Volatility,

uncertainty,
complexity and
ambiguity

VUCA is an acronym used to describe or to

reflect on the volatility, uncertainty,
complexity and ambiguity of general
conditions and situations. The U.S. Army
War College introduced the concept of
VUCA to describe the more volatile,
uncertain, complex and ambiguous
multilateral world perceived as resulting
from the end of the Cold War in the early
1990s. The common usage of the term
"VUCA" began in the 1990s and derives
from military vocabulary.[1] It has
subsequently taken root in emerging ideas
in strategic leadership that apply in a wide
range of organizations, from for-profit
corporations[2] to education.[3]

Meaning
The deeper meaning of each element of
VUCA serves to enhance the strategic
significance of VUCA foresight and insight
as well as the behaviour of groups and
individuals in organizations.[4] It discusses
systemic failures[5] and behavioural
failures,[5] which are characteristic of
organisational failure.

V = Volatility. The nature and dynamics

of change, and the nature and speed of
change forces and change catalysts.
U = Uncertainty. The lack of
predictability, the prospects for surprise,
and the sense of awareness and
understanding of issues and events.
C = Complexity. The multiplex of forces,
the confounding of issues, no cause-
 and-effect chain and confusion that
surrounds organization.
A = Ambiguity. The haziness of reality,
the potential for misreads, and the
mixed meanings of conditions; cause-
and-effect confusion.

These elements present the context in

which organizations view their current and
future state. They present boundaries for
planning and policy management. They
come together in ways that either
confound decisions or sharpen the
capacity to look ahead, plan ahead and
move ahead. VUCA sets the stage for
managing and leading.
The particular meaning and relevance of
VUCA often relates to how people view the
conditions under which they make
decisions, plan forward, manage risks,
foster change and solve problems. In
general, the premises of VUCA tend to
shape an organization's capacity to:

1. Anticipate the Issues that Shape

2. Understand the Consequences of
Issues and Actions
3. Appreciate the Interdependence of
Variables
4. Prepare for Alternative Realities and
Challenges
5. Interpret and Address Relevant
Opportunities

For most contemporary organizations –

business, the military, education,
government and others – VUCA is a
practical code for awareness and
readiness. Beyond the simple acronym is a
body of knowledge that deals with learning
models for VUCA preparedness,
anticipation, evolution and intervention.[6]

Themes
Failure in itself is not a catastrophe, but
failure to learn from failure definitely is. It
is not enough to train leaders in core
competencies without identifying the key
factors that inhibit their using the
resilience and adaptability that are vital in
order to distinguish potential leaders from
mediocre managers. Anticipating change
as a result of VUCA is one outcome of
resilient leadership.[5] The capacity of
individuals and organizations to deal with
VUCA can be measured with a number of
engagement themes:

1. Knowledge Management and Sense-

Making
2. Planning and Readiness Considerations
3. Process Management and Resource
Systems
4. Functional Responsiveness and Impact
Models
5. Recovery Systems and Forward
Practices
6. Systemic failures[5]
7. Behavioural failures[5]

At some level, the capacity for VUCA

management and leadership hinges on
enterprise value systems, assumptions
and natural goals. A "prepared and
resolved" enterprise[2] is engaged with a
strategic agenda that is aware of and
empowered by VUCA forces.
The capacity for VUCA leadership in
strategic and operating terms depends on
a well-developed mindset for gauging the
technical, social, political, market and
economic realities of the environment in
which people work. Working with deeper
smarts about the elements of VUCA may
be a driver for survival and sustainability in
an otherwise complicated world.[7]

Psychometrics[8] which measure fluid

intelligence by tracking information
processing when faced with unfamiliar,
dynamic and vague data can predict
cognitive performance in VUCA
environments
Social Categorization

Volatility

Volatility is the "V" component of VUCA.

This refers to the different situational
social-categorization of people due to
specific traits or reactions that stand out
during that particular situation. When
people react/act based on a specific
situation, there is a possibility that the
public categorizes them into a different
group than they were in a previous
situation. These people might respond
differently to individual situations due to
social or environmental cues. The idea
that situational occurrences cause certain
social categorization is known as volatility
and is one of the main aspects of the self-
categorization theory.[9]

Sociologists use volatility to understand

better how stereotypes and social-
categorization is impacted based on the
situation at hand as well as any outside
forces that may lead people to perceive
others differently. Volatility is the changing
dynamic of social-categorization in a set
of environmental situations. The dynamic
can change due to any shift in a situation,
whether it is social, technical, biological or
anything of the like. Studies have been
conducted, but it has proven difficult to
find the specific component that causes
the change in situational social-
categorization.[10]

There are two separate components that

connect people to social identities. The
first social cue is normative fit. This
describes the degree that a person relates
to the stereotypes and norms that others
associate with their specific identity. For
example, when a Hispanic woman is
cleaning the house, most of the time,
people connect gender stereotypes with
this situation, while her ethnicity isn’t
concerned, but when this same woman
eats an enchilada, ethnicity stereotypes
surface while her gender isn’t concerned.[9]
The second social cue is comparative fit.
This is when a specific characteristic or
trait of a person is prominent in certain
situations when compared to other people.
For example, as mentioned by
Bodenhausen and Peery, when there is one
woman in a room full of men.[9] She sticks
out because she is the only one of her
gender compared to many others of the
opposite gender. However, all of the men
are clumped together because they don't
have any specific traits that stands out
among the rest of them. Comparative fit
shows that people categorize others
based on the comparative social context.
In a certain situation, specific
characteristics are made obvious due to
the fact that others around that individual
don’t possess that characteristic. However,
in other situations, this characteristic may
be the norm and wouldn’t be a key
characteristic in the categorization
process.[9]

People can also be less criticizing of the

same person during different situations.
For example, when looking at an African
American man on the street of a low-
income neighborhood and when looking at
the same man inside a school of a high-
income neighborhood, people will be less
judgmental when seeing him in the school.
Nothing else has changed about this man,
other than his location.[9] When individuals
are spotted in certain social contexts, the
basic-level categories are forgotten and
the more partial categories are brought to
light. This really helps to describe the
problems of situational social-
categorization and how stereotypes can
shift the perspectives of those around an
individual.[9]

Uncertainty
Uncertainty in the VUCA framework is
almost just as it sounds: when the
availability or predictability of information
in events is unknown. Uncertainty often
occurs in volatile environments that are
complex in structure involving
unanticipated interactions that are
significant in uncertainty. Uncertainty may
occur in the intention to imply causation or
correlation between the events of a social
perceiver and a target. Situations where
there is either a lack of information to
prove why a perception is in occurrence or
informational availability but lack of
causation are where uncertainty is salient
[9].
The uncertainty component of the
framework serves as a grey area and is
compensated by the use of social
categorization and/or stereotypes. Social
categorization can be described as a
collection of people that have no
interaction but tend to share similar
characteristics with one another. People
have a tendency to engage in social
categorization, especially when there is a
lack of information surrounding the event.
Literature suggests that there are default
categories that tend to be assumed in the
absence of any clear data when referring
to someone's gender or race in the
essence of a discussion [9].
Often times individuals associate the use
of general references (e.g. people, they,
them, a group) with the male gender,
meaning people = male. This instance
often occurs when there is not enough
information to clearly distinguish
someone's gender. For example, when
discussing a written piece of information
most people will assume the author is a
male. If an author’s name is not available
(lack of information) it is difficult to
determine the gender of the author
through the context of whatever was
written. People will automatically label the
author as a male without having any prior
basis of gender, placing the author in a
social category. This social categorization
happens in this example, but people will
also assume someone is a male if the
gender is not known in many other
situations as well [9].

Social categorization occurs in the realm

of not only gender but also race. Default
assumptions can be made, like in gender,
to the race of an individual or a group of
people based on prior known stereotypes.
For example, race-occupation
combinations such as a basketball player
or a golf player will receive race
assumptions. Without any information of
the individual's race, a basketball player
will be assumed to be black and a golf
player will be assumed to be white. This is
based upon stereotypes because of the
majority of race in each sport tend to be
dominated by a single race, but in reality,
there are other races within each sport [9].

Complexity

Complexity is the “C” component of VUCA,

that refers to the interconnectivity and
interdependence of multiple components
in a system. When conducting research,
complexity is a component that scholars
have to keep in mind. The results of a
deliberately controlled environment are
unexpected because of the non-linear
interaction and interdependencies within
different groups and categories.[10]

In a sociological aspect, the VUCA

framework is utilized in research to
understand social perception in the real
world and how that plays into social
categorization as well as stereotypes.
Galen V Bodenhausen and Destiny Peery’s
article Social Categorization and
Stereotyping In vivo: The VUCA Challenge,
focused on researching how social
categories impacted the process of social
cognition and perception.[9] The strategy
used to conduct the research is to
manipulate or isolate a single identity of a
target while keeping all other identities
constant. This method creates clear
results of how a specific identity in a
social category can change one’s
perception of other identities, thus
creating stereotypes.[9]

There are problems with categorizing an

individual’s social identity due to the
complexity of an individual's background.
This research fails to address the
complexity of the real-world and the
results from this highlighted an even great
picture about social categorization and
stereotyping.[9] Complexity adds many
layers of different components to an
individual's identity and creates challenges
for sociologists trying to examine social
categories. [10] In the real world, people are
far more complex compared to a modified
social environment. Individuals identify
with more than one social category, which
opens the door to a deeper discovery
about stereotyping. Results from research
conducted by Bodenhausen reveals that
there are certain identities that are more
dominant than others.[9] Perceivers who
recognize these specific identities latch on
to it and associate their preconceived
notion of such identity and make initial
assumptions about the individuals and
hence stereotypes are created.

On the other hand, perceivers who share

some of the identities with the target
become more open-minded. They also
take into consideration more than one
social identity at the same time and this is
also known as cross-categorization
effects.[11] Some social categories are
embedded in a larger categorical structure,
which makes that subcategory even more
crucial and outstanding to perceivers.
Research on cross-categorization reveals
that different types of categories can be
activated in the mind of the social
perceiver, which causes both positive and
negative effects. A positive outcome is
that perceivers are more open-minded
despite other social stereotypes. They
have more motivation to think deeply
about the target and see past the most
dominant social category. Bodenhausen
also acknowledges that cross-
categorization effects lead to social
invisibility[9]. Some types of cross-over
identities may lessen the noticeability of
other identities, which may cause targets
to be subjected to “intersectional
invisibility,” [12] where neither social
identities have a distinct component and
are overlooked.
Ambiguity

Ambiguity is the “A” component of VUCA.

This refers to when the general meaning of
something is unclear even when an
appropriate amount of information is
provided. Many get confused about the
meaning of ambiguity. It is similar to the
idea of uncertainty but they have different
factors. Uncertainty is when relevant
information is unavailable and unknown,
and ambiguity where relevant information
is available but the overall meaning is still
unknown. Both uncertainty and ambiguity
exist in our culture today. Sociologists use
ambiguity to determine how and why an
answer has been developed. Sociologists
focus on details such as if there was
enough information present, and did the
subject have the full amount of knowledge
necessary to make a decision. and why did
he/she come to their specific answer.[9].

Ambiguity leads to people assuming an

answer, and many times this leads
assuming ones race, gender, and can even
lead to class stereotypes. If a person has
some information but still doesn’t have the
overall answer, the person starts to
assume his/her own answer based on the
relevant information he/she already
possesses. For example, as mentioned by
Bodenhausen we may occasionally
encounter people who are sufficiently
androgynous to make it difficult to
ascertain their gender, and at least one
study suggests that with brief exposure,
androgynous individuals can sometimes
be miscategorized on the basis of gender-
atypical features (very long hair, for a man,
or very short hair, for a woman. Overall,
ambiguity leads to the categorization of
many. For example, it may lead to
assuming ones sexual orientation. Unless
a person is open about their own sexual
orientation, people will automatically
assume that they are heterosexual. But if a
man possesses feminine qualities or a
female possesses masculine qualities
then they might be portrayed as either gay
or lesbian. Ambiguity leads to the
categorization of people without further
important details that could lead to untrue
conclusions.[9].

Sociologists believe that ambiguity can

lead to race stereotypes and
discrimination. In a study done in South
Africa by three sociologists, they had white
citizens of South Africa look at pictures of
racially mixed faces and they had to
decide whether these faces were
European or African. Because these test
subjects were all white they had a hard
problem defining these mixed race faces
as European and deemed them all to be
African. The reason they did this is
because of ambiguity. The information the
was available was the skin tone of the
people in the pictures and the facial
qualities they possessed, with this
information the test subjects had all of
that information available but still did not
no the answer for sure. They overall
assumed because they did not look
exactly like them, then they could not be
European.[9].

See also
 Antifragile: Things That Gain from
Disorder (book)
Cynefin framework
Global Simplicity Index
Goldilocks process
Innovation butterfly

References
1. Stiehm, Judith Hicks and Nicholas W.
Townsend (2002). The U.S. Army War
College: Military Education in a
Democracy . Temple University Press. p. 6.
ISBN 1-56639-960-2.
2. Wolf, Daniel (2007). Prepared and
Resolved: The Strategic Agenda for
Growth, Performance and Change. dsb
Publishing. p. 115. ISBN 0-9791300-0-X.
3. "Fingertip Knowledge" (PDF). Converge
Magazine: 34. June 2007. Archived from
the original (PDF) on 2012-02-27.
Retrieved 2018-06-01.
4. Johansen, Bob (2007). Get There Early:
Sensing the Future to Compete in the
Present. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-
Koehler Publishers, Inc. pp. 51–53.
ISBN 978-1-57675-440-5.
5. Suhayl Abidi, and Manoj Joshi (2015).
The VUCA COMPANY. Mumbai, India:
Jaico Publishing House. ISBN 978-81-
8495-662-7.
6. Satish, Usha and Siegfried Streufert
(June 2006). "Strategic Management
Simulations to Prepare for VUCAD
Terrorism" . Journal of Homeland Security.
Retrieved 2008-10-29.
7. Johansen, Bob (2007). Get There Early:
Sensing the Future to Compete in the
Present. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-
Koehler Publishers, Inc. p. 68. ISBN 978-1-
57675-440-5.
8. "What is psychometrics? | Psychometric
Society" . www.psychometricsociety.org.
Retrieved 2017-07-06.
9. Bodenhausen, Galen V.; Peery, Destiny
(2009-03-01). "Social Categorization and
StereotypingIn vivo: The VUCA
Challenge" . Social and Personality
Psychology Compass. 3 (2): 133–151.
doi:10.1111/j.1751-9004.2009.00167.x .
ISSN 1751-9004 .
10. Schick, Axel; Hobson, Peter R.; Ibisch,
Pierre L. (2017-04-01). "Conservation and
sustainable development in a VUCA world:
the need for a systemic and ecosystem‐
based approach" . Ecosystem Health and
Sustainability. 3 (4).
doi:10.1002/ehs2.1267 . ISSN 2332-
8878 .
11. Vescio, Theresa K; Judd, Charles M;
Kwan, Virginia S.Y. "The crossed-
categorization hypothesis: Evidence of
reductions in the strength of
categorization, but not intergroup bias" .
Journal of Experimental Social
Psychology. 40 (4): 478–496.
doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2003.09.005 .
12. Purdie-Vaughns, Valerie; Eibach,
Richard P. (2008-09-01). "Intersectional
Invisibility: The Distinctive Advantages and
Disadvantages of Multiple Subordinate-
Group Identities" . Sex Roles. 59 (5-6):
377–391. doi:10.1007/s11199-008-9424-
4 . ISSN 0360-0025 .

Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=Volatility,_uncertainty,_complexity_and_ambig
uity&oldid=844362817"

Last edited 19 days ago by an anony…

Content is available under CC BY-SA 3.0 unless

otherwise noted.