Ventana software support forum

Posted by George A Simpson <gsimpso4@csc.com> I'd like to respond to Kim's point: ""..what puzzles me is why other great ideas do not have to wait so long for widespread uptake?"" I think the answer has several parts. First, SD and for example six-sigma are not comparable because...

Posted by George A Simpson <gsimpso4@csc.com> Does anyone know of a mapping from Senge's archetypal patterns into stock and flow notation? We are interested in this for pedagogical purposes. ..george... Dr. George Simpson, Principal Consultant, CSC Posted by George A Simpson <gsimpso4@csc.com> posti...

Students should be interested in a model of IT system performance, which could be constructed using SD tools. (But if you want to push the envelope a bit, try discrete simulation here.) Another area that might interest them is defect resolution - the passage of messages through support tiers. Call c...

In response to Joel's point, as one who has done some significant neural network studies in the past, I don't see much merit in coupling neural networks and SD models. The model is transparent, it can explain itself. The network is opaque. Dr. George Simpson, Principal Consultant, CSC CSC Alliance: ...

Neural networks are the tool of choice when you need a predictive capability, and do not seek to gain or apply insights into the nature of the phenomenon. Its predictive capability is governed by the scope of the examples that it has learned from. Systems dynamics is the tool of choice when you need...

Hi Raj,

A topic Im interested in is the impact of IT on business performance -
evaluating the case for making a change to a businesss IT.

I think you might find this an interesting line to pursue.

From: George A Simpson <gsimpso4@csc.com>

In response to Jim Hines question "Is there any real reason -- beyond widespread practice and anecdotal evidence -- to run experience through statistical methods as opposed to running it through, say, a good story telling machine?" I can offer this compelling argument - phrased as a story:...

An SD model is a theory - just like any scientific theory. It is built on a body of evidence, and is useful for explaining observations. There are two questions one can ask about a theory: 1. - is it internally self-consistent (corresponding to verification in SW development)? 2. How well does it ac...

I have just completed several months of work on a very large government bid in the UK. We won, but I have a very inadequate model of how we did it. I did an informal survey of key participants, and the factors they said were important were: 1. establishing and maintaining a preferred supplier positi...

Niall, heres a thought for you. Look at Stermans model of the "maintenance game" described on page 68 of "Business Dynamics". This system can be recast as an ethical one, with the theme of maintaining relationships versus maintaining equipment. Rather than equipment defects being...

Hello Niall, This seems pretty easy to do. For example, with iThink, you just set up three converters with the three forms of the equation - one with each dependent variable. Graphical functions can easily plot the relationship, Sensitivity analysis can be used to vary the second parameter and label...