International Society for the Systems Sciences: Journals ISSS
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Can We Train Management Students to be Systems Thinkers- Additional Results
No full textSystems-thinking, a holistic approach that puts the study of wholes before that of parts, is an efficient way of dealing with real-world situations. By emphasizing the interrelationships between the system's components rather than the components themselves, systems thinking allows us to increase our personal and professional effectiveness, and transform our organizations. Specifically, systems thinkers can conceptually analyze the system without knowing all the details, recognizing the forest through the trees. They can see beyond the surface to the deeper patterns that are responsible for creating behavior. The current study deals with the development of systems thinking among students and graduates of technology management. The goals of the study are to identify the factors that influence the development of systems thinking and to find ways to encourage this development. We used a variety of research tools: A questionnaire for assessing the capacity for systems thinking, The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) personality type test and supervisor evaluations. In conclusion, the current study findings show that graduates with certain personality traits can gradually acquire or improve their capacity for systems thinking by receiving appropriate training and through a wide range of work experience, and by holding different job positions over time. Having a broad range of professional experience and holding different job positions can help graduates gain knowledge and become familiar with diverse systems and technologies
Integration of Sustainability Performance Indicators and the Viable System Model toward a Systemic Sustainability Assessment Methodology
No full textReports on the progress of sustainability initiatives in industrial practice and academic research have increased over the past several decades, but organizations are still faced with challenges in defining what sustainability means to them, in assessing their sustainability performance, and in making decisions that allow them to develop as sustainable systems. The developmental milestones of sustainability are consistent with the post-normal versus traditional science, where transdisciplinary and policy/action research are among the important approaches to be added to traditional analysis. This shift requires a new perspective to look at the problem at hand: we are no longer considering a group of users with common and self-interested goals when defining the scope of sustainability studies. This new perspective, in turn, requires sustainability indicators that can capture largely diverse but relevant measurements to completely represent the different perspectives that must be fulfilled, as well as requiring new methodologies that focus on heuristics, systemic stability, control, and feedback, versus traditional optimization for mechanistic problems. The presented research attempts to build upon an established connection between sustainability and viability, i.e., the Viable System Model offers a framework to map the self-adapting mechanisms that allow a system to cope with its internal and external sustainability challenges. These capabilities can help the organization reach its sustainability goals. A sustainability assessment model that integrates both sustainability indicators and Viable System Model methodologies has been developed and is presented here. This model presents an effort towards integrated assessment, with a focus on dynamics, control and feedback
COMPLEMENTARITY MODEL OF THE ORGANIZATIVE SYSTEM AMONG MICRO, SMALL AND MEDIUM-SIZED TOURIST ENTERPRISES OF MEXICO, IN A CHANGING ENVIRONMENT
No full textThe performance of tourist micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), in Mexican tourist destinations, tend to be slightly efficient before disturbances of the environment. In a globalized context, these organizations are not on equal terms with respect to large companies, what puts at risk their life cycle. This idea allows to address a local problem with high implications in the Mexican context through the Systemic method in order to propose effective and adaptive actions. This paper presents the design of a model based on the beneficial adaptation of heterogeneous attributes among MSMEs. The Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) allowed to integrate factors and actors involved in the problem situation and subsequently generate a construct, which was contrasted using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP). As a result, it was obtained that systemic complementarity is a framework that allows to integrate local collaboration opportunities and increase responsiveness to the environment and extend the permanence of the companies. In addition, relations raised in the construct could improve gaps among these organizations from collective learning without neglecting the development of individual capacities
Theoretical proposal from Systems’ Thinking for the Intelligent Tourism System
No full textIntelligent tourism is difficult to define not only because there are different interpretations according to the researcher focus and the resources target but also because it is a newly topic with difficulty for its practical application. However, lately, some authors have been working on the generation of general elements that characterize this kind of tourism activity, such as the technological utilization, social benefits, sustainability relevance, and products design. This study constitutes a theoretical approach from the systems thinking to analyze the scope of the system of intelligent tourism in order to identify some of the elements and relations through the purpose of a holistic interpretation.
Proposal of Visualising Model of Customer Demands Sufficiency Degree in Designing Private Life Insurance
No full textSince May 2016, customers’ demands confirmation at the time of life insurance solicitation was strengthened by the Japanese Financial Services Agency (FSA). It requires not only confirming what the customer is requiring, but also to realize what is required through the insurance plan proposal. To realize this, life insurance companies must firstly understand their customers’ needs and then need to show how the it can be realized through the proposed insurance plan as well as how it matches with their own needs. This means that both customer needs and the matching between these needs with the proposal must be visualized. The visualisation can be realized by using a three-dimensional model which contains time, space, and products axes. These three axes represent the elements of insurance products, where time represents 'when' the insured will deserve the benefits and space represents 'for what' the insured will deserve the benefits. The customer’s insurance expectation is, in other words, a clarification of the function which a customer is expecting out of entire functions of this insurance. This clarification of required insurance functions leads to identification of that customer’s insurance demands. Therefore, the three-dimensional model can be used to visualize both what the insurance can do as well as the customer’s own demands.This paper aims to propose a visualised, three-dimensional model which represents the structure, essence, and the concept of insurance. The three-dimensional model is a model which enables the visualization of sufficiency degrees of customer demands that could be invisible in most of the cases. Each axis of the three-dimensions represents the function of insurance. The visualising model of customer demands sufficiency degree enables a comprehension of the function of insurance in public social security, private life/non-life insurance, and customer demands point of view. Through the process of understanding insurance as a system by using this model, people will understand how can insurance support their financial risk and find out what they should and should not expect for private life insurance products.Through the result of several workshops and interviews with professionals and a life insurance specialist in order to evaluate the model, it was proven that the model helped in understanding the features and functions of life insurance, and participants could better understand their needs of insurance. Additionally, they had the impression that life insurance is something valuable and will be of benefit for future financial risks
PAYING ATTENTION TO THE EMOTIONS IN THE PROCESSES OF CHANGE USING THE VSM
No full textThe Beer´s Viable System Model (VSM) is a powerful tool for studying organizations as cohesive “wholes” and for evaluating their strategies counter to the complexity of the tasks they must perform. Primarily, it is a tool to diagnose the effectiveness of the structure of the organization, and offers a conceptual model of the information system to the management. It also allows assessing the consequences of organizations' policies.Social and human actors are not trivial, they pursue ideals, ends, objectives, and have preferences and values, all of which may change. To model that, there are three dimensions to take in account: activities, structure and behavior.The last dimension mentioned above, behavior, can be of interest at distinct levels: individuals, teams, organizational units, a whole organization, networks, etc. But a mere arrangement and the relationship with behaviors. And when took about behaviors, it´s necessary took about emotions, perceptions and cognition.The VSM has been adopted by several researchers and practitioners for diagnosing organizational performance, and/or for (re)structuring organizations based on the factors essential and adequate for its long-term viability. In this paper, the scope is to design or change companies to assess and take responsibility for the company's effects on environmental and social wellbein
Designing a Systemic Methodology for Program Evaluation
No full textEvaluation is commonly seen as a systematic process to determine merit, worth, value or significance. When engaging in program evaluation, evaluators use research methods to systematically investigate the effectiveness of social intervention programs adapted to the political and organizational environment surrounding them. However, aside from having a systematic character, evaluation has at its core a systemic and a critical character as well, as it is based on the establishment of judgments and the inclusion of stakeholders, both of which inevitably affect what will be seen as an improvement. Critical in terms of not taking for granted predefined assumptions about the evaluation and systemic in terms of a dynamic attitude towards the establishment of what and who should be considered in the evaluation and the acknowledgment the existing relationships of those involved in the evaluation. Thus, the systems theory of boundary critique (about how to explore value and boundary judgements) is relevant. For this reason, we seek to propose a methodological development for conducting social program evaluations. Our methodological proposal, seeks to contribute at a theoretical and a practical level as we not only seek to present a methodology that can be widely applied in the realm of social program evaluation through a practical case but we also seek to contribute to enriching the literature that links systems thinking practice and evaluation, focusing primarily in the contributions that critical systems thinking can make to the practice of evaluation. We examine different stages of the evaluation process and show how boundary critique can be used in each one. A practical example will be provided of an evaluation of a program for teaching alternative conflict resolution techniques to children in vulnerable areas of Bogota, Colombia
Leadership and Systemic Innovation: Socio-Technical Systems, Ecological Systems, and Evolutionary Systems Design
No full textInnovation comprises an area of human activity that bridges disciplinary boundaries in epistemological domains as well as action frameworks in ontological domains. It involves a complex system composed of people, organizations, role structures, skills, and knowledge bases, in addition to the hardware produced in workshops and factories. This paper argues that Systemic Innovation, as an emerging field of praxis in its own right, provides an integral and actionable framework for the curation of human initiatives that span human, technological, environmental, and generational concerns with lifelong learning and creative design initiatives. To do this, the field draws on socio-technical systems theory (STS), the study of living systems and ecological system dynamics (including such areas of embodied action as permaculture), and evolutionary systems design (itself comprised of general evolution theory (GST), social systems design methodology (SSM), and lifelong and transformative learning praxes). How these frameworks are used to guide systemic innovation in service of life, increasingly robust and supportive living environments, and future-creating scenarios of systemic viability and thrivability is at the heart of the field of Systemic Innovation. This paper explores the principle outlines of this approach
Developing a Systemic Program Evaluation Methodology: A Critical Systems Perspective
No full textIn recent years there has been an increased interest within the program evaluation field for introducing systems thinking concepts in it. However, most of these attempts have been primarily directed towards supporting the practice of evaluation and not towards making theoretical advancements. This article is focused on introducing systems thinking concepts at a theoretical level, particularly those related to boundary critique in the program evaluation field by reframing the Fourth Generation evaluation methodology. I will introduce the general ideas for carrying out such reframing as well as describing the major changes produced in the methodology and how the introduction of these concepts may be beneficial for conducting an evaluative process
Nested Levels of Organized Systems: A New Model of Multiple Nested Interacting Entropies that Result in the Production of Complexity
No full textA single holistic theory for how the universe is organized, and how its diversity of scales and systems coordinate and perform together, may yet be obtainable. But not within the current paradigms. We are stopped by some foundational misunderstandings within mathematics that forced the impasse we are currently at ‑ especially the discontinuity between relativity and quantum mechanics ‑ especially the discontinuity between physics/chemistry and biology/sociology/economics. A solution is presented, illuminating and defining mathematical relations previously ignored/unidentified. A third model that interfaces Prigogine’s statistical emergence of complexity and Mandelbot’s fractal (non-statistical) emergence of complexity