Posted by Jack Harich <
register@thwink.org>
One way to handle the implementation aspect of the ""solution"" the model
suggests is to not look at it that way. There is another viewpoint.
This is to first decompose the one big problem into several little
problems, each of which is much easier to solve. The decomposition I've
found most successful and reusable is these three subproblems:
A. How to overcome change resistance to adopting the proper practices of
the ""solution."" Think of the system with the problem as suffering from
organizational change resistance. When change resistance is overcome the
system will want to solve the problem just as strongly as it was not
wanting to solve it before.
B. How to properly couple two subsystems to another. Proper coupling
means the feedback loops between the two systems cause the systems to
work together in harmony.
C. How to avoid model drift. The ""model"" here is the model of the solution.
Call A, B, and C the change resistance, proper coupling, and model drift
subproblems.
In general you first solve A, then B, then C. However, your analysis
iterations will probably initially center on B, as you become familiar
with the problem.
Regarding C (model drift), as the total system with the problem evolves,
so too must the model, or the solution will become obsolete. This is
also called a self-managing solution. The term model drift comes from
Thomas Kuhn's cycle of scientific revolutions. The cycle steps are
normal science, model drift, model crisis, model revolution, and
paradigm change. I added the model drift stage, which was only implied
in his book.
Regarding B (proper coupling), suppose the problem was the diabetes
epidemic. The two systems (there are sometimes more) could be defined as
citizens and the educational system. The educational system needs to
constantly incorporate new methods based on what youth needs to learn in
its formative years, such as the right diet and exercise necessary to
avoid a susceptibility to diabetes. The educational system also needs
feedback on how well its working. When these things are happening the
two systems are properly coupled. Another example is the environmental
sustainability problem. There the human and environmental systems are
improperly coupled due to the externalized cost phenomenon, though this
is an enormous simplification.
This takes us to A (change resistance). Implementation may encounter
organizational change resistance, a barrier so common it's a
mini-industry in itself. So in your analysis you model change resistance
explicitly, usually in a separate model from B and C.
Generally the more difficult the problem, the higher the change
resistance. For incredibly difficult social problems, like
sustainability, systemic poverty and war, change resistance is the crux
of the problem. That is, we know what to do to solve the problem (the
proper coupling practices) but we cannot get the system to adopt those
proper practices.
Thus if you have not solved A, then no matter how good your ""solution""
to B is, you have not solved the total problem. Most people consider
only B as the problem to solve, which, if it's a difficult social
problem, is the perfect setup for a trap. When they try to implement
their solution to B, the one they have worked so hard on for so long,
they discover the system rejects it with surprising force and ingenuity.
An educational example of A, B, and C may be seen in Forrester's urban
decay model. The model showed how certain improper coupling practices
caused urban areas to be improperly coupled to the world around them.
This caused urban decay. The model also showed how, if new counter
intuitive policies were tried, proper coupling would occur.
But when Forrester started publishing, he encountered severe change
resistance. For example:
""The conclusions of our work were not easily accepted. I recall one full
professor of social science in our fine institution at MIT coming to me
and saying, ‘I don't care whether you're right or wrong, the results are
unacceptable.’ So much for academic objectivity! Others, probably
believing the same thing, put it more cautiously as, ‘It doesn't make
any difference whether you're right or wrong, urban officials and the
residents of the inner city will never accept those ideas.’ It turned
out that those were the two groups we could count on for support if they
became sufficiently involved to understand. That is a very big ‘if’—if
they came close enough to understand. Three to five hours were required
to come to an understanding of what urban dynamics was about."" - From
http://sysdyn.clexchange.org/sdep/papers/D-4165-1.pdf
In the urban decay crisis problem, change resistance was so small that
all it took to overcome it, one group at a time, was ""three to five
hours"" of exposure to the model. Rather than explain the whole model,
all Forrester explained was why present solutions had no effect or made
the problem worse, and how alternative solutions that had not been tried
could make it better and why.
But Forrester and others never addressed C, the model drift subproblem.
The urban decay crisis was merely resolved down to a problem. It was
never entirely solved. We still have slums all over the world. We even
have occasional riots, such as those recently seen in France. But we do
not have anything like the US urban decay crisis of the 1960, when
scores of people were slain in riots, such as 34 in the Watts riot alone.
As another example, a friend is a business consultant. He uses a
repeatable process for assessment, strategy development, etc. He feels
that most business problems fall into three categories: change
management, project management, and communication. From the perspective
of A, B, and C, his change management category is A and project
management is B.
Now you may wonder, what about C? Well I asked him, what about strategy?
Isn't that missing from your categories? He replied ""That's a whole
'nother story."" But I feel that if he had a fourth category called
strategy management, it would be C. That is, for a system to avoid model
drift, it must continually fine tune its strategies, the ones that lead
to continual updating of the solutions to A and B.
Hope this helps,
Jack Harich
Systems Engineer
Posted by Jack Harich <
register@thwink.org>
posting date Wed, 12 Dec 2007 11:21:40 -0500
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