Making systems more approachable

The principles we use to build systems maps haven’t changed much since the 1980s.

First off, we need to stop thinking about systems maps as deliverables. They’re research tools — stepping stones on our path to understanding complex problems.

If you’re part of the map-building process there’s no better tool for organizing your team’s research and keeping everyone on the same page. [...] However… I f you’re not part of the map-building process, systems maps can be exhausting to interpret.

Systems thinking enables us to engage complex problems more effectively, steering us away from short-sighted solutions that may work in the short-term but ultimately backfire and make things worse in the long run.

We also need to stop treating them as monolithic models of the entire system. We’re in the digital age now and maps are cheap. There’s no reason we can’t have multiple versions or break our research up into multiple maps, each with a well defined scope and focus.