T172 P-1

1- Thinking about expectations: Learning by experience:Q: What are the two components of experiencing?1- The quality of attention that allows me to notice the experience and its components.

2- The memory.Q: What is meant by Learning?

A: It is what I take away from the experience process that influences my behavior or thinking in the future.Q: When do you distinguish Learning as about effective action?A: When I, or another observer, recognize that I can perform what I was unable to perform before.

The nature of systems thinking and systems practice:

Q: Where does systems thinking and systems practice arise from?

A: from the particular ways of seeing the world.

Q: What are the important features of systems thinking?1- It respects complexity; it doesn't pretend it's not there.2- It attends to the connections between things, events and ideas.3- It makes complexity manageable by taking a broader perspective, by breaking down problems into their component parts.4- It works towards understanding the big picture.

5- It provides tools (mean diagrams, models, and SWOT analysis) for thought and the opportunity for a powerful way of looking at the world or at the any situation in the real world.

Q: What is meant by respecting complexity?

1- Accepting that sometimes our understanding is incomplete.2- Accepting that there is more than one way to understand complexity.

3- Accepting that our view is partial and provisional and other people will have a different view.

4- Accepting that when experiencing a situation or an issue as complex, we dont always know whats included in the issue and whats not.Q: When does complexity become frightening?

A: When we assume that we should be able to solve it.Q: How does Systems thinking allow us to let go of the notion that "Complexity can be quite scary"?A: By allowing us to:

1- Use a multiplicity of interpretations and models to form views and ideas about the complexity.2- How to comprehend it.3- How to act purposefully within.Q: What does the attention to relationships between things, events and ideas means?

A: It means that I can observe patterns of connection that give rise to larger wholes, which gives rise to emergence.

Q: Why systems thinking is fundamentally about relationship and process?

1- Because it is often the relationships between things, events and ideas that give them their meaning.2- Because it attends to the connections between things, events and ideas.3- Because it gives them equal status with the things, events and ideas themselves.Q: What are the natures of the relationships between a given set of elements?

1- Causal (A causes, leads to, or contributes to, B).2- Influential (X influences Y and Z).3- Temporal (P follows Q).4- Related to embeddedness (M is part of N). Q: What does thinking systemically about these connections include?

A: It includes being open to recognizing that the patterns of connection are more often web-like than linear chains of connection.Q: The approach "making complexity manageable by taking a broader perspective" is powerful for some problems and hopeless for others, Give an example for the hopeless ones?A: For example, it now seems clear that climate change induced by human activity is likely to have major impacts on the planet, its environments, and its living organisms, including people. But all of these effects are so interdependent it is impossible to discover what the effects are likely to be by breaking the problem down.Q: How does Systems thinking make complexity understandable?A: It characteristically moves one's focus in the opposite direction, working towards understanding the big picture.

Q: What are the two main drivers of the significant advances in Systems theory During the 1980s and 1990s?

1- The tremendous advance in computing capability.2- The renewed synergy between biology and Systems.

Appreciating epistemological issues:

Q: What is meant by epistemology?

A: It is the branch of philosophy that deals with knowledge and knowing, such as;

1- How do I know about the outside world? 2- How do I know my senses are not fooling me? 3- What constitutes evidence about the world?Q: What does recognizing that "the world is unknowable as it is" present to you?

A: It presents me with a choice. How do i deal with the day-to-day observations and events that seem to emerge from it? Each person, once they become aware of this unknowability, is confronted with, and needs to make their own choice.

Q: What are three main poles that cluster around each choice under the notion "the world is unknowable"?

1- Adopting a stance that the world is more-or-less as I see it, and to ignore the incompleteness of my viewpoints and my representations. This is equivalent to saying there is no epistemological problem about the world as I see it.

2- Deciding that the world is more-or-less as I see it but to recognize that my viewpoint is limited and the view-from-here may be misleading because it is only partial there is no view of the roof, to use my previous metaphor. This is a stance that accepts that I must be careful to explore the world as fully as I can because I cannot see everything and may be misled trying to account for my own role in my perceptions of the world

3- Taking on fully the implications of the world's unknown-ability. This stance demands that I always carry awareness that I will never know the world and must therefore always be.Q: What are of the mental attitudes you should try to adopt?1. Being open and sensitive to all kinds of information about a situation. Not just so-called factual information but impressions, intuitions and hunches, including other people's when they express them.2. Being willing and able to see the situation from all kinds of points of view in addition to my own.3. Being as open as I can be to seeing the situation and not letting my theories, presuppositions and assumptions tell me how I ought to see it.4. Not taking terms of reference, boundaries or constraints too seriously by trying to assume they may not be as rigid as they seem to be.5. Trying to find out how other people see the constraints and boundaries.6. Being wary of any solution to a complex question (including my own solutions).7. Enjoying diversity and complexity in a situation; resisting the temptation to discard inconvenient bits of information; paying more, rather than less, attention to awkward facts, impressions or ideas.8. Not minding too much if there are areas of uncertainty in my understanding, or bits of information I don't have; being skeptical about the facts I do have.Q: What are the things that you can include in your thinking about a complex situation?

1. The preceding history and the wider context of the situation.2. Information about how people (including you) involved in the situation feel about it; what are the hunches, intuitions and suspicions they, and you, have about it.3. Information about the dynamics (procedures, flows, communications, feelings) of the situation as well as the structure (roles, organization framework, boundaries, materials, components) and how the process and structure fit together.4. Information about how the situation appears to other people, including those around the situation as well as those directly involved.5. Attention to what is not going on and what is not present.

2- Experiencing complexity:Q: What are the objectives of using diagrams in systems case-study work?1. A powerful tool to analyze a situation and helps us to understand how complex system work.

2. Help in dealing with complex materials, content and getting organized.

3. Represent our understanding and ideas in simple and easy way.

4. Explore our capabilities, opinions, thoughts.

5. Diagrams are just like words, through them, we can see others ideas and we get a vision of what theyre trying to say and what theyre trying to achieve.6. The idea of drawing a diagram is like we are trying to visually represent our understanding and ideas.7. Highlights certain information and relationship between ideas in the situation that are not visible in text.

8. Diagram enables us to explore our understanding in a dynamic way and enables you to identify patterns of interconnection. 9. The diagram is like a captured piece of your understanding of the complexity.

Q: What are the overall objectives of using diagrams in systems case-study work?A: Overall, diagrams help in clarifying your thinking because they summarize complex situations allowing you to see complexity and individual components and their relationships. They also give new visions and ideas in a certain situation by letting you think carefully about the components and their connections to each other helping you to learn more effectively.

Q: What are the main outcomes you expect from a Rich Picture diagram?A: It allows you to have the whole of the situation spread out in front of you. You can see all the components, events, facts, values, opinions and emotions expressed by all the stakeholders.

Q: What are the five traps of the rich picture? 1. Representing the problem not the situation: Does the rich picture represent the situation or is it just my interpretation of what the problem is? Does it include all the features noted as problematic?2. The Impoverished rich picture: not include everything seem important to or related to the situation. To avoid this trap is to ask: Have I included everything I know about the situation in my representation of it?

3. Including my own analyses, interpretations and structuring: is this rich picture telling just one story or is it rich enough to suggest lots of stories about whats going on?

4. Words and wordiness: Too many words this can reduce the richness of the picture. To check the avoiding of this trap is to ask: Do I have to do a lot of reading to see the relationships between elements in the picture?5. The final version trap: assuming the rich picture is finished or it is the final version. To avoid this trap is to ask: Have I had any new insights about the complex situation since I last added something to this picture.

Q: What are the main outcomes you expect from a System map diagram?A: Systems map diagram will clarify structures and relationships between structural entities in the situation. They allow you to structure features of a situation in a number of different ways.Q: what are the processes of drowning a system map?

1. A system of interest is one that a system thinker chooses to focus their interest on.

2. Find the purpose: because in complex situation we find the mess has arisen because somewhere at some time some had a purpose, tried to achieve it, but their intention got lost in the unintended consequences of what they did. The question to use for identify the purpose, what components exist, who brought them, and why.

3. Drawing a system map: drawing effective system map lies in finding appropriate balance. The balance lies somewhere between the learning, which comes from the process of drawing the maps, and the use I might make of the end product.

4. Boundary: represent a boundary between a system and its environment.

Q: What are the main outcomes you expect from Influence diagram?

1. It will clarify the dynamic relationship between events, effects and structure.Q: What are characteristics of Influence diagram?

1. It looks to Interconnectedness as another way of structuring complexity.

2. In the influence diagram we search for interconnection in the form of influence to hold together a structure that resolves some of complexity. 3. There are two way of looking for influence connection;

a. Start from system map; modify it and adapting to identify the principle interconnections.

b. Start by identifying the component of the complexity that seem to be influential and building the influence diagram from there.

Q: What are the main outcomes you expect from Multiple Cause diagram?

A: Drawing multiple-cause diagrams allows for the identification of systems of causation. Such a system can be pictured as an interconnected group of events or effects; the effect is of a system that behaves as if its purpose were to cause other events and effects.

Q: What are characteristics of Multiple Cause diagram?

1. It is useful in investigating.

2. It uses the interconnectedness as means to looking for causation.

3. Allow you to explore the origins of particular events or effects. 4. If one input cause is removed, the output effects continue to happen because feedback loop are present or there are other causes that lead to effects.

5. The power of multiple cause diagram consider as a heart of any complexity.

Q: What are the main outcomes you expect from Control model diagram?

A: It allows you to explore what is needed if a system is to fulfill its purpose.Q: What are characteristics of Control model diagram?

1. Useful in investigating purpose and the means to achieve it.

2. Provide a structure for exploring the question what X trying to achieve, and how they do it, and how they know they done it.

3. Allow to decide whether the elements are in place to support the achievement of the purpose and whether if they are the right element.

4. If the control does not work well, it is because the system is not connected together or some of the elements are mess matched.

5. The output from the control model is description of the reason for its failure to effect the transformation, or achieve the purpose it was meant to achieve.

Q: What are the main outcomes you expect from Sign graph diagram?

A: It will show something about sensitivities between variables. Q: What are characteristics of Sign graph diagram?

1. Not usually use to structure the understanding of the complexity which makes set less useful in the task of searching for system within the complex situation.

2. They can help to sort out how and why variable in the system change so first we should identify variables either from text or rich picture.

3. A sign graph would help to discover the influences that would increase the amount of contribution collected and those that decrease the contributions. 3- Understanding systems approaches to managing complexityA: What are the four balls a system practitioner must juggle?

1. B: Being a practitioner with a particular tradition of understanding

2. E: Engaging with the real world situation

3. C: Contextualizing a particular approach to a new situation

4. M: Managing your involvement in the situation. Q: What are the main skills of system practitioner?1. To learn through experience.2. To manage the relationship between approach and real world.

3. Adopting approach.

Q: As a system practitioner, what does "Being" mean to you?

1. It is understanding situation and be aware about it.

2. I see the situation, which are in front of me and immerse myself, as I am part of it. 3. It Refer to our awareness and our ethics of action and responsibility. Q: How does practitioner engages in a situation?A: This depends on his background, the experience of being the practitioner. Q: As a system practitioner, what does "Engaging" mean to you? 1. Engaging mean from my experience I will see how the situation look like to me if it is complex or messy.2. Real world could be experience as simple or complicated or as situation or as system. So how I concern or engage with it I will see situation.

Q: As a system practitioner, what does "Contextualizing" mean to you? 1. Contextualizing mean from my skills learning through experience how I'm going to deal with the situation. 2. It means, also, how to put system practitioner approaches into context (contextualizing) for taking action in the real world.

Q: As a system practitioner, what does "Managing" mean to you? A: To start managing my situation and see my performance and deal with the situation as a system practitioner and start find solutions.

Being a systems practitionerQ: State the activity-sequence of "being" a system practitioner?

1. Some of the special features of being human include consciousness, language, emotions and the capacity to reason or rationalize.

2. Review modeling in the modeling pack

3. Being aware of the constraints and possibilities of the observer.

4. Appreciating your basis for understanding by:

a. Distinguish between history and tradition.

b. Distinguish between systemic and systematic thinking and action.

5. Being ethical.

6. Reviewing some implications for practice of juggling the "Being".Q: What is Kolbs model used for? Draw it stating with experience.A: The model experiential learning used as a conceptual basis for the design of all sorts of processes from curricula to consultancies, and it is powerful model.

Q: Distinguish between systemic thinking and systematic thinking?

Systemic thinking

( )Systematic thinking

()

1Concern with whole and said that they emerge from their parts.The whole can be understood by considering parts by linear cause-effect mechanisms.

2Boundaries of systems are determined by perspectives of those who participate in formulating them. The result is a system of interest.System exists as concrete entities.

3Combine individual perspectives which provide multiple partial perspectives.perspective is not important

4Systems are characterized by feedback.Analysis is linear

5Systems cannot be understood by analysis of the component of part, but understood by studying the interconnectionsSituation can be understood by step by step analysis

6Concentrate on basic principles of organization.Concentrates on basic building blocks.

7ContextualAnalytical

8Concerned with processConcerned with entities and properties

9The properties of the whole system are destroyed when the system is dividedThe system can be reconstructed after studying the components

Q: explain the difference between systemic and systematic actions? Systemic ActionSystematic Action

1The espoused role and the action of the decision maker is very much part of an interacting ecology of system.The espoused role of the decision maker as a central theme, the decision maker claims to be objective and outside the system being studied.

2Ethics are perceived as being multileveled as are the levels of systems themselves.Ethics and value are not integrated into the change process.

3It is interaction of the practitioner and the system of interest with its context that is the main focus of exploration and change.The system being studied is seen as open system, but intervention is performed as closed system

4Perception and action are based on experience of the world.Perception and action are based on real world.

5Explore the tradition of understanding in which the practitioner is immersedTraditions of understanding may not be questioned and the methods of analysis may be evaluated.

Q: give a suitable example of systemic actions?

A: When the doctor tells his patient that he or she has a systemic lupus or a systemic infection then this means that the patient is experiencing a generalized infection all throughout the entirety of his or her body. The entire system (the human body) is affected thats why the case is already systemic. This also implies that the health prognosis is poor because the infection has spread.

Q: give a suitable example of systematic actions?

A: If you have a consistent method of cleaning the bedroom first, followed by the living room and lastly the dining room then more or less you can be described as cleaning your house systematicallyQ: What are the main ways you need to be self-aware as a practitioner? Q: What are the advantages of each way of awareness? Q: What are the traps if you do not have self-aware?

Way of being awareAdvantagesPotential traps when missing

1. By attempting to surface your traditions of understanding so that you can be aware of the choices you make in tracking your practice. Knowing what theory informs your practice, choosing new theoretical frameworks is available. You remain unaware of your own prejudices.

You have theories that are not suited to the context.

2. By refining, you become epistemologically aware, and able to think and act systemically or systematically. Increase the choices you have as a practitioner, alter your approach from describing system to designing system of interest. Conflict (including passive aggression) arises when your truth claim perspective is asserted over someone else's.

Collaborative action is more difficult.

3. By appreciating the constraints & possibilities of the observer & how this awareness questions the commonly accepted notion of objectivity & replaces it with that of responsibility Avoid mistaken reliance on objectivity.

Enables a richer appreciation of what is involved in human communication. Avoid taking responsibility for actions.

Avoid being ethical.

4. By seeking to embody your systems thinking in practice

More able to contextualize your practice.

You appreciate the history of the situation in which you are practicing. Your actions are restricted to the theoretical rather than form praxis (combining theory and practice).

5. By adding an ethical dimension to your work. Increase the choices available to stakeholder. You take responsibility for others without their agreement.

Q: How can a system practitioner be ethical?

1. Ethics within systemic practice are perceived as operating on multiple levels (ex: like the system concept of hierarchy, what we perceive to be good at one level might be bad at another).

2. Ethics and value within systematic practice are not addressed as a central theme unless the practitioner is aware of the choice they are making, since the choices made have ethical implication. If there is no awareness, they are not integrated into the change process because the practitioner or researcher takes an objective stance that excludes ethical considerations.

3. The ethical is always tried to act to increase the number of choices available, since, the more freedom ones has, the more choices he has, & the better chance that people will take responsibility for their own actions.

Engaging with complexity:

Q: State the activity-sequence of "Engaging" with complexity?

1. Clear your appreciation of complexity.

2. Experiencing complexity as mess or difficulty.

3. Exploring complexity, "where is the complexity? What is it?"4. Choosing to distinguish between complex situations and complex systems

5. Appreciating some implications for engaging with a situation regarded as "mess, difficulty, complex or simple system". Q: What are the three features a practitioner might use to distinguish a mess from a difficulty? 1. Messes are made up from a network of problems and opportunities that will be described differently by different people engaged in the situation; what is a problem for one person may be an opportunity for another. By contrast a difficulty will be described much the same, even from a diversity of perspectives.

2. The improvement in a mess is not just the sum of the improvements in its component parts. The improvements in a difficulty are easier to identify and describe and it is easier to identify how they came about.

3. Because a mess is a set of external conditions that causes dissatisfaction, a judgment about whether or not it has been improved, and by how much will depend upon the perspective of the observer. The improvement in a difficulty will be generally agreed upon by observers from any perspective.

Q: Is any one of these distinguishing features more significant than the other?

A: To deal with messes requires a holistic or systems approach; therefore it makes little sense to distinguish one feature as more important than another. A core concept at the heart of the idea of mess is, however, that of emergence, meaning the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Q: State some features of messes and difficulties according to Ackoffs points?1. A problem or an opportunity is an ultimate element abstract from a mess.

2. Problems or opportunities do not exist in isolation, although it is possible to isolate them conceptually.

3. A mess may comprise both problems and opportunities; what is a problem for one person may be an opportunity for another.

4. No mess can be solved by solving each of its components problems / opportunities independently of the others because no mess can be decomposed into independent components.

5. Simple situations do exist that can be improved by extracting one problem from them and solving it. These are called difficulties.Q: What is Russell Ackoff view of the system?

A: Russell Ackoff claimed for a set of elements to be usefully viewed as a system, it was necessary that:

1. The behavior of each element of the set should have an effect on the behavior of the whole set.2. The behavior of the elements, and their effects on the whole set, should be interdependent.3. However subgroups of the elements are formed, each subgroup should have the same effect on the behavior of the whole and none should be completely independent.Q: What is Schoderbeck description of the complexity?

A: Schoderbeck described the complexity of what they regarded as a real or physical system as arising from the interaction of:

1. The number of elements comprising the system, for example, the number of chips on a circuit board.

2. The attributes of the specified elements of the system.3. The number of interactions among the specified elements of the system, for example, the number of neuronal connections in the brain.4. The degree of organization inherent in the system, Ex. the social arrangements in a beehive or an ants nest.

Q: What are the differences between simple system, complex (hard) system and complex (hard) adaptive system?

Simple systemsComplex systemsComplex adaptive systems

Have predictable behavior; e.g. a fixed interest bank account.Generate counterintuitive behavior (full of surprises); e.g. lower taxes and interest rate leading to higher unemployment.The elements of a system can change themselves.

Few interactions and feedback or feed forward loops; e.g. a simple barter economy with few goods and services.Large array of variables with many interactions and feedback or feed forward loops;Complex outcomes results from few simple rules.

Centralized decision making; e.g. power is concentrated among a few decision makers.Decentralized decision makingSmall changes can have big effects and large changes may have no effects.

DecomposableirreducibleThrive on tension and paradox.

Q: For each of the following situations, decide whether it is best considered as a mess or a difficulty?1. The group that runs a local orchestra continually argues about whether they should stick with popular classics or venture into more difficult and less popular pieces. (M)2. Joan wants to send a computer file to Ray, but they use incompatible types of computer software. (D)3. Jack is buying a new car and his most important criterion for choice is fuel economy. (D)4. An environment agency has legislative responsibility for controlling pollution but the fines imposed on polluters are minimal. (M) Contextualizing systems approaches:Q: Discuss in brief the Contextualizing in BECM process.

A: Contextualizing means from my skills learning through experience how I'm going to deal with the situation. How to put approaches into context (contextualizing) for taking action in the real world?

Q: What does the phrase putting into context describes?

A: It describes the process of contextualization involved in the choice of approach. An aware practitioner is able to contextualize a different collection of methods at their disposal to create an opportunity for a greater range of advantageous changes in the real world situation.

Q: What is the challenge for the system practitioner?

A: It is to be able to engage in double learning. "Learning about the domain and learning about the approach to the domain as well as juggling the other balls BECM".

Q: What are the main skills of system practitioner in order to contextualize system approaches? 1. To learn through experience.

2. To manage the relationship between approach and real world.

3. Adopting approach.Q: What is meant by "approach"?

A: An approach is ( a way of going about taking action in a real world situation. Q: What are system approaches? The choices can be made for coping with complexity is to approach the world systemically using system thinking. Everyday ways we use adjectives to describe the world approach. Some that come to mind are: 1- Scientific approach.2- Reductionist approach.3- Empirical approach. 4- Critical approach.

5- Philosophical approach6- Experimental approach.7- Spiritual approach. 8. Practical approach. Some of these approaches to taking action seem to operate at different levels - both systems and science could be seen as meta-disciplines and different approaches could be taken in both by an aware practitioner. Systemic & a systematic approach can be encompassed within a system approach, by an aware practitioner.

Q: What are the three categories / groups (or the nine conditions) for assessing the adequacy of design of any system of interest, according to churchman?

A: Churchman has identified nine conditions for assessing the adequacy of design of any system of interest, he identifies these condition into three groups: MotivationControlExpertise

1System is teleological.

System has teleological components which co-produce the measure of performance of systemSystem has a designer who influences the decision maker.

2System has a measure of performance. System has an environmentThe designer aims to maximize system's value to the client.

3There is a client whose interests are served by system. System has a decision maker who can produce change in the measure of performance of system's components.There is a built in guarantee that the purpose of system defined by the designer's notion of the measure of performance can be achieved and secured.

Q: As system practitioners, why we need to identify the purpose is an important process?

1. Particular actions will differ from observer to observer because of their different perspectives, which arise from their traditions of understanding.

2. A systems practitioner must adopt different stakeholders' perspectives.

3. Even if we do not ascribe purposes to our own actions, another observer may infer our purposes by observing our actions and their outcomes.

4. To managing purposeful and purposive differences.

Q: What is meant by purposeful behavior? Give an example.

A: It means a behavior that is willed, there is some sense of voluntary action. In other words; I will do it because it will be useful and benefit for me. Example: A group of friends who eat together regularly at the local pub are enthusiastic about football and decide rather than just watching and talking about it they will form their own team. This they do. (willed action).

Q: What is meant by purposeful behavior? Give an example.

A: It means behaviors to which an observer can attribute purpose following the logic of the purposeful, system that can be seen to have an imposed purpose that they seek to achieve are called purposive systems. I will in force to do it to achieve what I want even I not like to do it. Example: A manager sees that there are that are not satisfied with the after-sales support, as a result, he imposes on us to change our ways of operating even though we think differently. (It is an imposed action).

Q: What is meant by purposeful systems? A: They are systems that can be seen to articulate their own purposes as well as seek them. This system cant be controlled as well known its results. Within this system, people can pursue the same purpose.

Q: What is meant by Purposive systems? A: They are systems that can be seen to have an imposed purpose that they seek to achieve. This system can be controlled and known its results.

Q: What are differences between 'hard' and 'soft' traditions of system thinking: systemic and systematic actions? The hard systems thinking traditionThe soft systems thinking tradition

Systematic approach.Systemic approach

2Oriented to goal seeking.Oriented to learning.

3Assume the world contains system that can be engineered. Assume the world is problematical by can be explored by using system models.

4Assume system models to be models of the world. Assume system models to be intellectual constructs.

5Talks the language of problem and solution.Talks the language of issue and accommodations.

Q: What are the advantages and disadvantages of the hard systems thinking tradition?

1. Advantages ( Allows the use of powerful techniques.

2. Disadvantages (May lose touch with aspects beyond the logic of the problem situation.

Q: What are the advantages and disadvantages of the soft systems thinking tradition?1. Advantages ( Is available to all stakeholders including professional practitioner.

2. Disadvantages ( Does not produce the final answer and it accepts that inquiry is never-ending.

Q: Describe how, if, the given situation exemplifies the process of contextualizing:

Ahmed has just finished a systems course at University. Most of his colleagues at work are not really interested in these ideas and dont really understand them but he found a lot of the tools useful in thinking about his situation. Because of this, he has sometimes suggested using a particular systems diagramming tool when he thought his colleagues would be receptive to the idea.A: As a ware practitioner Ahmed should focus on the thinking that enables him to use the right tools, techniques and methods in the right context for effecting action. This occurs by some steps:

1. Describing the system approach.

2. How the system approach relates to purposeful behavior on the part of the practitioner.

3. Distinguish between tools, techniques, methods.

4. The process that Ahmed will use is to ask: what experiences did individuals or groups have that led them to develop particular system approaches for managing complexity?

5. Finally, the proper approach used in contextualizing in the real world.Q: What is meant by "a method" in systems thinking? Give an example.

A: It is a systematic procedure, technique, or inquiry employed by or proper to particular discipline or art. It is also known as a systematic procedure, technique, of doing something.

Example: If a practitioner engages with a method and follows it, like a recipe or an instructions manual for assembling something, regardless of the situation then it remains method.

Q: What is meant by "Methodology" in systems thinking? Give an example.

A: It is a body of methods, rules employed by a discipline; it can be adopted by a particular user in a participatory situation.

Example: If the method is not regarded as a formula but as, guidelines to process, and the practitioner takes responsibility for learning from the process, it can become methodology. Q: What is meant by "Tools" in systems thinking? Give an example.A: Within systems practice, a tool is usually something abstract, such as a diagram, used in carrying out a tracking down, affecting a purpose, or facilitating an activity.

Example: a system map is considered as a tool; with practice it becomes a technique. Q: What is meant by "Technique" in systems thinking? Give an example.A: Technique is concerned with both the skill and the ability of doing or achieving something and the manner of its completion, such as drawing a diagram in a prescribed manner.

Example: would be drawing a systems map to a specified set of conventions. Checking personal reactions and investments in situations. In use, it could be a method or it could become incorporated into a methodology.

Q: What are the Types of Systems Methods?

1- Hard system method (HSM).

2- Soft system method (SSM).3- Viable system model (VSM).

4- Open University systems failures method.5- Systems dynamics.

6- The Critical system thinking (CST).Q: What are the characteristics of hard system method (HSM)?

A: It could be taught as dealing with aspects of decision making that are designed to prevent problems and messes from occurring and also recognizing opportunities and seizing them in an optimal way. The HS-method does not take this explicitly into account.

Q: What are the characteristics of Soft system method (SSM)?

A: It is essentially an investigation and design method. SS-method gives effective guidelines that might be expected to bring about improvements in a problem situation. It offers a high probability of improving things, but has no test of optimality. Q: What are the characteristics of viable system model (VSM)?A: Viable system model: (software package called Viplan) shifting from goal-seeking (Hard) to soft systems.

Q: What are the characteristics of Open University systems failures method?A: Their motivation was to discover the ways failures in organizations can best be understood. They observe that one of the best ways people learn is from their mistakes. Q: What are the characteristics of Systems dynamics method?A: building a computer simulation model to describe the behavior of any particular system under study, followed by experimentation with the model in order to derive suitable policy options for modifying the behavior of the real system.

Q: What are the characteristics of the Critical system thinking (CST)?A: It is regarded as a system approach to research and intervention in complex situation. CST it is argued, is a debate within the system research community around three themes:

1. Critical awareness is a process that involves boundary critique by considering in formalized ways the question of where and by whom boundary judgments around system of interest are made. This involves examining and reexamining taken-for-granted assumptions.

2. Improvement is defined temporarily and locally, taking issues of power into account. It is argued that critical awareness is required to surface different viewpoints in any attempts at purposeful action.

3. Methodological pluralism uses a variety of systems methods that are flexible, dynamic and locally decidable. Managing complexity:Q: What is meant by System?

A: A simple definition of a system is an assembly of components interconnected as if they had a purpose. The components are affected by being the system and the behavior of the system is changed if they leave itQ: What is meant by System of interest?

A: A system of interest is one that a systems thinker chooses to focus their interest on. Q: What are the seven factors that increased the relevance of system thinking to policy making and to the function of government (Geoff Mulgan)

A: Geoff Mulgan identified seven factors that increased the relevance of systems thinking to policy making and to the functions of government. These were:

1. The expansion of information flows, especially within government itself.

2. Pressure on social policy to be more holistic.

3. The growing importance of the environment, especially climate change.

4. Connectedness of system brings new vulnerabilities.

5. Globalization and the ways in which this integrates previously discrete system.

6. Need for ability to cope with ambiguity and non-linearity.

7. Planning and rational strategy.

Q: When a systems practitioner can call a system "complex"?

A: When he tries to make sense of it using systems thinking and found, or formulated, a system of interest within it.

Q: Who can we explore complexity (become familiar with the complexity)?

1. We must look for systems or elements of systems. Then we use the systems to understand the situation.

2. Consolidating our previous understanding of systems.

3. Acquiring skills to assess the quality of our own diagrams.

Q: What are the characteristics of managing complexity?1. Have a stake in the issue "an interest".2. Need a purpose for engaging with the real world situation.3. Fundamental choice faces both systems theorists and complexity theorists is choosing to see system or complexity either

4. As something that exists and can be discovered, measured, modeled, manipulated, maintained or predicted

5. As something we construct, design, or experience in relationship to something, event, situation, or issue because of the distinctions or theories we embody.

6. Complexity is a property of something.

7. Complexity refers to the condition of the universe, which is too rich and varied for us to understand in simple, common mechanistic or linear ways.

8. Complexity is something we experience, so what is complex will differ depending on who is experiencing.

9. Complexity 'something' is used to describe a new way of thinking about the world, a new paradigm.

10. Complexity deal with the nature of emergence, innovation, learning and adaptation.

11. Complexity is an organizing adjective result in different metaphor.

Q: Why does diagramming a complex situation in very important tool for a systems practitioner?

1. The essence of using diagrams is captured in the idea of getting to grips with complexity.

2. Producing a diagram enables us to explore our understanding in a dynamic way and enables you to identify patterns of interconnection.

3. The diagram is like a captured piece of our understanding of the complexity.

4. They allow the system practitioner to impose some structure on complex, and possibly problematic, situation.

5. Variation between diagrams will be in terms of perspectives, or they will explore different aspect of situation.

6. The system map will illuminate structures and relationships between structural entities in the situation.

7. The influence diagram and multiple cause diagrams will illuminate the dynamic relationship between events, effects and structure.

8. The sign graphs will show something about sensitivities between variables.Done by: Abdulrahman Alenazi (), Saudi BrunchPage 12