On the other axis is a scale of certainty from close to to far from. Outputs What has been produced. This section categorizes mapping tools under brainstorming, hypothesizing, and simulating. We are aiming to make sustained change at a broad scale. Keywords: Complex adaptive systems, Complexity, Methods, Systems thinking, Theory, Tools. However, most mapping and visualizing methods listed above are far superior in terms of mapping actual system structures and dynamics. What stands out to me as critical in order to make a positive impact, is the ability to develop your own individual agency and actions. The team use the example from the Net Zero Strategy on electric vehicles as a guide for their own causal loop diagram (See figure 9). T here is a full array of systems thinking tools that you can think of in the same way as a painter views colors many shades can be created out of three primary colors, but having a full range of ready made colors makes painting much easier. Palgrave. Once drawn up, a ToC map can provide an ongoing point of reference as the programme is being implemented. Connecting the Dots: Systems Practice and Political Economy. It also offers strategies and resources to support your entire team in applying a systems thinking approach to TPP work. When considering the implementation of effective monitoring and evaluation, the ROAMEF policy cycle is detailed in section 3 of the HM Treasury Green Book. It can reveal underlying trends and behaviours in the system. The project team have created a causal loop diagram of the relevant system their issue sits within. A circle is drawn and variables are listed on the outside. Sterman, J. Within this policy design stage, the tools are mapped to 2 systems thinking principles: Principle 1: identify the key issues and establish a collaborating community with a shared goal and Principle 2: reach a shared understanding of the problem. The fundamental principle of this shift is that everything is interconnected. Springer-Verlag, London. Avison, D. E, Golder, P. A, Shah, H. U. Systems thinking is the process of understanding how things influence one another within a whole. Thus use a minus () when an increase in one factor causes another factor to decrease or likewise, a decrease in one factor causes another factor to increase. This toolkit includes our Systems Tools Matrix to help determine which tool would be of most use, and also includes a complete compilation of our guides to system mapping: A Case Study of Milwaukees Civic Response Team, A Practitioners Guide to Supporting Market Systems Change toward Inclusion and Equity, A Case Study of Milwaukees COVID-19 Civic Response Team. Often used in social network analysis. (Adapted from Morgan, G. (1997) Imaginization: New Mindsets for Seeing, Organizing and Managing, San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler). #18. KRISTEL VAN AEL Partner at Namahn, associate professor at the University of Antwerp Alex Ryan VP of Systems Innovation and Program Director of MaRS Solutions Lab peter jones Co-founder and frequent co-chair of the RSD Symposium, Formalize relationships with new community partners. Your brain is a complex problem-solving machine. It views a problem as a collection of components that interact and change in response to different interventions. They are accumulations. b. For a step-by-step guide on systems change evaluation, refer to the comprehensive A Practical Guide to Evaluating Systems Change in a Human Services Systems Context. #34. Plan and build a comprehensive referral system. We are not really sure we understand the problem, let alone the solution. The first is the loop/path, which starts with (the X factor), which (continue with the story of the loop or path in the map that is particularly key). 20, 293-314. Chelsea Green Publishing, White River Junction. Consider those with informal power as well as those with formal power. In the central circle identify the elements of the system, or the factors under control or authority of the decision-maker, for example your policy areas narrative and vision, and your personal motivations to focus on your work. This type of model is often used to re-create and/or predict how micro-scale behavior results in macro-scale behavior. We use the term collaborating community in both this document and The Systems Thinking Journey to describe the group of stakeholders from across the system whose diverse perspectives should be included in your project wherever possible. The toolkit is a foundational resource intended to help grantees understand what systems thinking is and why it should guide implementation and evaluation of every TPP program. Likewise analysing the system to create a narrative of why it produces the outcomes that it does (Tool 7). It builds understanding on what can be controlled or influenced in your system and what constrains your options or actions. Through the evaluative process, the employment of CSH questions prompts ways to improve the stakeholdings associated with stakeholder groups both involved and affected by the dynamics of the situation. Systems thinking is a way of looking at the world and the underlying connections, patterns, and ideas that shape it. Tony OConnor, Head of the Government Operational Research Service. Tamara Finkelstein, Head of the Government Policy Profession. Stakeholder here means anyone who has a view of the system. Professor Sir Ian Diamond, National Statistician. They articulate how their intervention will impact other policy teams and stakeholders in the system. I can probably apply other approaches to this problem. Systems Thinking Practice: Starting Out . The team examine the links across different policy areas and consider how they affect each other, identifying causes and effects within the system. #38. Soft Systems Methodology: Conceptual Model Building and its Contribution. The team identify new challenges to achieving their goal that may need work-arounds or mitigations, as well as new ideas for where they can build on enabling forces to drive impactful change. When data and rules are assigned to them, simulations can be run to explore possible interventions, future scenarios, counterfactual pasts, or to test your understanding of the system. Introduction The following are a selection of methods that adopt a systems thinking approach. Continue learning about systems thinking. Taking a step back to assess a proposed service or policy approach can help to surface new ideas and act as a stress test for ideas. We encourage readers of the toolkit to also read the Systems Thinking Case Study Bank which gathers testimonials of civil servants from a diverse range of backgrounds and specialisms. Sir Patrick Vallance, Government Chief Scientific Adviser. It forms out of environmental factors and biological elements. You may decide to group stakeholders, for example other government departments, or you may decide to break down into greater detail, for example Defra, Cabinet Office, or even individuals like Director of GO-Science. Most people tend to think linearlyX cause leads to Y effect. To overcome this perceived inaccessibility we have taken a pragmatic approach to choosing which systems thinking tools have been chosen for inclusion in the toolkit, and in our instructions for how to use each tool. The T on the top of the arrow can be thought of as a tap, and it is there to remind you that the flows can be changed, in other words births and deaths can go up or down. Conceptually, people often find emergence a bit tricky to get their head around, but when you get it, your brain starts to form emergent outcomes from the disparate and often odd things you encounter in the world. Ackermann, F, Eden, C. (2014). They also have a Guide to system mapping blog series. This is demonstrated in the Net Zero Strategy systems map, where the relevant system is captured by showing qualitative factors, such as the publics concern for the environment, alongside quantitative factors, such as the cost of charging infrastructure. Eden, C. & Ackermann, F. (2001). Here we have suggested using key system performance questions to monitor and evaluate your intervention, but this is also a useful tool to bring in early in your work as you consider different interventions, thus we suggest you cycle between this and the other policy design stages to ensure your goals, planned interventions and monitoring and evaluating strategy align and are coherent. Thinking in Systems. The design of a model is typically underpinned by theory or data about how agents behave in the system. Deliver key legislation (leads to 5), Main outputs - capabilities achieved/ barriers overcome, 4. Sage Publications, London. Rahmandad, H., Oliva, R. & Osgood, N.D. (2015). What are their views of the problem?c. It may be your team, but you may also choose to map out the system from another perspective, for example a child, a service-user et cetera. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other. The stocks are boxes which are labelled with what they represent and should have a unit associated with them, for example in figure 14 it is population size (N) where N is the number of individual organisms in a population. Systems thinking (Waters Foundation, 2018) is an approach that concerns an understanding of a system by examining individual components and their linkages and interactions that comprise the entirety of that defined system. Simulations are particularly valuable for complex systems when it is hard to picture what a future outcome could be. A simple example of emergence is a snowflake. A rich picture - see the rich picture template. We want to describe events causally-our managers are too busy because we're trying to ship our current project-but few events occur in a vacuum. It can be used on a map that you have created or one you have inherited. These prompts help you identify if your work is complex and therefore would especially benefit from a systems thinking approach. Viable systems model (VSM): Developed by operations researcher Stafford Beer, VSM models the organizational structure on any autonomous system capable of adapting itself to a changing environment. From a systems perspective, we know that larger things emerge from smaller parts: emergence is the natural outcome of things coming together. The map can be expanded by adding the factors that are weighed for each step. Distinct from stakeholder analysis, actor mapping helps to depict the many relationships between stakeholder to explore relational dynamics in a system. #71. How you involve others also depends on whether the mapping process is an outcome in itself, with an aim of aligning understanding of the system across multiple stakeholders, or whether it is the final product that is most important. Various versions of theory of change maps are already used across government. Routledge. Bathtub: The bathtub analogy is a simple way of describing any stock and flow system. There are some examples of visualisation tools on the COVID-19 dashboard which uses interactive maps and graphs to show key measures of the system. It provides definitions of key terms, tips for reading and interpreting diagrams of systems, examples of how system maps can be used, and a list of resources for more information and learning. In this tool, you will analyse your system to look for areas of leverage and possible areas for interventions. When it comes to systems thinking, the goal is synthesis, as opposed to analysis, which is the dissection of complexity into manageable components. Below are the twelve most common system structures or patterns. Thus you would use a plus (+) sign when one factor increasing causes the next variable to also increase, or alternatively, one variable decreasing causes the other variable to decrease. It is a helpful and accessible approach to complex problems as it considers the forces and dynamics within the system, rather than relying on a simple linear cause and effect process. Key questions to test your assumptions, assess the impact of your work, the degree to which your actions are producing intended results and why or why not. An increase in X decreases Y, which decreases X. The team sense-check their assumptions with others in the system to ensure that they are not repeating past mistakes or missing vital data. Therefore, it is important to not overestimate the importance of a part of the system because of an abundance of available data or likewise underestimate the importance of a part of the system due to a lack of data. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". The problem is well understood. Understanding the relationship between "Events . Time is usually compressed so that participants can see the long-term consequences of their actions. Darkness: The idea that no complex system can be completely known, because each human has limited perceptions. Isaksen, S.G., Dorval, K.B., Treffinger, D.J. A list of enablers and blockers that illuminate the key forces at work in your system. We designed them to help individuals and organizations level up their change making abilities for a positive, regenerative, and circular economy. Springer. Finally, check your theory of change has a compelling narrative that explains the underlying rationale, hypotheses or assumptions linking one step to the next that you can share with your collaborating community. All TPP programsregardless of their tier or focussupport the health and well-being of adolescents. When using data sets in a model of a system to try to understand system behaviours it is essential that data quality and data uncertainty is effectively communicated. Discuss and write down the problem such as the current purpose or outcome of your system that is undesirable. Understanding the enablers and inhibitors (Tool 5) and mapping the causes and effects in a causal loop diagram (Tool 6) will all significantly help in understanding the system to inform reaching a shared understanding of the problem with others. Putting Systems Thinking into Practice in Your Organization. The SODA method is designed to support the development of solutions to messy problems and/or develop strategy. Description extracted from an original submission by Colin Eden: This tool produces a map made up of chains of arrows that connect your aims/goals at the top of the map to potential options to achieving those goals at the bottom of the map. The related insight, according to Ackoff, is that the sum of the optimal solutions to each component problem taken separately is no an optimal solution to the mess., #2. Can you take advantage of this without duplicating effort? FEATURED TOOL OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT Description extracted from an original submission by Yasmin Merali: SSM is an approach for exploring, making sense of, and defining multiple views of problem situations and their potential solutions. Expertise Strategic planning Cognitive mapping has been used in Strategic Options Development and Analysis (SODA), where operational research (OR) interviews mappers and facilitates group processes to learn from the map. They help you to explore the system and think broadly about the stakeholders. Barbrook-Johnson P, Penn A. Annex 3 contains a list of some of the software that has been used by civil servants. (2022). (2001). Royal Academy of Engineering Creating systems that work: Principles of engineering systems for the 21st century. Is some failure acceptable? They are the people who will be carrying out any changes that you make to the system. Balancing loops are stabilising, regulating and stability seeking. An inhibitor is a significant force in the environment that undermines or prevents the system from creating your desired outcome. Systems maps are best created with stakeholders, and sometimes it is the participatory process, rather than the end result, which can add the most value. Below is our suggestion. They now want to analyse the map to see if it can help explain why a past policy failed to achieve the outcomes it was meant to so they can avoid repeating past mistakes. Acumen Academy Systems Practice course material for guidance on using systems thinking when approaching a problem and also on creating and analysing causal loop diagrams. In This Toolkit: Welcome How To Use the Toolkit #46. -Dan Marx, "Has staying power and relevance beyond the first reading." Work your way out from the core story by describing the major regions of the map and their dynamics. Similar to the iceberg metaphor, what is above ground (the leaves) are obvious, whereas the less obvious cause is unseen below (the roots). They also look for parts of the map that should be connected but arent and what problems this lack of connection creates. Gilbert, N. (2008). Tight deadlines can limit your ability to do this, but engagement with a system need not be limited to large workshops you can still test understanding with your collaborating community via other methods such as emails or calls, still enabling you to incorporate their perspectives into your work and build buy-in to your approach. The steps needed between the goals and the options, located in the middle of the map, form the basis for a strategy. This document is a an Introductory Toolkit for for civil servants. Choose the areas that seem most promising for a leveraged impact on the system and that you want to share with others for their feedback and assessment. Who will detect or gather data on how the system is performing? You can create a simple behaviour over time graph to help portray trends in the system that demonstrate the problem. When those downstream effects ultimately circle back and affect the factor you started with, you have uncovered a potential loop. Enablers and inhibitors should be described in a short statement to clarify what they mean - even a few words are enough. Common example is two non-profits with the same goals undercutting each others work in the pursuit of additional funding. The team avoid taking a linear approach (assuming a straightforward cause and effect between their activities or inputs and expected impacts) but instead understand the context that their problem sits within. Thus the value of stock and flow diagrams (Tool 9) and theory of change maps (Tool 10) is often found in explaining or describing a process rather than predicting a specific output. This short video (2 minutes) from Peter Senge, an organizational development and systems . You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. Strengthening Hypertension Prevention and Control Services in Alaska, Increasing Access to Quality Contraceptive Services in Palau through Training and TA, Co-Creating Pathways to Workforce Development with Youth in Buffalo, NY. Circulate your monitoring and evaluation strategy with stakeholders to gain their views and iterate as required. A model is anything that, through some level of abstraction, can demonstrate or emphasise the potential performance of a new policy or intervention. Morecroft, J.D.W. For example, an increase in the battery range of an electric vehicle has the effect of increasing public confidence in electric vehicles, or likewise a decrease in battery range has the effect of decreasing public confidence. Or you can create a theory of change map (Tool 10) to test your proposed intervention further. It is posited that by focusing on non-obvious factors, practitioners can increase their odds of success. By enhancing your TPP program evaluation with systems change principles, you can capture complexity such as: This complexity can help track your TPP programs progress and impact within a changing system. Dont worry we wont send you spam or share your email address with anyone. Understanding causality leads to a deeper perspective on agency, feedback loops, connections and relationships, which are all fundamental parts of systems mapping. It is possible, however, to monitor and evaluate your intervention and determine the extent to which benefits are being realised. The downside of using SMART in more complex situations is that it can promote a narrow-focus and short-term approach that can lead you to quick fixes that ultimately fail. By setting the problem and their goals with the system in mind the problem statement also helps the team avoid the pitfall of making short term fixes which are unlikely to be impactful or resilient. Mapping your system is helpful when your system has so many stakeholders and policy areas that you and your team cant hold all the interdependencies in your mind, you need a visual prompt. For example, considering the child protection system from a childs, parents and front-line workers point of view. Sterman, J.D. Ulrich, W. and Reynolds, M. (2020). Dont include personal or financial information like your National Insurance number or credit card details. Choose how you will build your map. High doesnt require any systems thinking expertise or specialist software. Eden, C., Ackermann, F. (1998). The original concept of each step depicted as a rung on a ladder was created by Chris Argyris. What do you think is missing? Increased confidence of investors (leads to 9), 8. Management flight simulator: A learning environment that provides participants with experiential and conceptual lessons based on simulated real-world situations. The team keep this discussion to refer to throughout the project and inform decision making. If you cant decide which area something belongs, consider breaking it up so the parts can be positioned either side of a boundary. Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. Finally, the team identify factors that are important to their problem but that they have no influence over and add all these to the diagram (see figure 6). , These individuals are the co-founders of the Civil Service Systems Thinking Interest Group (STIG). Feedback loops that uncover how different parts of the system affect each other. Around 30 to 60 minutes to create a behaviour over time graph, write your goals and problem statement. Once you have shared the map with your key stakeholders and iterated it accordingly, you can choose to continue to Tool 8 which gives you the tools to use the map to identify areas of the system to change to achieve your desired outcome. They help you identify monitoring and evaluation questions and the data required to answer these. Innovation and research (leads to 8 with a secondary benefit to 9) Write your goals as short statements that begin with A system which/where/that.: Form your system problem statement by combining your problem with either your near-term or long-term goal, to form a statement that looks similar to the statement below: We are trying to move from a system where (the problem) to a system that, which or where (near term or long-term goal).For example, we are trying to move from a system where policy is sometimes produced in siloes to a system that creates coherent and resilient policy. This in turn increases the number of births due to more available parents, this again further increases the population it is reinforcing (R). However ToC maps can end up promoting a linear, reductionist and rigid approaches to approaching complexity. Connect your starting factor to the next factor with an arrow to show that one causes another. In figure 14, we are interested in how a population increases or decreases. Figure 7: A diagram of your systems boundaries. When your TPP program builds and sustains relationships with compatible partners that share your goals, compensate for your barriers, and complement your strengths, you will support components of the system of care that work and repair those that dont. Frame your factors as something that can increase or decrease (for example number of civil servants, level of trust). Jackson, M. (2019). a. On other occasions, for example, a tool may create a visual that better describes a system than words alone. Additional time to expand and feed in the views and perspectives of others. MIT Press, Cambridge MA. Overcome barriers to market growth (leads to 2 and 3), 2. We are grateful to the following experts who informed and inspired development of the toolkit and helped us in our journey (in alphabetical order): Key advisers who contributed advice throughout the toolkits development our collaborating community (in alphabetical order). They will be able to give different perspectives and challenge, be a source of further data and evidence, bring in historic knowledge and help you discover the gaps and flaws in your understanding. You can also use this technique with stakeholders to encourage them to express their perspectives of the system. How your action will affect your system in different areas or different levels, for example the local system vs the entire system level - potential ripple effects. To analyse the map, the team look for the parts of the causal loop diagram that seem to be influential, in other words those that are highly connected across the diagram. They gain buy-in for their intervention as a result and by using their key performance questions to monitor and evaluate their intervention this allows them to ensure that the intervention produces their desired outcome. Its Here Now, Fernando Ojeda with Jorge Neri:My dad plants trees. Begin Drawing. The team also want to create a narrative for the map to help others who werent part of the mapping process understand what the map shows. This section of the toolkit aims to strengthen your ability to apply systems change evaluation approaches and principles to your work. The methodology has 7 stages with methods (such as Rich Pictures, CATWOE definition and Conceptual Models) to support the process of going from an unstructured problem situation to an agreed collective decision about the most feasible and desirable thing to do in order to improve the situation. So, when we say everything is interconnected from a systems thinking perspective, we are defining a fundamental principle of life. Drifting/eroding goals (or unintended poor performance): Current pressures lead system participants to lower standards or goals, leading to deteriorating performance over time. #63. The project team want to understand the forces within their system. Limits to growth (or unanticipated constraints): A reinforcing feedback loop that leads to exponential growth until a system limit is reached. Satisficing: Because humans have incomplete information (a far cry from the perfect information presumed by traditional economics), they make the best possible choice at any given time based on what satifies their goals to a suffient degree. Next, create any feedback loops (see figure 15). Behaviour Over Time Graphs or System Problem Statement (Tool 4) is a useful approach for exploring with others what the problem with the current system is and the goals the collaborating community want to set for a future system. Systems Thinking With the Iceberg: A Tool for Multi-stakeholder System Sight Timing: 90-120 Minutes # of Participants: 8-Unlimited Equipment needed: flipchart paper, markers, 1 pad of large post-it notes (4"x6"), 2 pads of 3"x3" post-it notes per team, pads of hexagon post-its in two colors (enough of one color for 3 hexagons per team), flipchart with It also reveals gaps in their knowledge and new stakeholders that the team need to engage with. If we have these dynamic impacts and ripple effects, then we expect to see these fundamental changes in the system (insert changes that align to your overall vision or goal) because .. All of our tools are based on decades of experience auditing, consulting and teaching ISO and IATF management systems across industries and the globe. An understanding of the different boundaries within your system, as shown in figure 6, and in the context diagrams template in Annex 1 and a high level understanding of where you should focus your energy to achieve your desired outcome. There are two basic types of causal loops: reinforcing (#4) and balancing (#5). Additional time to expand and feed in the views and perspectives of others. Agent-based models, SAGE Publications. Or is a mitigation strategy necessary if the action does not have the result you expected? i. a long-term (5 years or more) goal for your system. When this analysis is done by constructing a computer simulation of the organization's behavior, it is called system dynamics.