Systems Approach & Enemies

Systems Approach & Enemies

Author: C West Churchman

Publisher:

Published: 1979-06-14

Total Pages: 248

ISBN-13:

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Churchman critically assesses the systems approach to social sciences in the light of recent criticisms. He is particularly concerned with the contentions that the systems approach with its rational models is at odds with reality in the human world of politics, morality, religion and aesthetics.


Systems Approaches to Making Change: A Practical Guide

Systems Approaches to Making Change: A Practical Guide

Author: Martin Reynolds

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-02-18

Total Pages: 337

ISBN-13: 1447174720

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The five approaches outlined in this book offers the systems thinking practitioner a range of interchangeable tools for pro-actively making systemic improvements amidst complex situations of change and uncertainty. Practitioners from all professional domains are increasingly confronted with incidences of systemic failure, yet poorly equipped with appropriate tools and know-how for understanding such failure, and the making of systemic improvement. In our fragile Anthropocene world where ‘systems change’ is often invoked as the rallying call for purposeful alternative action, this book provides a toolkit to help constructively make systems that can change situations for the better. Systems Approaches offers an excellent introduction for those seeking to understand systems thinking and to enact systems thinking in practice. The book helps practitioners from all professions to better understand inter-relationships, engage with multiple perspectives, and reflect on boundary judgements that can inhibit or enhance improved purposeful change. After an editorial introduction to these systems thinking in practice capabilities, successive chapters illustrate five systems approaches, each chosen for having a rigorous though adaptable framework, and a robust long pedigree of application in complex situations. Each chapter illustrates what the approach is about, followed by invaluable tips and insights from experience regarding how the tools might be practiced. Amongst updates from originating authors for this 2nd edition, each approach has an accompanying postscript on some developments since the 1st edition.


Systems Approaches to Management

Systems Approaches to Management

Author: Michael C. Jackson

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2007-05-08

Total Pages: 455

ISBN-13: 0306474654

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Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Washakie County is a county located in the U.S. state of Wyoming. As of 2000, the population was 8,289. Its county seat is Worland.Washakie County was organized in 1911 and named after the head chief of the Shoshone people, Chief Washakie, who became an ally of the US Government.


A Systems Approach to Social and Organizational Planning

A Systems Approach to Social and Organizational Planning

Author: Gerrit Van Wyk

Publisher: Trafford Publishing

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 282

ISBN-13: 1412013909

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"A Systems Approach to Social And Organizational Planning is about systems thinking and its application in health care. Health care systems all over the world are on the verge of breakdown and neither patients nor governments and businesses can afford health care delivery as we know it any longer. The problem is that planners still conceptualize enormously complex biological and social systems in a simplistic manner. An analysis of the problem indicates that the solution lies in using a holistic apporoach, such as the systems approach, to re-conceptualize our thinking about the problem situation. The result is a systems view of health, which has profound implications for planning and change management in health care. It is a fresh and different approach to an intractable problem and therefore deserves the attention of both systems thinkers and health care planners. The purpose of the text is to introduce readers to the systems approach and to contribute towards the current debate about health care planning. The target audience is therefore students new to systems thinking and specifically health care planners."--Publisher.


Collaborating with the Enemy

Collaborating with the Enemy

Author: Adam Kahane

Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers

Published: 2017-07-05

Total Pages: 186

ISBN-13: 1626568243

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“Offers practical guidance for how to work with diverse others, which is a precondition for confronting many of the complex challenges we face.” —Morris Rosenberg, President, Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Collaboration is increasingly difficult and increasingly necessary. Often, to get something done that really matters to us, we need to work with people we don’t agree with or like or trust. Adam Kahane has faced this challenge many times, working on big issues like democracy and jobs and climate change and on everyday issues in organizations and families. He has learned that our conventional understanding of collaboration—that it requires a harmonious team that agrees on where it’s going, how it’s going to get there, and who needs to do what—is wrong. Instead, we need a new approach to collaboration that embraces discord, experimentation, and genuine cocreation—which is exactly what Kahane provides in this groundbreaking and timely book. “Kahane shows that people who don’t see eye-to-eye really can come together to solve big challenges. Whether in our businesses, our governments, our communities, or our personal lives, we can all benefit from this smart and timely book.” —Mark Tercek, former President, The Nature Conservancy and coauthor of Nature’s Fortune “Shows us how thinking and seeing differently can help us navigate this challenging landscape. Kahane abandons orthodoxy in taking on the most intransigent problems, showing us the path to effective action in a complex world.” —James Gimian, coauthor of The Rules of Victory “Collaborating with the Enemy belongs on the same shelf as Sun Tzu’s The Art of War and Machiavelli’s The Prince.” —Stephen Huddart, President, The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation


Systems Approaches to Managing Change: A Practical Guide

Systems Approaches to Managing Change: A Practical Guide

Author: Martin Reynolds

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2010-03-10

Total Pages: 321

ISBN-13: 1848828098

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In a world of increasing complexity, instant information availability and constant flux, systems approaches provide the opportunity of a tangible anchor of purpose and iterate learning. The five approaches outlined in the book offer a range of interchangeable tools with rigorous frameworks of application tried and tested in the ‘real world’. The frameworks of each approach form a powerful toolkit to explore the dynamics of how societies emerge, how organisations create viability, how to facilitate chains of argument through causal mapping, how to embrace a multiplicity of perspectives identifying purposeful activity and how to look for the bigger picture across multiple disciplines. Systems Approaches offers an excellent first introduction for those seeking to understand what ‘systems thinking’ is all about as well as why the tools discussed herein should be applied to management and professional practice. This book provides a practical guide, and the chapters stand alone in explaining and developing each approach.


Similarities, Connections, and Systems

Similarities, Connections, and Systems

Author: Niraj Verma

Publisher: Lexington Books

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 206

ISBN-13: 9780739100004

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In this groundbreaking work, Niraj Verma goes beyond the criticism of rationality to present a bold alternative model of inquiry--a new rationality for the professions. Inspired by the work of pragmatist William Jones, Verma proposes a methodology that fuses the rational and the irrational to offer professionals an approach to inquiry that more completely examines the factors that impact the planning process in a practical, systematic way. The new rationlity is systemic and so values similarities more that differences, connectivity more that fungibility, and purposes and ends more that causes and mechanisms.


Systems Thinkers

Systems Thinkers

Author: Magnus Ramage

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-02-19

Total Pages: 319

ISBN-13: 1447174755

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This book presents a biographical history of the field of systems thinking, by examining the life and work of thirty of its major thinkers. It discusses each thinker’s key contributions, the way this contribution was expressed in practice and the relationship between their life and ideas. This discussion is supported by an extract from the thinker’s own writing, to give a flavour of their work and to give readers a sense of which thinkers are most relevant to their own interests.


Applications of Systems Approaches at the Field Level

Applications of Systems Approaches at the Field Level

Author: M.J. Kropff

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2013-11-11

Total Pages: 463

ISBN-13: 9401707545

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Systems approaches for agricultural development are needed to determine rational strategies for the role of agriculture in national development. Mathematical models and computer simulation provide objective tools for applying science to determine and evaluate options for resource management at field, farm and regional scales. However, these tools would not be fully utilizable without incorporating social and economic dimensions into their application. The second international symposium, Systems Approaches for Agricultural Development (SAAD), held in Los Baños, 6-8 December 1995, fostered this link between the biophysical sciences and the social sciences in the selection of keynote papers and oral presentations, a selection of which are included in these books. The contents further reflect how systems approaches have definitely moved beyond the research mode into the application mode. The large number and high quality of interdisciplinary research projects reported from different parts of the globe, to determine land use options that will meet multiple goals and yet sustain natural resource bases, is a key indicator of this `coming of age'. At the farm level, where trade-off decisions between processes and products (commodities) feature strongly, much progress is also evident in the development of systems-based tools for decision making. At the field level optimization of resource use and minimizing environmental effects has become of major concern for which systems approaches are indispensable. The books, of which Volume I deals with regional and farm studies level and Volume II with field level studies, will be of particular interest to all agricultural scientists and planners, as well as students interested in multidisciplinary and holistic approaches to agricultural development.