative
 * adaptability to the environment
 * implies starting small
 * implies it happens "naturally" - natural consequence of process, and component parts - learning as you go
 * value, capacity, learning
 * implies growth takes time -- takes it own time

Aha moments from Team Member training related to organic growth:
 * Pruning; Organic growth does not mean you can’t guide the growth (see Banzai)
 * Organic growth does not mean unconstrained growth
 * The Learning Circle is an infinitive, continuous and homogeneous process. It can also be non-linear and adaptive.
 * Learning Circle = Life Circle
 * Organic growth does not necessarily mean ‘uncontrollable growth”
 * Agile; it’s the living space between the tools
 * The nature of predictability is different between mechanical and organic systems
 * Guidance is a 2-way street. It comes from outside the team and from the team outward
 * You learn from failures more than you learn from successes but its okay to be successful and not learn so fast.
 * The development of the individual effects the development of team, and vice versa

Growth Facilitation - Organic Growth sometimes needs assistance. A team using OpenAgile is delivering value organically. Growth Facilitation helps the team grow in its capacity to deliver value, and helps the delivered value to support the growth of the capacity of the team.

The Learning Circle is a model that is both organic and disciplined.

Quotes
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete." - R. Buckminster Fuller

"A designer is an emerging synthesis of artist, inventor, mechanic, objective economist and evolutionary strategist." - R. Buckminster Fuller

"How often I found where I should be going only by setting out for somewhere else." - R. Buckminster Fuller

"Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Always do your best. What you plant now, you will harvest later." - Og Mandino

"What you get by achieving your goals is to as important as what you become by achieving your goals." - Henry David Thoreau

"Without hard work, nothing grows but weeds." - Gordon B. Hinckley

"Experience is the teacher of all things." - Julius Caesar

Axiom, story or example
A great analogy to help explain this concept is to look at mechanical systems and organic systems. A mechanical system like a car doesn't grow. It is assembled. A car is made up of many components that are critical to its function – an engine, tires, steering wheel. But if you are missing the engine, the car has no value as a car. You can't easily manufacture a car in small stages so that even the first stage has essential car-ness. Instead, a car only makes sense at the end when all the pieces are put together.

On the other hand, if you look at a tree, every year right from the time it is a seedling, it retains its essential tree-ness. Moments after the seed has sprouted, you can call it a tree. As it grows, there is no point in time when it is not a functional tree. Even if a branch breaks off, it is still a tree.

Mechanical systems respond poorly to change. Change can even be catastrophic for a mechanical system. However, organic systems are much more adaptive to change. OpenAgile is a means for humans working together to respond to change in a way that is more like an organic system rather than a mechanical system.

References (links)
Insight from User:JoshW For discussion of organic change, which in some ways is similar to OpenAgile's concept of organic growth, see "TEN PRACTICES FOR GETTING CHANGE RIGHT" in second half of http://www.stevedenning.com/slides/GettingChangeRight-Mar29-2010.pdf

Organic vs. Mechanical Value Delivery
A great analogy to help explain this concept is to look at mechanical systems and organic systems. A mechanical system like a car doesn't grow. It is assembled. A car is made up of many components that are critical to its function – an engine, tires, steering wheel. But if you are missing the engine, the car has no value as a car. You can't easily manufacture a car in small stages so that even the first stage has essential car-ness. Instead, a car only makes sense at the end when all the pieces are put together.



On the other hand, if you look at a tree, every year right from the time it is a seedling, it retains its essential tree-ness. Moments after the seed has sprouted, you can call it a tree. As it grows, there is no point in time when it is not a functional tree. Even if a branch breaks off, it is still a tree.

Mechanical systems respond poorly to change. Change can even be catastrophic for a mechanical system. However, organic systems are much more adaptive to change. OpenAgile is a means for humans working together to respond to change in a way that is more like an organic system rather than a mechanical system.