This book is about the behaviour of systems. Systems are important,
for we interact with them all the time, and many of the actions we
take are influenced by a system - for example, the system of
performance measures in an organisation influences, often very
strongly, how individuals within that organisation behave.
Furthermore, sometimes we are involved in the design of systems, as
is any manager contributing to the definition of what those
performance measures might be. That manager will want to ensure
that all the proposed performance measures will drive the 'right'
behaviours rather than (inadvertently) encouraging dysfunctional
'game playing', and so anticipating how the performance measurement
system will work in practice is a vital part of a wise design
process. Some of the systems with which we interact are local, such
as your organisation's performance measurement system. Some
systems, however, are distant, but nonetheless very real, such as
the healthcare system, the education system, the legal system and
the climate system. Systems, therefore, exist on all scales, from
the local to the global. And all systems are complex, some hugely
so. That's why understanding how systems behave can be very
helpful. Systems are complex for two main reasons. First, the
manner in which they behave over time can be very hard to
anticipate - and anticipating the future sensibly is of course a
key objective of management. Second, the 'entities' within a system
can be connected together in very complex ways, so that an
intervention 'here' can result in an effect 'there', perhaps a long
time afterward. Sometimes this can be surprising, and so we talk of
'unintended consequences' - but this is of course a euphemism for
'because I didn't understand how this system behaves, I had not
anticipated that'. Systems thinking, the subject matter of this
book, is the disciplined study of systems, and causal loop diagrams
- the 'pictures' of this 'picture book' - are a very insightful way
to represent the connectedness of the entities from which any
system is composed, so taming that system's complexity.
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