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Equifinality - Different Paths to the Same Goal |
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Katz and Kahn remind us of an important principle of open systems, which applies to every single social organization ever to exist, be it an army or a commercial enterprise. It was first proposed by Ludwig Von Bertallanfy, in 1940, and is termed "equifinality". According to this principle, an organization can reach the same outcome or result from different initial conditions, and by a variety of paths. In essence, there is no one best way to do anything.
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This contradicts the Taylorist-inspired mantra of "Great minds think alike", and has been proven correct, time and again, the world over. It also calls into question the value of "Benchmarking" and also the practice of developing hard-set "best practices" that are never reviewed, amended and improved upon. Since change is the only constant, we must fully devote ourselves to continuous improvement. Luckily, there are many more than one best way to improve our organizations.
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Katz, Daniel., Kahn, Robert L. "Organizations and the System Concept" in Jay Shafritz and Steven Ott (eds.), Classics of Organization Theory. Dorsey Publishing. Homewood: Ill. 1987.
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