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Systems Thinking in Large scale interventions


Today we discussed in the class of LSIP about the consulting workshop that we had on 21st June. It helped us to understand consulting and its different types and different strategies. There is one very important thing came into the discussion which is Systems Thinking. It is one of the most important elements of Organizational Development and Change Management Consulting.
System thinking is very interesting way to understand any problem and it is different from the conventional way where we study problem isolated from the systems.
It talks about mainly sum is greater than the whole. We cannot understand a problem without its relationship with the system. In every system, we should study first the parts of the system and second its interconnections, its relationship with other parts. Only then we can study the system perfectly. Any change in any part of the system affects the whole system. But conventionally when we look at a problem we just study problem not its interconnections with the system. Then we create a solution based on the information we have and try to solve the problem. But actually it’s just a quick fix and it’s not the correct solution. Because of the quick fix the problem again occurs and again we do the same thing. So the problem again occurs and it becomes routines of the system which is called reinforcing loop in systems thinking and solutions we create which helps the system run smoothly is the balancing loop.
There is a chronic problem behind every reinforcing loop and we are not addressing it. Because of balancing loop we are thinking that system is working fine. Every reinforcing loop has some underlying short term goals and these goals have some underlying assumption. Because of those underlying assumptions, which are feeding the goals, and the goals which are feeding the routine, the reinforcing loop keeps working.
Delay in the system is the delay between identifying chronic problem and awareness of reinforcing loop.
So in systems thinking we can work on different level of the problem to solve the chronic problem holistically. These interventions are
  1. .      Reinforcing Loop focussed intervention
  2. .      Goal focussed Intervention
  3.        Assumption Focussed Intervention
  4. .      Delay Focussed Intervention

If we want to change the assumptions, we need to change the narrative. Narratives can be changed by storytelling. If we want to change the goals we need to change the metrics and change in the metrics helps to change the attitude. If we can reduce the delay we can be aware of the reinforcing comparatively quickly.
We also talked about, what are the five things that are very necessary so that company can live for very long time. These five things are
  • .       Conservatism in finances
  • .      Sensitivity to the world around them.
  • .       Awareness of the identity.
  • .      Tolerance of new ideas.
  • .      Valuing people s an asset.

We discussed about two most valuable companies of India which are living for very long time and sustaining. These companies are
  • .       CEAT Tyres (RPG Groups)
  • .       Larsen & Toubro

We also discussed about the merger between Renault and Nissan. It was a merger made in heaven. Some important things that I have found in the merger are,
  • .       Synergism between Renault & Nissan
  • .      Complementary Geography
  • .       Complementary technologies
  • .      Merged and treated each other as equal (Not a winner and loser)
  • .      Created a culture of trust between both the companies.

Then we discussed about search conference which is a type of LSIP,  where diverse stakeholders of diverse background comes together and discuss what is good and what needs to be improved. We discussed a case of Salford City Council, where every stakeholder of the community came together and discussed how they want their city to be in the future and they changed the whole city from debt ridden to thriving society.
 It was a very engaging and interesting class where we discussed different elements of LSIP.


Ashish Raj Namdeo

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