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Cynefin framework

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Decision-making framework

The Cynefin framework

The Cynefin framework (/kəˈnɛvɪn/ kuh-NEV-in)[1] is a conceptual framework used to aid decision-making.[2] Created in 1999 by Dave Snowden when he worked for IBM Global Services, it has been described as a "sense-making device".[3][4] Cynefin is a Welsh word for 'habitat'.[5]

Cynefin offers five decision-making contexts or "domains"—clear (also known as simple or obvious), complicated, complex, chaotic, and confusion (or disorder)—that help managers to identify how they perceive situations and make sense of their own and other people's behaviour."}},"i":0}}]}'>[a] The framework draws on research into systems theory, complexity theory, network theory and learning theories.[6]

Name<br>[edit]

The idea of the Cynefin framework is that it offers decision-makers a "sense of place" from which to view their perceptions.[7] Cynefin is a Welsh word meaning 'habitat', 'haunt', 'acquainted', 'familiar'. Snowden uses the term to refer to the idea that we all have connections, such as tribal, religious and geographical, of which we may not be aware.[8][5] It has been compared to the Māori word tūrangawaewae, meaning a place to stand, or the "ground and place which is your heritage and that you come from".[9]

In 2021, the Welsh government introduced the original Welsh concept of Cynefin as a core principle in the school curriculum.[10] In this context Cynefin extends beyond a physical or geographical place and includes historic, cultural and social dimensions that have shaped and continue to shape the community which inhabits a place.[11] The concept is intended to "help pupils explore, make connections and develop understanding of themselves within a modern, diverse and inclusive society. This cynefin is not simply local but provides a foundation for a national and international citizenship’’.[10]

History<br>[edit]

Snowden, then of IBM Global Services, began work on a Cynefin model in 1999 to help manage intellectual capital within the company.[3]{{cite book|last1=Snowden|first1=Dave|editor1-last=Despres|editor1-first=Charles|editor2-last=Chauvel|editor2-first=Daniele|title=Knowledge Horizons|date=2000|publisher=Butterworth–Heinemann|location=Boston|at=[https://books.google.com/books?id=evngN1vTO-8C&pg=PA239 239]|chapter=The Social Ecology of Knowledge Management}}Also see Snowden, Dave. [http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.196.3058&rep=rep1&type=pdf \"Cynefin, A Sense of Time and Place: an Ecological Approach to Sense Making and Learning in Formal and Informal Communities\"]. citeseerx.ist.psu.edu."}},"i":0}}]}'>[b]Snowden, Dave; Pauleen, David J.; Jansen van Vuuren, Sally (2016). \"Knowledge Management and the Individual: It's Nothing Personal\", in David J. Pauleen and Gorman, G. E. (eds.). ''Personal Knowledge Management''. Abingdon: Routledge 2011, 116."}},"i":0}}]}'>[c] He continued developing it as European director of IBM's Institute of Knowledge Management,[15] and later as founder and director of the IBM Cynefin Centre for Organizational Complexity, established in 2002.[16] Cynthia Kurtz, an IBM researcher, and Snowden described the framework in detail the following year in a paper, "The new dynamics of strategy: Sense-making in a complex and complicated world", published in IBM Systems Journal.[4][17][18]

The domain names have changed over the years. Kurtz & Snowden (2003) called them known, knowable, complex, and chaotic. Snowden & Boone (2007) changed known and knowable to simple and complicated. From 2014 Snowden used obvious in place of simple, and as of 2015 is using the term clear.[19]

The Cynefin Centre—a network of members and partners from industry, government and academia—began operating independently of IBM in 2004.[20] In 2007 Snowden and Mary E. Boone described the Cynefin framework in the Harvard Business Review.[2] Their paper, "A Leader's Framework for Decision Making", won them an "Outstanding Practitioner-Oriented Publication in OB" award from the Academy of Management's Organizational Behavior division.[21]

Domains<br>[edit]

Cynefin offers five decision-making contexts or "domains": clear, complicated, complex, chaotic, and a centre of confusion.[d] The domains on the right, clear and complicated, are "ordered": cause and effect are known or can be discovered. The domains on the left, complex and chaotic, are "unordered": cause and effect can be deduced only with hindsight or not at all.[22]

Clear<br>[edit]

In the clear domain there are tight constraints, no degrees of freedom, and best practice can be used to sense, categorize and respond

The clear domain represents the "known knowns". This means that there are...