Activating Change: A Designer’s Guide to Systems Thinking - Boxes and Arrows

As Donella Meadows has said, “a small shift in one thing can produce big changes.” We have an opportunity to drive positive change because we influence the outcomes of the products and services we design that influence the behavior of people who use them.

Three: Learn and AdaptWe interact with a variety of feedback loops on a daily basis with systems. Systems thinking recognizes that they are intertwined, resulting in constant flows. It is in A World of Systems, developed by the Donella Meadows Project, that we discover how we are constantly interacting with multiple systems.

As designers, we make choices that other people have to live with. Our responsibility as designers is to make those choices count. System thinking is one way of thinking about how we can make more ethical and holistic choices. A systems approach to designing needs strong partnerships to overcome complexity. Systems thinking is an approach that incl... See more

Two: Create Meaningful Change According to Peter Senge, most problems we face today are a result of yesterday's solutions. When we look at the big picture and see how it all fits together, we can identify opportunities that make sense for the whole. A Theory of Change is a framework for thinking about change interventions. We need to analyze the pa... See more

Tools

• Mapping


• Iceberg model


• Theory of change

Mindsets

• Sees the whole picture


• Engages different perspectives to see new leverage points in complex systems


• Looks for relationships and how parts interact


• Looks for unintended consequences


• Thinks circularly; not linearly


• Embraces complexity


• Questions assumptions

How to Use Systems Thinking One: Understand the Big PictureUsing mapping as a tool to understand the complexity of a problem or project, we level-set the playing field by making it visual and giving all stakeholders the opportunity to understand it. There are different ways to map, and it is important to define the relationships between elements wh... See more