Systems Thinking

Systems Thinking is:

Applying the concept of a system to a situation in order to gain insight and understanding


In practice this means that the situation, (the problem, issue, scenario, product, service etc) is declared to be a system and it is assumed that it will therefore adopt all the properties and characteristics of a system. The consideration and examination of these systemic properties and characteristics in the context of the situation provides the insight that leads to a greater understanding.

The beauty of Systems Thinking is that it can be applied to anything, anywhere and at anytime, effectively allowing you to compare chalk with cheese. This means a systems thinker can take the learning in one domain and transfer it to another domain. It allows for the comparison of different systems to gain insight and understanding of generic issues and behaviour. Some systems are simple, some systems are very complex yet they may display similar behaviour and by understanding the simple system and what drives its behaviour can be transferred to the more complex situation.

Systems Thinking is not the preserve of engineers or scientists, anybody can apply and use it. It is a tremendously powerful and universal framework that can be used in many situations:

• To gain understanding of a complex situation: For example, biologists use Systems Thinking to help understand a complex bio-system
• To gain sufficient understanding to make predictions of future system behaviour: For example, economists (and perhaps politicians should) use Systems Thinking to understand the dynamics of the world’s economies in order to predict behaviour when aspects are changed
• To solve a problem: Scientists, Engineers and Managers use Systems Thinking to solve problems leading to approaches such as Lean and Six Sigma
• To create a new system: Engineers, System Designers or Architects use Systems Thinking to design better systems – in this context it is called Systems Engineering

Being able to apply Systems Thinking requires an understanding of the systemic properties and characteristics of a system. Most  humans are not natural systems thinkers and require guidance through Systems Approaches and Systems Tools.