Love this and preach this all the time. You cannot fix a problem if the fundamentals and systems are not in place. It wastes so much time and productivity.
On a serious note, I applied this type of thinking to help identify which reports end users actually used. When I got involved, the reporting teams were bursting at the seams trying to manage over 1,000 reports. They previously attempted to reduce and consolidate the number of reports by asking the business which reports they needed or did not need. They were able to describe a dozen or so reports but not enough to provide the relief they were seeking. My leader at the time asked me to help. My recommendation to them was to unscheduled all but the most critical reports they needed the business needed to function and wait until people missed it and called in to find out why they didn’t get their report. The final number was somewhere around 50.
I did the paper plate thing. I extended it to also include Crystal Cutlery and Red Solo cups. The experiment lasted for 3 months until my wife and joined me in our new location (work transfer). I couldn’t convince her to continue the experiment. But in that time, not a single dirty dish left in the sink unwashed.
Huge fan of systems thinking, though I find many still fall into the trap of not factoring the social aspect of problem solving and strategy formulation - behind every lever are people, and the vernacular of "systems" lends itself towards thinking of organizations as oiled or malfunctioning machines versus dynamic ecosystems.
Soft Systems Methodology (Systems thinking subtype) addresses this in theory and to a degree, but I just don't see it in practice as much. It's an execution challenge. I'd love to hear others thoughts/different experiences and perspectives.
Love the idea of “breaking the framework,” as you put it. Small tweaks often keep you stuck in the same loop, while reshaping one critical lever has ripple effects that solve the broader issue.
Love this and preach this all the time. You cannot fix a problem if the fundamentals and systems are not in place. It wastes so much time and productivity.
Systems thinking forces us to step back, widen the frame, and see what was always there but never noticed.
When the solution isn’t appearing, maybe the problem itself needs to be questioned.
On a serious note, I applied this type of thinking to help identify which reports end users actually used. When I got involved, the reporting teams were bursting at the seams trying to manage over 1,000 reports. They previously attempted to reduce and consolidate the number of reports by asking the business which reports they needed or did not need. They were able to describe a dozen or so reports but not enough to provide the relief they were seeking. My leader at the time asked me to help. My recommendation to them was to unscheduled all but the most critical reports they needed the business needed to function and wait until people missed it and called in to find out why they didn’t get their report. The final number was somewhere around 50.
I did the paper plate thing. I extended it to also include Crystal Cutlery and Red Solo cups. The experiment lasted for 3 months until my wife and joined me in our new location (work transfer). I couldn’t convince her to continue the experiment. But in that time, not a single dirty dish left in the sink unwashed.
Peter Senge, PhD, would be proud.
Thank you for a great read!
Huge fan of systems thinking, though I find many still fall into the trap of not factoring the social aspect of problem solving and strategy formulation - behind every lever are people, and the vernacular of "systems" lends itself towards thinking of organizations as oiled or malfunctioning machines versus dynamic ecosystems.
Soft Systems Methodology (Systems thinking subtype) addresses this in theory and to a degree, but I just don't see it in practice as much. It's an execution challenge. I'd love to hear others thoughts/different experiences and perspectives.
I love this approach and have never quite expressed it this way. The counterintuitive can be a powerful problem-solving tool.
Love the idea of “breaking the framework,” as you put it. Small tweaks often keep you stuck in the same loop, while reshaping one critical lever has ripple effects that solve the broader issue.