Upload
madlyn-mason
View
221
Download
2
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Module VII System Performance
Advanced System Change
Learning Objectives
• Reinforce understanding of system archetypes and leverage points
• Reinforce understanding of three particular system archetypes
• Learn how to change the behavior of these archetypes
• Introduce systems science computer simulation
Review: Archetype
A commonly recurring pattern of system structure and associated behaviors
System Archetypes
• Success to the Successful• Fixes that Fail • Shifting the Burden
What is a Leverage Point?
A place in a complex system that, if changed, will change the overall behavior of the system.
5
Leverage Points in Archetypes
Success to the Successful
• Two or more organizations/methods/agents are competing for a limited resource (like funding or time)
• The allocation of that resource is based on past successes
• But success is only possible if you have resources
• Whichever organization initially succeeds will have more and more resources allocated to it
Success to the Successful
True Leverage Points
What people usually do:• Nothing!
What they should be doing:• Changing paradigms• Changing goals• Creating self-organization• Changing rules• Changing information flows• Change numbers
What We Could Do Instead
Fixes that Fail
• Quick-fix solution is applied to a problem• Resolves the problem in the short term• Unintended consequences of the quick fix
make the problem worse in the long term
Fixes that Fail
Fixes that Fail
Fixes that Fail
True Leverage PointsWhat people usually do:• Try another fix without examining why the previous
one failed
What they should be doing:• Changing paradigms• Changing goals• Changing information flows• Weakening undesirable reinforcing loops
What We Could Do Instead
Shifting the Burden
• Choice between solving a problem by treating the symptoms or applying a fundamental solution (i.e. root cause)
• Symptomatic relief of the problem reduces pressure to apply a fundamental solution
• Over time, side effects of the symptomatic solution undermines the ability to apply the fundamental solution
Shifting the Burden
True Leverage PointsWhat people usually do:• Continue shifting the burden
What they should be doing:• Changing paradigms• Changing goals• Changing information flows• Weakening undesirable reinforcing loops
What We Could Do Instead
Complicated Systems
YIKES
What is a Simulation?
22
Why a Simulation?Causal Loop Diagram• Diagrams help us have new
conversations about the situations we have experienced
• Diagrams help us understand how the interventions we have done or are planning will interact with the system
• Diagrams can help us see how feedback loops influence our work
Simulation• Simulations help us explore
and better understand situations we have no experience with
• Simulations let us experiment in a “virtual system” with interventions that might never have been tried before
• Simulations can help us see out the interactions between feedback loops influence our work
23
Lessons Learned
• Intervening in archetypes can be counterintuitive• We need an understanding of both leverage
points and system structure before we intervene• We may not be able to predict responses to
interventions in very complex systems without turning to computer simulation
• Nevertheless, the methods we have learned are applicable and appropriate in many complex systems
Learning Objectives
• Reinforce understanding of system archetypes and leverage points
• Reinforce understanding of four particular system archetypes
• Learn how to change the behavior of these archetypes
• Introduce systems science computer simulation