Sick people still attending work to get paid Hospital staff unable to get food Remote working and the rise of remote tools Job losses and redundancy School closures A new routine with kids and work Rises in domestic violence Deaths and sickness across the globe
next larger context - a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan." Eliel Saarinen - Finnish-American architect
to analysis that focuses on the way that a system's constituent parts interrelate, how systems work over time and within the context of larger systems. Behaviour results from the effects of reinforcing and balancing processes.
for solving a problem by broadening our thinking and helping us articulate problems in new and different ways. Summary • A framework and way of thinking to make sense out of an organization's complexities, since all things are systems.
websites for social housing • Usability testing and redesign a website for a housing association offering social housing • If a housing associations website doesn’t work, it impacts the local council • Residents start phoning or visiting council offices to report issues with their social housing • We had the potential to create a variety of emergent behaviours for many actors in that system, if that website didn’t work • Some councils wouldn’t invite a housing association to build homes, if the website wasn’t usable enough - to save them from more work handling extra resident enquiries!
solution, oftentimes it’s better to find areas where an incremental change will lead to significant renovation in the system. The smallest nudge for the biggest effect. Fast Company - https://www.fastcompany.com/90112320/design-thinking-needs-to-think-bigger Leverage Points Leverage points are often unintuitive
to fix everything • “I don’t like being called a resident, it makes me sound like I’m a patient at an asylum” • Changing the terminology to something that resonated with the people living in the social housing had a bigger effect than some of the other content being considered
for diagnosing complex or long-term problems. • Can help you identify the systemic structures that are responsible “Patterns of behaviour of a system” • Enable you to spot issues with what you are designing
the commons “This resource belongs to me, and is too big to ever run out” Common resources inevitably get exploited by agents wanting to maximize their individual gain from the shared resource Fishing industry Race to the bottom “Speed and disposability are the most important factors” Players compete to be the lowest common denominator in the system Budget airlines Addiction “Dependancy offers some convenience for you” When agents become addicted to external forces to maintain the system Proprietary printer inks and coffee pods Success to the successful “Because that department is doing well, they must be good and others are not” The more success you get the easier it is to get more success and the harder it is for others to get access to success Fast fashion Many more archetypes here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_archetype
the fittest customers “Everyone is capable of reaching the heights of fitness” “We want to reward those that put in the extra hours of activity and really push themselves” Systems thinking warning signs: Success to the successful Archetype spotted:
solution is more buses “We know that if we can get X more buses and bus routes, that gets Y number of cars off the roads” Systems thinking warning signs: Fixes that fail Growth and underinvestment Archetype spotted:
easy way out often leads back in” • Systems mapping • Contextual and deep research • Work out where the boundaries are • Looking for systems archetypes or “systems traps” Food systems map that shows how multiple subsystems interact (Source: adapted from the Nourish initiative n.d.)
a solution Seek to understand first • Be happy to sit with the ambiguity • Focus on your discoveries • Separate symptoms of a problem from the cause • Uncover levers and interventions • Stay curious!
tiny, non-obvious levers It’s not always about the big changes • Where are the feedback loops? • Identify the nodes and parts • Identify the relationships • Look at the non-obvious parts of a system that you might normally ignore • What minor changes can you make?
you're approaching the system from This affects the type of intervention or change you design • What is your sphere of influence? • Microscopic to planet level • How much influence do you have at this level? • What can you change? • Can you change level to increase how much you can change the system?
in the system The difference in time between the action and the desired outcome (or undesirable!) • What you implement now won’t have an effect for a while • Anticipate what can happen in between your change and the effect - what can change? • With delays between relationships in a system, you can misinterpret the impacts, outcomes, or causes of an event
possible unintended consequences Good intentions don’t always lead to a good outcome • Pre-empt what could possibly go wrong • What are the knock on effects of that change? • Draw a causal loop diagram • Storyboard or model what could happen Residents homes Tenants homes
for delays in the system 4. Understand the level you're approaching the system from 3. Look for the tiny, non-obvious levers 2. Don’t jump to a solution 1. Embrace complexity A systemic code of conduct