Summary of slides from the course Organizing for Grand Challenges taught during the study (International) Business Administration at Erasmus University. 3d year.
Session 1: Introduction to the course & Grand Challenges
What are the big questions guiding this course?
- Why does it seem so hard to tackle grand challenges?
- What makes grand challenges so complex?
- What is the role of innovation for tackling grand challenges?
- How does innovation for impact look like?
- How do such innovations differ from Business innovations?
- What are possibilities and limits of innovations to tackle grand challenges?
Grand Challenges
Big global issues → poverty, climate change, etc
Where does the term come from?
It was pointed by German mathematician, David Hilbert → it was his attempt to
basically find allies to solve 23 grand challenges by solving them many
breakthroughs would happen.
What can Management research really contribute?
- Help define and understand the nature and complexity of grand challenges
- Provide analytical insights on innovation to tackle grand challenges.
Definition:
Grand Challenges are formulations of global problems that can be plausibly
addressed through coordinated and collaborative effort (George et al. 2016).
What are the 3 characteristics of grand challenges according to Ferraro et al, 2015?
1. Uncertain
“Second, grand challenges confront organizations with radical uncertainty, by
which we mean that actors cannot define the possible future states of the
world, and therefore cannot forecast the consequences of their present
actions, or whether future others will appreciate them.”
- Grand Challenges are highly uncertain and the problem cannot be
defined from the start as it will develop and change over time.
Example: Covid-19 developments from a disease → epidemic →
pandemic.
Ferraro et al., 2015: 364
2. Complex
“First, grand challenges are complex, entailing many interactions and
associations, emergent understandings, and nonlinear dynamics.”
, - Problem is made up of many components that constantly influence
each other.
- Nonlinear dynamics mean that these influences are often unpredictable
and appear random
→ Leading to vicious feedback loops.
Example: the ‘law of unintended consequences’ or the ‘Cobra Effect’.
Internet → The cobra effect is a phenomenon that occurs when a
policy intended to solve a problem actually makes it worse or even
creates an entirely new problem. The cobra effect can also be said to
be when people are incentivized to make the problem worse, usually
by a government.
Ferraro et al., 2015: 364
3. Evaluative
“And third, grand challenges are evaluative, cutting across jurisdictional
boundaries, implicating multiple criteria of worth, and revealing new concerns
even as they are being tackled.”
- Grand Challenges cut across social, economic and environmental
domains, affecting many different sectors.
- Many different stakeholders are involved that have different
understandings and therefore approaches to the problem.
Ferraro et al., 2015: 364
Grand challenges as cutting across social, environmental and economic
issues
Example: Global displacement
- Social issue: People in need of protection and medical assistance
- Economic issue: Financial burden on host country’s economy
- Environmental issue: Overuse of scare natural resources around
refugee camps.
Example Climate Change: 3 different understandings
- ‘Profligacy’ story (extravagant consumption and production patterns of
the global North as causes of climate change).
- ‘Hierarchy’ story (depicts climate change as a “tragedy of the global
commons” attributable to the lack of global governance and planning).
- ‘Individualistic’ story (considers climate change as a minor problem,
can be solved).
Ferraro et al., 2015: 367
, Understanding Grand Challenges
1. Simple problems (solving an equation, etc) → require ‘elegant’ solutions
2. Grand challenges (reducing CO2 emissions, land degradation, etc)→ require
complex problem-solving
“By comparison, Simon (1996, p. 140) described going to the moon as “a simple task
indeed, compared with some others we have set for ourselves, such as creating a
humane society or a peaceful world.” (Ferraro et al, 2015: 382)
“God gave physics the easy problems” (bernstein et al, 2000)
Wicked problems → unsolvable
- There is no clear formulation
- No stopping rule
- Unique
- Every problem is a symptom of another
Rittel & Webber use the term ‘wicked’ in a meaning akin to that of ‘vicious’ (like a
circle) (Rittel & Webber, 1973: 136)
The law of unintended consequences… or the Cobra Effect.
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