Table 1 Systems thinking skills
From ‘usual thinking’ approaches… | …to systems thinking |
|---|---|
Focused on particular events (Static thinking) | Problems framed in terms of a patterns of behaviour over time (Dynamic thinking) |
Focused on particular details (Tree-by-tree thinking) | Focused on understanding the context of relationships (Forest thinking) |
Focused on factors that influence/correlate with results (Factors thinking) | Focused on causality and understanding how behaviour is generated (Operational thinking) |
System-generated behaviours are driven by external forces (Systems-as-effect thinking) | System-generated behaviours are driven by internal actors who interact with system itself (Systems-as-cause thinking) |
Causality is viewed as uni-directional, without interdependence or interactions between causes (Straight-line thinking) | Causality is viewed as ongoing with feedback effects, including interdependence and interactions between causes (Loop thinking) |