Search found 30 matches

by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Tue Sep 19, 2006 2:19 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: QUERY Beer Game Simulation Performance Metrics
Replies: 15
Views: 12357

QUERY Beer Game Simulation Performance Metrics

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> To be realistic about it, taking John Sterman's advice into account, the metrics that matter are measures of impact on customers -- with the resulting impact on the player. So, while it would require a bit of work, I would sugg...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Fri Apr 07, 2006 12:43 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: SD and other modelling approaches
Replies: 11
Views: 10652

SD and other modelling approaches

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Allow me to be both a little practical and a little cynical about this issue. Before doing so, however, I will say that it makes sense for the simulation community to work on a clean set of criteria for choosing ""bes...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Sat Mar 04, 2006 2:05 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Competitiveness in Construction
Replies: 2
Views: 4482

Competitiveness in Construction

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Check out the Lean Construction folks: http:/www.leanconstruction.org They don't do SD modeling, but have a whole lot of information that would be useful in a modeling effort. They have developed software for construction proje...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Thu Mar 02, 2006 2:03 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Explaining Validation
Replies: 11
Views: 8302

Explaining Validation

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Tim and others, One approach that helps me is to think about what makes any scientific theory plausible. 1. It must explain the phenomena of interest -- which means, you must be able to derive or create the phenomena using the ...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Thu Jan 12, 2006 1:45 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: QUERY Synchronising Forecast and Production
Replies: 2
Views: 4103

QUERY Synchronising Forecast and Production

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> You might also want to find a copy of Dennis Meadows' book, ""Dynamics of Commodity Production Cycles."" Even though his model has been extended by Sterman (in ""Business Dynamics""), I f...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Thu Jan 12, 2006 1:32 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Perceiving feedback
Replies: 7
Views: 6098

Perceiving feedback

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> It might be time (at the risk of insulting everyone's intelligence) to remember what mathematics really is when applied to helping us understand the natural world. Even doing something as simple as using numbers to count object...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Tue Jan 10, 2006 1:26 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: The "usefulness" of SD
Replies: 18
Views: 31177

The ""usefulness"" of SD

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Jack Homer makes an excellent point, as he usually does, when he talks about putting a ""stake in the ground."" I have found this method useful in lots of non-SD situations, as well -- for the same reasons J...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Fri Dec 23, 2005 12:38 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: SD and other modelling approaches
Replies: 41
Views: 40321

SD and other modelling approaches

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> I have been helping companies with strategic thinking for nearly 20 years (I don't much like the term ""strategic planning"" because that generates a report which gathers dust for 12 months and then is disca...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Thu Dec 01, 2005 12:00 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Characterizing System Dynamics
Replies: 33
Views: 31394

Characterizing System Dynamics

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> For fundamental questions about system dynamics, I always find it enlightening to return to the original source -- Jay Forrester. His ""Principles of Systems"" gives very clear, direct answers to most of the...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Wed Nov 30, 2005 12:00 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Agents, Emergence, Evolution, and SD
Replies: 4
Views: 8250

Agents, Emergence, Evolution, and SD

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Emergence is a tricky concept in the philosophy of science, albeit quite attractive intuitively. Carl Hempl, in his ""Aspects of Scientific Explanation,"" wrestled with this concept. Here's what he said (in ...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Thu Oct 27, 2005 11:42 am
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Loop Dominance in CLDs
Replies: 2
Views: 3787

Loop Dominance in CLDs

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> This is quite simplistic, but one way to deal with the issue of keeping the picture simpler is simply to call such items (that actually enter into the dynamics as ratios) by a name that implies something else is going on but do...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Sun Oct 16, 2005 1:12 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Pre-simulation indicators of usefulness
Replies: 10
Views: 8807

Pre-simulation indicators of usefulness

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> I find it useful to ask people to think about ""the process"" that is producing the behavior of interest. [First, of course, we must identify the behavior of interest and create some data about it -- at the ...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Fri Sep 23, 2005 12:03 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: System archetypes with improvements
Replies: 3
Views: 4599

System archetypes with improvements

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> As a way of introducing the power of system dynamics to the uninitiated, I have always wanted to use the ""system archetypes"" described so well by Daniel Kim (and others.) But, the first question that comes...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Sat Sep 17, 2005 2:05 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: All models are wrong (was Strategy magazine article about Ja
Replies: 16
Views: 11296

All models are wrong (was Strategy magazine article about Ja

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Jean-Jacques, It's not just true in academia (which prides itself on self-criticism and the scientific method, which is fundamentally skeptical) but also in commerce that being honest about one's products' shortcomings pays off...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Fri Sep 16, 2005 11:35 am
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Best first stock-flow model?
Replies: 2
Views: 3878

Best first stock-flow model?

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Jim (and others), I don't know if my approach applies in whatever context you're working, but with people who are employed and working on understanding their own processes, here's what I do: 1. I teach them traditional "&q...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Thu Aug 11, 2005 12:39 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Feedback Thinking for Business? (Was Feedback and Behavior)
Replies: 8
Views: 7366

Feedback Thinking for Business?

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> I'm shocked by the last two messages from Jean-Jacques Laublé and hardly know where to start to respond. I suspect others out there feel the same way. In the past, Jean-Jacques has written, I thought, insightfully about SD mode...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Fri Jul 29, 2005 12:09 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Marketing driven growth and decline
Replies: 15
Views: 9407

Marketing driven growth and decline

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Rutger, Kim, et al. You might want to take a look at Bradley Gale's book, ""Managing Customer Value"" for data from the PIMS Project (Profit Impact of Marketing Strategies) -- which has a database of more th...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Wed Jul 27, 2005 12:10 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Marketing driven growth and decline
Replies: 15
Views: 9407

Marketing driven growth and decline

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Kim, let me describe a situation I encountered that may, in fact, be a case of customers lost due to lack of marketing. Years ago we studied a business forms printing company and discovered, much to everyone's surprise, that th...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Tue Jul 19, 2005 10:38 am
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Measuring Systems Thinking Abilities
Replies: 12
Views: 9427

Measuring Systems Thinking Abilities

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Martin, Since we cannot send attachments through this list, I've sent you a copy of Barry Richmond's article directly. It may also be available on the isee Systems corporate website. While I like Richmond's sensible approach ve...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Fri Jul 15, 2005 12:02 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Port Dynamics and Bottlenecks
Replies: 5
Views: 6024

Port Dynamics and Bottlenecks

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> First, I would think, you need an operational definition of ""bottleneck."" My work in Lean Six Sigma (process improvement) has taught me that there are (at least) two kinds of bottlenecks: 1. Capacity const...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Thu Jun 09, 2005 12:44 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Wisdom of Crowds
Replies: 13
Views: 11206

Wisdom of Crowds

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> The notion that small groups of people are smarter than individuals has certainly shown to be true in my 25 years of testing it. I have been running group sessions over my career in which I break up the participants into small ...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Sun May 15, 2005 1:42 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Shaping the Future" by Popper et al (was Problem Solving ver
Replies: 17
Views: 13478

Shaping the Future"" by Popper et al (was Problem Solving ve

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Jay Forrester, although he strikes me as a modest man, IS an authority in SD. That doesn't mean, of course, that he is infallible. But to deny him the position of authority is absurd. Moreover, I have been struck over the sever...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Sat May 07, 2005 1:05 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Flowcharts to Stock/Flow Diagrams
Replies: 0
Views: 2684

Flowcharts to Stock/Flow Diagrams

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> I am doing much work in Lean Six Sigma consulting these days. One of the fundamental things neophytes learn to do is to flowchart processes within their organizations. And they ALL (almost without exception!) instinctively do i...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Wed May 04, 2005 12:06 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Shaping the Future" by Popper et al (was Problem Solving ver
Replies: 17
Views: 13478

Shaping the Future"" by Popper et al (was Problem Solving ve

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> Erling Moxnes writes: ""What the authors could be criticised for is that they did not foresee how the report would be misinterpreted and that they did not prevent this. This may however be just as difficult as ...&quo...
by John Gunkler jgunkler sprintmail
Wed Apr 13, 2005 12:22 pm
Forum: SD Mailing List Archive
Topic: Evaluating expected modeling benefits
Replies: 15
Views: 18625

Evaluating expected modeling benefits

Posted by ""John Gunkler"" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com> I run into a similar dilemma in my ""day job"" - where I am a management consultant helping organizations solve all kinds of problems using a ""tool kit"" of competencies, models, methods...