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Final (Copy_Tweaks)Op1444_ Systems Thinking_Leverage points
PGLD
Created on August 11, 2022
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Transcript
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
System rules
Delays relative to change rates
Reinforcing feedback loops
System structure/self-organization
11
Information flow structures
Buffer sizes
Balancing feedback loops
10
Stocks and flow structures
12
Constants, parameters, numbers
System
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
System rules
Delays relative to change rates
Reinforcing feedback loops
System structure/self-organization
11
Information flow structures
Buffer sizes
Balancing feedback loops
10
Stocks and flow structures
12
Constants, parameters, numbers
System
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
Constants, parameters, numbers (least effective leverage point)
12
- Describes the conditions of a system (such as air quality, company profits, national debt or taxable income to the government).
- Monitors and reports the stocks and flows of a system (i.e. inputs and outputs).
Constants, parameters, numbers
System
Constants, parameters, numbers
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
Buffer sizes
11
- A system with large stocks relative to its flows is more stable than a system with small stocks.
- For example, large ‘stocks’ of higher quality of life (or wealth) in a population will make it more resilient to sudden changes in flows (e.g. loss of income).
Buffer sizes
System
Stocks and flow structures
10
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
- When the structures are physical (like roads, airports, schools or hospitals) they are slow and expensive to change.
- When the structures relate to social, political, organisational or interconnected systems structures like banks, they are complex and linked to belief systems.
Stocks and flow structures
System
Delays relative to change rates
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
- Changes to system flows often result in oscillations due to delayed adjustments caused by delayed information.
- Delays in feedback as to the system state can therefore frequently result in over capacity or under capacity (e.g. think of current challenges in supply chains due to the pandemic).
Delays relative to change rates
System
Balancing feedback loops
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
- They are inherent in complex systems to keep important stocks fairly constant and in safe bounds.
- They often apply to the information and control parts of a system rather than the physical parts.
- They need a goal, a monitoring mechanism that signals a variance from the goal and a response mechanism.
Balancing feedback loops
System
Reinforcing feedback loops
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
- These are self-reinforcing and the more they work, the more they gain the power to work some more.
- These are the source of growth, explosion, erosion and collapse in systems and a system with an unchecked reinforcing feedback loop will ultimately destroy itself.
Reinforcing feedback loops
System
Information flow structures
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
- Information flows create new loops through delivering information to places where it wasn’t going before and they thereby change people’s behaviour.
- Missing feedback or information flows are the most common causes of system malfunction.
Information flow structures
System
System rules
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
- The rules of a system define its scope, its boundaries and its degrees of freedom.
- Many nations’ constitutions are strong social rules. Government acts and regulations set out rules of conduct and processes.
- Laws, punishments, incentives, constraints, informal social agreements and rules of a game are progressively weaker rules.
System rules
System
System structure/self-organization
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
The system goal
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
- One of the most surprising characteristics of living systems and social systems is their ability to change themselves completely by creating whole new structures and behaviours.
- When systems self-organise, the aspects of systems as listed above from 1–8 change, for example by adding new physical structures, and new feedback loops, and by making new rules.
System structure/self-organization
System
The system goal
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The paradigm used to design the system
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
- The goal of a system reflects the purpose or function of a system.
- System goals can be for example keeping the bathwater at the right level, or keeping the room temperature comfortable or keeping inventories stocked at sufficient levels.
The system goal
System
The paradigm used to design the system
- Paradigms are the sources of systems.
- Paradigms are the shared ideas in the minds of societies, the mindsets out of which a system – its goals, structure, rules, delays and conditions – arise.
- A paradigm is a belief system about how the world works and is made up of unstated assumptions (unstated because everyone grows up with those beliefs).
Constants, parameters, numbers
Buffer sizes
Stocks and flow structures
Delays relative to change rates
Balancing feedback loops
Reinforcing feedback loops
Information flow structures
System rules
System structure/self-organization
The system goal
The power to shift paradigm to deal with new challenges
The paradigm used to design the system
System
The power to shift the paradigm to deal with new challenges (most effective leverage point)
- Transcending paradigms involve staying unattached in the arena of paradigms, staying flexible, and realising that no paradigm is true and that this in itself is a paradigm.
- This means recognising that our own worldview is a limited understanding of the laws of the universe that are far beyond human comprehension.
- This means being fully aware that paradigms are constructs of our minds and being able to let go of them with a sense of humour and be comfortable in the humility of not knowing.