Systems Thinking
Contact: Lena Nielsen
Map the system you’re actually in, then stress-test your next move against more than one version of what happens next.
Format
2 days in-person, or 4 x 2.5 hour virtual sessions.
Duration
2 days, or 4 sessions across 2 to 3 weeks.
Description
Most people jump straight to a decision without ever mapping the system that decision sits inside, then get blindsided when a fix in one place creates a new problem somewhere else.
Day one teaches systems mapping: participants build a Rich Picture of a real, current complex problem, naming its parts and actors and tracing the connections between them as causal loop diagrams, then stress-test their own blind spots with a short set of boundary questions such as who is included in this system, who is affected but left out and whose interests define what counts as success. That combination finds the point in the system where a small change actually moves the whole thing.
Day two turns that map forward: building two or three genuinely different future scenarios from it, then stress-testing a real decision against each one before committing. Participants bring a real, current complex problem and leave with a system map and a decision that has already survived more than one version of the future.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this training, participants will:
- Build a Rich Picture of a real complex problem: its parts, its actors and the tensions between them
- Trace feedback loops as causal loop diagrams and find the point of highest leverage, the smallest change that moves the most
- Stress-test their own map with boundary questions: who’s included, who’s affected but excluded and whose interests define success
- Build two or three genuinely different future scenarios from a single system map
- Stress-test a real decision against multiple possible futures before committing to it
For who?
Leaders, strategists and anyone responsible for a decision that plays out over months or years, not days.
This program pairs well with our Decide With Clarity program, which picks up once you have already named the decision in front of you.