Mouserat

Systems Thinking in Energy Efficiency

I’ll be the first to admit that I was a little confused by direction taken by Section 3 of Systems Thinking Made Simple. While Section 1 was all about how to democratize systems thinking, so that anyone could apply to any problem, Section 3 seemed primarily targeted at company founders or CEOs. It was challenging for me to envision how I would influence the Mission -> Vision of the larger project I am working on, as an intern. However, there was one idea that jumped out at me in Chapter 11, which I thought anyone could really use to influence how their organization approaches wicked problems.

In Table 11.3 (p 208), the Cabreras summarize points for effective intervention (somewhat similar to Meadows’ system levers). A line divides the figure into top and bottom, with the bottom representing points where you may have the most influence and the top representing points where you have the least influence. I think it would be interesting to try to identify these areas of most and least influence for energy efficiency, which is the topic of my capstone project.

Convincing people in the residential sector to undertake major energy efficiency upgrades is something of a wicked problem. There’s a general lack of knowledge about how energy is used in the home and what homeowners can do to save energy. It’s also difficult to convince homeowners to pay more upfront to get more savings over the long-run, especially since most homeowners aren’t sitting down to do a complex financial analysis. Additionally, it can be difficult to convince homeowners to make upgrades they can’t see, such as insulating their home. The list goes on. Perhaps as a result of these many barriers, energy interventions can get very complicated both internally and from the perspective of the homeowner. These interventions often involve a whole slew of touchpoints, from online advertising to in-person energy audits to entire networks of installation contractors. In addition, programs are crowded with various program and market actors with differencing motivations and objectives.

I think it would be potentially enlightening to sit down and try to map out all of these different factors using the DSRP framework. I’m hoping this will yield some insight into both what the simple rules behind this complex system may be, as well as where we might have the greatest potential for change. I’m not totally sure what the outcome of this analysis will be, but I think a fresh perspective on this issue will help.

Question: Where there ideas from Systems Thinking Made Simple that you think you may be able to apply to your capstone work?  

Staking Out Our Missions and Visions

A few years back, I had the opportunity to help launch a recycling and re-use project here in Colorado.  We recycled asphalt roofing shingles and found a great new use for this recycled material, re-using those waste shingles in asphalt pavements for roads and highways and driveways and parking lots.

As a tree-hugger, I was surprised to find myself immersed in the multiple technical details of highway construction and asphalt use.  It's a vast system of people, money, materials.

But I really want to talk about mission and vision.

In Systems Thinking Made Simple: New Hope for Solving Wicked Problems, Laura and Derek Cabrera cover a lot of ground.  I stumbled and staggered through some of their territory, strolled through ripening fields of flowers in other chapters, and scratched my head through several sections.  And I relished their discussion of mission and vision.

In the Roofs to Roads project, we integrated short, clear mission vision statements, just as the Cabreras¹ affirm.  We created these for each stakeholder.  Why?  Because we had widely disparate stakeholders, with a variety of visions and systems and motivations!

(This was my secret vision: oh yeah. solar paved.)

Highway engineers wanted SAFETY and PERFORMANCE and LOW RISK, but they also wanted to follow the RULES created by then-Governor Bill Ritter, who wanted each state department (in our case, the Department of Transportation) to recycle more.  A lot more.  25% more. 

We environmentalists wanted GREEN roads and more RECYCLING, more people involved in and loving recycling.

Roofers pulling asphalt shingles off roofs wanted EASE OF OPERATIONS and LOW COST.

Road construction companies wanted CHEAPER ASPHALT so they could win more construction bids.  

Creating a shared mission/vision for the Roofs to Roads project never really occurred.  Rather, we had a multi-faceted central cohesion, where each stakeholder saw the elements they valued.  A kind of geodesic dome where each stakeholder saw mainly their own triangle, but all the triangles connected, and they understood there was a connection to other stakeholder's priorities...but really, they only cared about their own.  Our job was to create the cement between triangles. 

As the project progress, advanced, moved, we regularly reviewed the goals, motivations, mission and vision of our stakeholders, viewing the project and the system we were created from each perspective, tracking relationships, looking for feedback loops and leverage points.

Question for you:  

Is your mission and vision flexible, or even multiple?  

Do you have several stakeholders in your life (perhaps within your own mind and heart)?  

If you had a pleasing plethora of missions and visions, short powerful ones, what might they be?

 

Footnote:

1. 10 TESTS FOR EFFECTIVE MISSION→VISIONS, Cabrera, Derek; Cabrera, Laura . Systems Thinking Made Simple: New Hope for Solving Wicked Problems (Page 212). . Kindle Edition.

Metacognition and Conscious-Competence Continuum

    In 1996, teachers had problems with students passing notes. In 2006, those problems had advanced to texting, and by the time I taught in 2016 there were kids just sitting in class watching Netflix. As dramatically as the students have changed in the past two decades, the current pedagogy on how to best teach is changing as well.

            Instead of having a teacher stand in front of you and just talk at you the whole class, many schools are shifting to a student-centered approach of instruction. Most lessons under this current innovative style involve the teacher acting as a facilitator rather than a source of information. Doing so has allowed for teachers to place additional efforts on well-crafted instructional strategies and therefore metacognition has become increasingly prevalent. Making students think about their thinking leads them to be more aware of where they're stuck, they often exhibit better retention and problem-solving skills. Giving students metacognitive skills leads them to gain an “awareness of his/her learning processes, (and) leads to an increase in integrative abilities and transfer across areas of study” (Cabrera, 176).

            From a systems thinking standpoint, metacognition is the mechanism that moves people from being unconscious and incompetent to conscious and competent. Without the individuals in system moving towards conscious competence it will remain stagnant. This “consciousness and competence continuum” is necessary for systems to be comprised of systems thinkers. For example, looking at the necessary steps for transforming our current food system requires shifting more consumers to the conscious and competent part of the continuum. Hunter Lovins would be a much better person to read about transforming the food system. An unconscious incompetent food consumer might be someone who lives in a food desert without being aware of what that even is or how many nutrients they consume. Making that person think about how they think about food, or be metacognitive towards their food consumption, will bring them towards seeking out more nutrients in their diet and move them towards conscious incompetence.

Exposing people to ideas in a manner that moves them along the continuum will help us transform our systems. Like teaching metacognitive skills in one subject leading towards additional transfer across multiple subjects, teaching metacognitive skills in one system could lead to having skills to move towards more conscious competence in another system.

Question: Although personally I think of myself as reflective, I worry about what I might be unconscious and incompetent at. How do people initially become aware that they’re unconscious and incompetent at something by themselves so they can become conscious incompetent?

There's No Yin Without Yang

This week’s reading, Section 3 of Systems Thinking Made Simple, discussed how we could further develop our own systems thinking skills or help others to develop them. I thought that these chapters raised a lot of interesting points that resonated with me. One in particular was the idea of dichotomy. Dichotomy appears in various forms throughout history, science, religion, etc. It usually presents itself as polar opposites—with no “gray area” in between. Some of the examples that the Cabreras provided were left-brained vs. right-brained, heart vs. mind and yin vs. yang.

     We have been continuously learned throughout our lives that you must be more creative or more logical. Hard skills (logic and analytics) are often seen as difficult and more valuable, while soft skills (creativity and intuition) are seen as easy. Systems thinking involves developing both sets of skills. Analyzing complex systems involves depth of thinking and mental modeling.  

     The Cabreras mentioned the term “functional psychopaths” when discussing the topic of dichotomy (173), referring to smart people who have developed only analytical skills and have failed to develop their social and personal skills. Lacking these skills can cause issues in relating to others in and out of the workplace. The reading pointed out certain characteristics that one would need in order to be a “good” systems thinker and an overall well rounded person. Some include: problem solver, resilient, honest, sense of humor, curious, compassionate, self-aware and collaborative to name a few (174).

Question: Do you agree with the Cabreras and their view on dichotomous thinking (in relation to building systems thinking skills)? Why or why not?

Also, here is a short interesting video I found about dichotomy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqz53d-fYL8&t=32s

 

 

Lack of metacognition in school curriculum leading to mid-life crises?

Significant amounts of the systems thinking literature we have focused on this semester urges readers to remember that systems thinkers are not born, but emerge. In complex systems we not only need systems thinkers at the top, but also in every level of organizations. In the craziness of today's world then, why then have we not democratized systems thinking and metacognition so that it becomes incorporated into the early stages of the education system? Why are students still pushed to memorize topics as opposed to examining them, when the world we live in today is changing and self-organizing at a rate faster than you can write your note cards?

Metacognition, or increased awareness in general of one's own thought processes, was a topic addressed in this week's reading that I found especially interesting.  Imagine if metacognition was taught in public schools and not only private 'hippie' schools starting at a young age. If this way of thinking in addition to systems thinking was incorporated into early school curriculum, I do not think that our jobs as environmentalists would be as pertinent to the health of the earth as they are now. In my opinion our mental models would be clearer and represent a more accurate depiction of the world, one in which oil companies and environmental organizations would benefit from realizing that they are a part of the same exact system. 

On a lighter note, I also think that lack of metacognition and systems thinking in school curriculum has also contributed to the oh so popular quarter and mid life crises. From a young age our minds have been educated, but our hearts have potentially been forgotten in this process. We have lots of information in our brains, but much of it is flawed mental models and someone else's perspective that we have adopted as our own. We continue on this path until we are old enough to begin slightly realizing that we have no solid internal foundation for which some of our major beliefs were built upon. We understand that our system 1 thinking has had the wheel for far too long, and it is necessary to begin utilizing our system 2 thinking, which starts a long and uncomfortable process for many known as the quarter and mid life crises. Could this be avoided by democratizing systems thinking, and are we missing out on a world that is more meaningfully created and run?

In what way have you become a better systems thinker this semester?

Moore's Law and Quantum Computers

Moore’s Law is a wonderful example of exponential growth in regards to the number of microprocessor transistors we can fit on a single circuit board. It is also an example of the necessity for us to change our logic moving into the future, which I will get to later. Back in 1965, Gordon Moore first hypothesized that the number of components per integrated circuit was doubling every 18 months (Wiki). Surprisingly, this trend has continued to the present where we can now fit over 2,600,000,000 microprocessor transistors on one integrated circuit. Our current methods of computing are still based upon the same logic that they always have been. The computer takes a stream of either 0’s or 1’s and interprets each of them one at a time; hence, it’s extremely beneficial to have more and more transistors. We will eventually reach a point where this will plateau, though, and we will be forced to accept our limitations of this style of computing or evolve a new brand of logic.

            Quantum computing poses to be this leap in logic. Rather than using transistors to run the 0’s and 1’s, a single electron can be used to accomplish this task. An electron has many weird properties on the quantum level; however, and can be thought of as a magnet whose north end can be south simultaneously and vice versa for the “south” portion of the magnet. While transistors have binary possibilities, electrons tap into seemingly parallel quantum universes where they can be an infinite number different of possibilities.

            As I was reading, Systems Thinking Made Simple by Derek and Laura Cabrera I was thinking of this difference in traditional and quantum computing as they discussed our needed evolution from “bi-valent versus multi-valent logics” (Cabrera, 128). They say, “We can think of bivalent logic as having two strong positions: right or wrong, on or off, guilty or not guilty, true or false, 1 or 0” (Cabrera, 128). Contrasting that to “multivalent logic that has more than two outcomes” (Cabrera, 128).

            In science, we try to define something by what it is as specifically as possible. This reductionist method fails when we try to work with systems, though, and we end up defining something by what it is not. Bad is defined as by what is not good, efficient is defined as what is not wasteful, health is defined as what is not sick. Although defining something by what it is it takes more time, it is necessary to be competent systems thinkers.

References

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law

Finding inspiration

Today was an odd day. Despite the fact that I am constantly reminded that I seemingly aloof and not part of the group… I maintain that I am a scientist, and as such am entitled to ask weird questions, and to regularly not be within the norm. I felt happier after reminding myself that I am a scientist.

I met two people today. Both of which couldn’t be more different than one another, yet both provided my brain with fun thoughts to mull over. The first was a photographer by the name of J Henry Fair… Henry was, in the most offensive way, an artist. He could have walked into our room straight out of a Manhattan art studio and I wouldn’t have blinked an eye. And as he stood in front of the TV monitor giving us his spiel about how even Obama was bad in the face of the grater ecological world, I realized that the story his photographs were telling were precisely why I am in this masters program.

Toward the end of my tenure as an undergrad, I gave a presentation about how to illicit an emotional response in non-science folk about ecological issues. I chose to show a photo of an red fox eating its cousin, the artic fox. Now, normally these two species don’t interact. This is primarily due to the arctic fox’s fur coat being suited for snow. Yet when the snow begins to melt earlier and earlier in the season, the white coat no longer acts as camouflage, and the red fox can encroach upon its cousin’s niche. Since the arctic fox is quite a bit smaller than the red fox, and is directly competing for resources, the arctic fox becomes prey. Thus, a cute white fox being carried off by a mean red fox becomes a vehicle for discussing climate change with a broad non-scientific audience.

This sentiment was mirrored in Henry’s presentation. He uses photography verging on abstract impressionistic, to entice the viewer to ask, “what is it?” This is particularly effective in his photography of the Gulf Oil Spill ­– he creates an image which could be anything. A red cut in an otherwise blue field might as well be a flower patch, or a flock of flamingos. Yet the decidedly gorgeous scene is something truly horrific… and all of the sudden I am thinking to myself: “Henry, you have my full undivided attention…”

*

The second conversation I had today was of a completely different nature, instead of the infinite interpretation and the eventual realization of Henry’s photography, I spoke for a long time with my hair-cutter-person about the virtues of recycling. A seemingly simple conversation on the outside… However, she threw this one at me: “doesn’t it take more energy to recycle some materials that it would to make new ones?”

I thought for a bit. And said something clever… but I realized that I wish I had pulled out my phone and showed her pictures of the pacific garbage patch, or sea birds with plastic pellets in their gullet. Pictures are worth a thousand words, and I argue that they mean far more than any words that I could say.

Is meta-mapping really the best way to visualize systems?

In section two of Systems Made Simple, the Cabreras introduce their tool for system visualization: meta-mapping. As a data visualization enthusiast, I agreed with many of the points they made about not over-using colors, different shapes, and relational lines. In addition, I thought they offered an intuitive tool for visualizing systems using their DSRP framework. I thought their technique for mapping perspectives was a better visual representation of this type of information than I’ve seen in the past. In addition, I liked their method for representing part-whole relationships. However, throughout the reading, I was consistently frustrated with the premise that their tool was the only tool that could conceivably be used to visualize systems and that all other tools were useless.

I have used various pieces of powerful software (e.g. ArcGIS, Excel, R) over the years for various tasks. I’ve also been in situations where people get really excited about using these for a certain application that they were never intended to fill (one memorable example being a database of energy efficiency measures that was stored in Excel, but probably should have been in a more sophisticated database software). I’ve learned over time that while powerful, these pieces of software are ultimately just tools. While they are unquestionably useful, even necessary in certain applications, in others it’s best to pursue a different strategy.

Bringing this back to meta-mapping, I find it really hard to believe that this particular tool is the best one to use in every situation. For example, what if you are presenting a visualization of a system to someone who hasn’t read Systems Made Simple? Are they supposed to learn this new vocabulary of symbols and shapes just to read your map? Or would it be better to opt for a more universal diagram style, that people may understand more intuitively? I also found the observations about colors, shapes, and lines in diagrams, which were also discussed in this section to be true sometimes, but not all the time, as they seem to imply. They even present diagrams using different colors and shapes as examples of good practice. I wish the Cabreras would have pitched their meta-mapping approach with a more nuanced view about its utility, as well as some evidence supporting its efficacy (other than one anecdote about one classroom of five year olds).

Question: Can you think of an example of a time an analytical tool, a “buzzword” concept, or a framework was applied in a context that didn’t quite fit? How can we train ourselves to think about what tools are most useful for different scenarios?

Perspective and Exclusion

    A concept that struck me from this reading is one that Harsha touched on in her blog post: the idea of perspective when defining relationships and actors within a system.  When something is defined as being A, the opposite is categorized and defined as not-A.  This idea of exclusion-based definitions is something that our blog group touched on last week, and I think was even exemplified by Sam's blog post last week (what isn't a system?).  

    So with that in mind, I thought it would be fun to do a little thought exercise.  Using this exclusion, perspective based way of defining things, I am going to attempt to define resilience and systems thinking.  If something is resilient, then that means that it is not: rigid, unchanging, or static.  In a sense, for something to be resilient it must be always changing, or adaptive.  When it comes to complex  social systems, resilience is key in smooth operations.  

    When it comes to systems thinking, this thought exercise becomes a little bit harder.  How would you define a systems thinker? How would you define what a systems thinker is not?  As Sam discussed last week, literally everything can be defined as a system depending on how it is bounded.  However, a systems thinker is a bit easier to define.  A systems thinker is one that views the interconnected-ness of society (and other stuff) in a iterative, big picture manner.  Understanding the interactions between all elements of a system is what every systems thinker strives to do.  So, that leads me to the following question: using this perspective, exclusion based manner of definition, how would you define what a systems thinker is and is not?

Scaling Systems, Scales of Justice

The Cabreras do entertain discussion of ethics and democracy, what I think of as Justice.  As they say, "... systems thinking as a concept is a lot like democracy. You can’t do democracy in an aristocratic way. Democracy has to be of, for, and by the people." (Cabrera, D., Cabrera, L. Systems Thinking Made Simple: New Hope for Solving Wicked Problems (Page 169).  

In Chapter 9, their Systems Thinking book becomes somewhat intelligible again, for a page or so, until we're told that the essential DSRP rules are actually not the only rules, that we must learn four additional simple rules: vision, mission, culture, and learning, or VMCL. (op. cit., p. 166). 

At this point, I am seriously ready for Systems Thinking for Dummies.  But as I try to understand where they are going in looking at Circles of Influence and Circles of Control (a profound exercise for anyone who wants to change the world, transform systems, mitigate climate change), as I look at their apparent dedication to grass-roots, bottom-up democracy, I am drawn to thinking about Theory U.

This theory of transformational leadership for transformational organizations was developed by Otto Scharmer, another systems thinker from MIT like Donella Meadows.

 

Proposing the necessity for an open-hearted, intentional, and profoundly present approach to the human activity of problem solving, Scharmer invokes the exquisite perception suggested by the Cabreras as Distinction, in their example of the wise kindergartners, systems thinkers, who see the many many parts of a bus.  

We might have to hold our minds and hearts together with rubber bands or steel cables to be able to contain ourselves, but to carefully and completely observe the system of resistance to taking immediate action on climate change, according to Scharmer, would be profoundly important.

Just observing.

Then feeling, opening, releasing, deepening into a new understanding.

In this way, the power of our own nature, our own psychology, gives us roots to emerge over and over to be the grass roots that create a new field of reality.

So be it.