Systems Thinking as an Emergent Team Property: Ongoing research into the enablers and barriers to team-level systems thinking

Abstract

-This paper describes ongoing research exploring systems thinking at the team level. Termed collaborative systems thinking by the authors, the concept of higher level systems thinking is envisioned as a means both to build workforce competency and to explicitly deal with system complexity at a higher level within an organization. This paper introduces the key research questions, an initial definition of collaborative systems thinking, demographic and technical motivators, and summarizes the research progress to date and plan for completion. The results of this research will inform the design of technical processes and provide empirical knowledge to support workforce development interventions aimed at developing systems thinking within engineering teams.The role of organizational culture is also considered as a factor in enabling collaborative systems thinking.

A behavioral framework for highly effective technical executives

“…He surmised, "The growing body of research on EI (emotional intelligence) would support the notion of the relationship to performance as universal" (Boyatzis, 2009, p. 62). Other research priorities might include gaining more understanding of how systems thinking affects project performance, perhaps building on Skarzauskiene's (2010) findings, and on the nature, development, and assessment of systems thinking shills in individuals and project teams (Richmond, 1993;Frank, 2006Frank, , 2010Lamb and Rhodes, 2008).…”

“…Engineered systems' complexity continues to increase, introduced through advancements in technology and the logistics required to design and field systems (Lamb and Rhodes, 2008). Q. Dong (1999) (as cited in Lamb and Rhodes, 2008) reported that with complexity increases, an ever-smaller fraction of the design knowledge is documented.…”

“…Q. Dong (1999) (as cited in Lamb and Rhodes, 2008) reported that with complexity increases, an ever-smaller fraction of the design knowledge is documented. He indicated that 85 percent of the design knowledge is documented for a basic system component but that only 30 percent of a simple system's design knowledge is documented, with the remaining 70 percent being tacit knowledge encapsulated in the experiences of the designers.…”

“…Rebovich (2008), Wojcik and Hoffman (2006) and Mansouri and Mostashari (2010) have espoused using a systemic approach to organizational governance within the context of systems of systems engineering. Within organizations systems thinking principles have been applied to solving complex problems (Lamb and Rhodes, 2008;Middleton, 2010), improving the ethical climate (Roth, 2002) and reviving a failing safety program (Pierce, 2002). Building on Richmond's (1993) operational framework Maani and Maharaj (2004) found that three systems thinking skills -forest, closed loop and operational thinkingcontributed more to the understanding of the system and therefore play a greater role in performance.…”

“…While some have presented evidence of the value of systems thinking to organizations and their leaders, the abundance of different perspectives in these emerging fields makes cross study comparisons difficult (Lamb and Rhodes, 2008). Also, as Maani and Maharaj (2004) noted, translating systems thinking measurable elements has remained a research challenge.…”