Ecosystem
Building
Si Guide Series
Overview
Systems change is about changing the structure of a complex organization so as to
realize the emergence of new overall functions and capacities. This is an endeavor
to shape a new level of alignment across a system; to realize a new pattern of
cooperation amongst actors and a higher level of overall functionality. As such the
job of the systems builder is to develop innovation ecosystems that align diverse
actors in new synergistic ways. This is not an easy endeavor but one that is now
made possible by new ways of organizing through information-based networks.
In this guide, we give an overview to the key aspects we need to consider in the
process of building collaborative networks of diverse actors. We expand upon the
primary considerations in developing networked organizations, new wholistic value
models, scaling dynamics, and impact assessments relevant for whole systems
change. The guide should be of relevance for anyone attempting to develop
collaborative ecosystems for transformative change.
Systems Thinking Systems Awareness Systems Theory Complexity Theory Adaptive Systems
System Inquiry Systems Modeling Mapping Actor Mapping Leverage Points
Where am I?
This paper forms part of
our series of 20 guides
covering all things systems
innovation. Transition Design Transition Models Furtures & Naratives System Gardening Co-Design
+++
Ecosystem Building Networks Value Network Scaling Change Systemic Evaluation
Guide Contents
Why Ecosystem Systems Key Aspect of Growing
Approaches Entrepreneur Ecosystems Networks
We look at what exactly we We talk about the role We look at the key Here we outline the key
mean by “ecosystem” of the systems aspects that constitute considerations in growing
approaches and why we entrepreneur in an innovation an ecosystem for systems
take this approach developing ecosystems ecosystem innovation
Why
Ecosystems
Approaches?
Overview
No one organization can realize systems change; it takes
the coordinated effort of many diverse actors. Systems
change is about mobilizing whole networks of diverse
actors to create new patterns of organization. In this
context, the existing industrial-age institutional
structures through which we coordinate human activity
and mobilize resources are not designed for the
complexity of today's challenges.
Instead, open organizations that can work with
complexity to connect and coordinate diverse actors in
synergistic ways are needed to realize the emergence of
the system-level functions required for transformation.
We call these networks of diverse actors working
together through varying types of relationships
“ecosystems".
Contribution
Solution Contribution
Solution
Contribution Contribution
Solution Solution
Contribution
Contribution
Solution
Solution
Contribution
From Projects & Solutionism... To Innovation Ecosystems
Innovation Ecosystems
With systems-level innovation, the scale of the complex
systems we are working to change is much greater than that
of any one organization. Open and collaborative networks
are now emerging as a new way to organize work at a larger
scale, realize more complex higher-level functions, and
create collective change. The process through which
complex systems change is decentralized, massively parallel,
and highly complex.
As an illustration, we can think about the system-level
innovation of going from the idea of electricity to its mass
adoption through large-scale power transmission. Such a
systems-level energy transition requires a mass of actors
working within a loosely coupled set of decentralized
connections. The idea of an "innovation ecosystem" helps us
to structure our thinking about this. As systems builders, we
are attempting to create these kinds of innovation
ecosystems as they are the only thing that will have the
capacity to shift the system to a new equilibrium.
Energy System
Only an ecosystem can
change this
Parts
One organization
can change this
New Configurations
Our focus is too often on growing organizations, on
implementing more programs, delivering more products or
attracting more money when none of these equate to
systemic impact, and may well detract from it. The job of the
system innovator is not to grow another organization or
program, but to actually change systems through innovation.
Innovation is about connecting diverse elements in new
ways.
When this is taken to the system level it means connecting
people and organizations in new configurations to realize
new functional capabilities that can evolve to meet the
challenges that exist on the macro-level. An innovation
ecosystem is a set of players, knowledge, processes,
connections, and resources that make innovation happen
through a combination of parallel, synergistic and
decentralized activities.
Economies of Scale Economies of Connections
Value is created by getting more Value is created through the
efficient at producing parts synergistic organization between parts,
through standardization to achieve via connectivity, data and insight.
mass production
Insight from Marc Ventresca
“The elements of new opportunities, the elements of new
combinations are around, they are available to us it just
takes pulling them together in new and different kinds of
ways, and that skill is a system building skill”
Networked Organizations
Since the massive proliferation of connectivity recently
experienced, we now find ourselves organized into boxes
and silos, which are hugely mismatched with their operating
environment. In a world of connectivity and networks,
creating more boxes and boundaries is of limited use; what
is needed is for us to work with this connectivity and use it
to connect outside and between traditional organizations in
new ways.
New kinds of organizations that look more like multi-cellular
organisms are needed, rather than the single-cellular
organisms that we inhabit today. As June Holley says:
“Systems change when new networks take the place of the
old.” Responding to the challenges at hand is not about
creating another organization or program; value creation
comes from the assembly of heterogeneous elements into
new network configurations, with new incentives for
alignment, new values, and new ways of communicating and
organizing based on new methods and technologies.
Systems
Entreprenure
What is What is Systems
Entrepreneurship? Entrepreneurship?
The value creating The creation of new functional
activity of introducing value networks through the
new products or services integration & alignment of the
to a market parts across a system
Systems Entrepreneur
Systems building is about generating momentum by creating
and capturing the energy of key people within a system and
creating the context for organizing them in new productive
constellations. Systems builders enable change by creating
the appropriate conditions for the actors to change their
overall ways of operating, in ways that are intelligible to
them, that they see the value in, at their pace, and in a way
that utilizes their resources to the maximum.
To do this we have to illustrate and communicate effectively
what is the higher-level value to the whole ecosystem that
could be realized by the actors aligning in new ways; we have
to bring them together and illustrate this. What can they not
do on their own that we could do together? What are the
desired outcomes? What is the function required to achieve
this? How could we align to achieve new outcomes? What
are the new value flows that would need to be in place to
incentivize those higher-level outcomes? These are the
questions we should be asking ourselves as systems builders.
Insight from Geneva Global
"A systems entrepreneur is a person or organization that
facilitates a change to an entire ecosystem by addressing
and incorporating all the components and actors required
to move the needle on a particular social issue.”
++ +
+ + Key
Dimentions
Building Ecosystems
Key considerations in an ecosystem-building initiative
include Searching for that higher-level outcome that is
currently dysfunctional or where there is potential for
new benefits from alignment. Consider how the
ecosystem as a whole will create value and grow the
overall pie and how the participants may share in that.
Think about how we might create a service to enable
members to work together in an overall function.
We need to start to identify the types of actors with
whom we need to work, the purpose of the
ecosystem, the thematic areas they will work around,
and the activities they will do in co-learning and co-
creating around the challenge
Who are the actros What are the activity
who willl be part of
the ecosystem? Tracks?
What is the
purpose of this
ecosystem?
What is the supporting
platform?
What are the factors
effecting the
challenge?
What is the purpose
of this ecosystem?
To start we need to consider what the
purpose of the ecosystem is, i.e. why are
you creating it? Following on from this we
want to give an account of the story we
are going to tell about the ecosystem and
its value. This is an important aspect as it
will set the framing for everything that
follows.
What are the factors
affecting the challenge?
Now we need to think about the “factors"
affecting this dynamic, and the different
challenges contributing to the overall wicked
problem that we wish the ecosystem to
address. This will create the thematic areas that
the ecosystem will work around. Here we can
do a collective challenge mapping activity to
have potencial participants contribute to the
challenges the ecosystem should be working
around and would be relevent for them.
Who are the actors we
need to bring together?
Now we need to consider the“actors". these
are the different groups of people and
organzations we may engage in our ecosystem.
We also need to think about how to talk to
them in a way that is relevent to them and will
support them seeing value in being part of the
network
This looks a bit
Key Nice ideas, this
would be really
strange to me
useful for us
Questions
Not sure about this,
might be useful
Perspective
How does this person
see the situation? Too idealistic, don’t
think it will work
Challenge of
Motivations Developing
What are their motivations, Collaborative
both intrinsic and extrinsic?
Networks
Engagement I like the look
of this
In what way do you think this
person could be involved? Can’t see how it
would help us
Looks like it
might compete
Messaging with our offering
What is the right messaging to
talk to this person effectively?
What are the Activity
Tracks?
Now we want to consider the general set of
activity types the members of the ecosystem will
engage in to co-learn and co-create around the
challenge. We want to structure the specific
activities into general programs that help the
actors move forward on building capacities. For
example, these programs might be organized
around developing research, learning,
connecting actors, enabling them to collaborate
on challenges, etc.
What is the supporting
platform?
Finally we need to think about the platform we
will use to organize and communicate. Along
with this define the value model, how we assess
the ecosystems development and the shared
knowledge base and set of tools needed by
members.
Growing a
Network
Overview
Now we want to consider what is needed to
realize and scale this new level of organization.
Without the right infrastructure in place, we will
likely hit blockages and the network may become
chaotic over time due to misalignment.
Assessment Value Network
A framework for how we asses
Define types of value
the development of the
exchange, channels and
ecosystem and make investments
participants
Ecosystem
Growing
Key Aspects of Growing
an Ecosystem for
System Innovation
Collaborative Scaling
Platform Dynamic
Platforms for connecting, Define the core growth
coordination and organizing dynamics
activities
Scaling
Scale is a key issue of consideration here. How do we get
from small isolated “pockets of the future” to the future we
want to see? Creating an ecosystem is not about creating
organizations. It is rather about creating new connections
and developing and scaling preexisting communities. Scaling
systems change is different because we are working with
connectivity and patterns to reorganize preexisting resources
rather than creating and scaling production.
We are not trying to grow our organization, program, or
solutions by producing more; we scale new patterns through
increasing connectivity. We increase connectivity by
understanding what makes people want to connect to this
pattern and synchronize their behavior to realize the
emergence of the new organization. As Rachel Sinha notes,
change happens by finding “people who have the energy to
change the system, bring them together, empower and
enable them to create change.”
Platforms
Developing an underlying platform and using
information technology effectively is key to scaling.
Open networks powered by information technology
can connect and enable people to share and exchange
value within large peer networks. The proliferation of
telecommunication and automated algorithmic
coordination is now making such large-scale networks
possible.
This technology radically drops transaction costs and
organizational costs, allowing us to shift production
outside of the traditional closed organization and
create these new larger networks at a very low cost.
Understanding and harnessing the potential of this
technology is key to learning how to orchestrate large
ecosystems of actors in the agile and innovative ways
required to respond to some of today's most complex
challenges effectively.
New Value Models
The formation of a functional ecosystem involves the
creation of new channels and pathways through which value
is channeled to new ends. Not only this but it involves a
broadening in the spectrum of values that are included.
Systems innovation is not about rearranging the deck chairs,
but reorganizing systems structure and this requires
significantly altering how value is defined, how that value is
exchanged and between whom. To realize system change,
new values have to be brought into the patterns that
incentivize and coordinate us.
This is done not via the existing institutions that are
designed to execute on the old values but communities of
individuals that are passionate about new values. As such,
the focus of systems and social innovation should be on
developing communities instead of more “organizations".
What is needed are systems based upon new values and
communities are the vehicles through which new values are
brought into the world.
Creating New Value Networks
Responding successfully to the sustainability crisis involves
incorporating a new set of values into our economies - it
involves accounting for the whole and not just the parts.
We call this full cost accounting, networks that take
account of multiple social, economic, and environmental
factors are now required. This requires the formation of
new business models and new value networks.
These value networks have to extend their business model
beyond those of today to be multi-valued networks.
Systems change is a regenerative process and this
regeneration happens by enabling new flows of value
through the whole system. The process is realized when
networks become operationalized with new value streams
flowing through them that enable new higher-level
functional responses to the challenges that the old
organizations could not respond to.
Version 2.
A Systems Innovation Publication
[Link]
Reference and Resources
New Economy Coalition (2013). (52) Excerpt from Otto Scharmer - From Ego-System to Ecosystem Economies. YouTube. Available at:
[Link] [Accessed 26 Aug. 2020].
TEDx Talks (2011). TEDxOxbridge - Marc Ventresca - Don’t Be an Entrepreneur, Build Systems. YouTube. Available at:
[Link] [Accessed 5 Oct. 2020].
Infrastructure for impact, the work of system building | Marc Ventresca | TEDxOxbridge. (2015). Retrieved from
[Link]
BUILDING ECOSYSTEMS FOR SYSTEMS CHANGE How do we collaborate to create ecosystems that support innovation for systems
change? A reflection on the Unusual Suspects Festival 2014: Session 22 Co-hosted by Social Innovation Generation (SiG) National and
Oxfam. (n.d.). [online] Available at: [Link]
building_ecosystems_for_systems_change_public.pdf.
System Changers (2014). Anna Birney, The Craft Of Collaboration. YouTube. Available at: [Link]
v=Pl3oFVhx3FY [Accessed 26 Aug. 2020].
Nordic FUTURE - Live Now (2017). Indy Johar - Nordic FUTURE - The Dark Matter Problem of Massive Change. YouTube. Available at:
[Link] [Accessed 26 Aug. 2020].
Ashoka (2018). From Social Entrepreneurs to Systems Change Leaders - Daniela Papi-Thornton | Ashoka U Big Idea Talk. YouTube.
Available at: [Link] [Accessed 5 Oct. 2020].
