Now, let's look at how to apply the four Ps of connected leadership to systems. We'll begin with the first of the four Ps, purpose. Think about the system that matters to you. Why does that system exist? What is its purpose? As systems thinkers, we should ask why a lot as we both ascend and descend. What do I mean by that? We covered a useful model for thinking about feedback at the team level and it's useful again here for systems thinking. The ladder of inference is the idea that there are different steps in our thought process that involve different levels of inference and objectivity. It's said that systems are not as they are but as we are as system documenters and observers. Knowing when and why we climb the ladder is crucial to the objective of understanding the purpose of the system we care about. Built into this inquisitive nature should be our curiosity to bring other voices to help explain the system from their perspective. Who has lived experience of the system? Have you heard those who should be heard and help inform and change your data, meanings, assumption, conclusions, and beliefs? Just as the ladder of inference is important and interpersonal skills, it's also important in systems. While shortcuts can be helpful in certain situations, it can be risky to rise reflexively and subconsciously up the ladder. If you sense you're making limiting assumptions, you might try writing your process down and asking yourself, am I observing all there is to observe? What if it's not, what it seems as you take each step up the ladder? Try using this process to identify the purpose of your system. What might you be missing or drawing conclusions about? Be sure that as you ascend, you're asking yourself why at every step. Another helpful model for this process is based on an iceberg. This time we need to ask why a lot as we descend. The iceberg is one of the core tools in systems thinking. We're sourcing here from the Water Center for Systems Thinking but there are others in the public domain if you search on any browser. In the iceberg, the area above the surface represents the easily observable events and data. But there's more to the iceberg than what we can see on the surface. As we descend, we ask ourselves, why does that happen more than once to get to deeper and deeper insights about the system? Just beneath the surface, we have the larger trends or patterns that led to the surface level data. Going deeper, we have the structure of the system, the underlying factors, the policies, laws, information flows, relationships, or physical structures that shaped those trends. Finally, in human-made systems, we have the underlying assumptions, beliefs, and values that led the system to be created in the first place. It's only after developing this deep understanding of our system, what it creates, how it works, why it exists, that we can identify our leverage to change it. Now, in your worksheet, start to sketch out the different levels of the iceberg. At the easily visible events level, describe what you think is happening in your system that anyone who care to look may also be able to see. Next level down, what do you think are the underlying trends? Why are the events you see above the surface happening? You need not know for sure. Please do not worry. Part of systems thinking is getting comfortable in your limited but unique vantage point and improve as you go. At the next level down beneath the surface, let's look at the structure of the system. What do you think that the rules are that govern the interactions between agents and the system? Are there relationships that work in one particular way? For example when one thing goes up, does it cause a rise in something else? Why does that happen? This is all worth exploring in the structure layer. At the deepest level furthest from view if you were at the surface, what are the underlying beliefs and paradigms that underpin the system you care about. A simple example thanks to system innovation.io is the common cold. Anyone including me could see that I regularly catch colds for instance. Looking at one level deeper at patterns, we might notice that it happens more when I'm tired. The underlying structure that causes this pattern might be me saying yes too much, excessive work, late nights, not enough sleep. Furthest from view, certainly of my colleagues but maybe even myself, I could have developed an identity wrapped up and working too hard and never saying no. It's alluded to in the structure layer in the water center iceberg model and other places. A really useful tool for this middle layer, not the highest or lowest levels but the complex inter-connected relationships that make up the bulk of the system. Having visual representations of these behaviors and feedback processes can be helpful in mapping out the dynamic structures and relationships at play. The causal loop model can be very helpful to identify the different factors involved in a relationship and whether they support or take away from one another. Channeling another of Julie Zimmerman's favorite examples, the chicken crossing the road system. What happens when we have a system involving eggs, chickens, and road crossings? If we increase the number of eggs, the number of chickens goes up, a positive feedback loop. Similar with the number of chickens, if we increase the number of chickens, we get more eggs. This reinforcing loop factors like this could go on and on forever. But what about the third factor, road crossings? It looks like if we increase chickens, more of them will cross the road, a positive relationship. However, once road crossings increase, sadly, the number of chickens and eggs will go down. It has a negative relationship with the other factors and the right-hand loop is a balancing one. While this system is a bit simple and a bit of fun, you can hopefully see how to sketch some of the key relationships that make up the system you care about. You could use the same causal loops to sketch everything from roadside chicken coops to complex relationships within the systems you care about, from the environment, health care, and many more. There are more resources to help you think from this system thinker and other sources when you are ready to start sketching.
