Exploring Wicked Problems: Understanding Complexity and Innovation
Wicked problems or Three Body Problem?
Wicked problems, known for their intricate interconnections and multifaceted nature, pose formidable challenges in tackling societal issues. Their complexity often defies straightforward solutions, necessitating innovative approaches and deep understanding. These problems defy simple solutions due to their complexity.
Part of what's missing: Simple solutions often lacks an understanding of moving targets and changing parameters as described in software development. While there are outstanding researchers in both industry and academia, it's essential to emphasise the importance of a comprehensive understanding of the challenges, particularly in addressing wicked problems.
This, however, requires a few parts.
Navigating Complexity: Trust, Biases, and Changing Parameters
One being able to trust the information shared which requires both an understanding of the interviewees, their biases, their incentives and motivations, their behaviours, as well as understanding the complexity of moving parts in the organisation itself.
The complexity extends to organisational analysis, methodologies, and training, often compounded by a limited understanding of complex human behaviours and their impacts on decision-making processes. How and why those affect information provided by organisations, people, and businesses. How business models affect drivers in organisations and how these do not align from department to department, and person to person. All these drivers differ, but within organisations. And the complexity adds when bringing in other organisations, societal changes, and forces.
Another compromat of this is the velocity and speed of research. If you are studying a wicked problem, within 18-36 months it could well be that almost all aspects of this wicked problem have changed including large stakeholders (politicians, CEO's, board members). This requires a fundamental understanding of which parts are able to change and how to foresee their trajectories including projecting potential developments.
The Three-Body Problem: An Analogy for Wicked Problems
During a discussion with Michael Heron at the masters program of Game Design and Programming at Chalmers University and Gothenburg University, he shared an insight and drew parallels between wicked problems and the three-body problem when listening to me explaining the complexity, offering an captivating analogy to illustrate the complex dynamics inherent in societal challenges.
Michael provided this context regarding a project we are both part of. This is also connected to tools we have built at amoeba, so it affects a lot of different areas since we work with societal changes, economics, resource management, innovation, behaviour science.
"In physics and classical mechanics, the three-body problem is the problem of taking the initial positions and velocities (or momenta) of three point masses and solving for their subsequent motion according to Newton's laws of motion and Newton's law of universal gravitation. Unlike two-body problems, the three-body problem has no general closed-form solution. The resulting dynamical system of three bodies orbiting each other is chaotic for most initial conditions, and in most cases the only way to determine their positions is to calculate them using numerical methods. The three-body problem is a special case of the n-body problem."
In plain terms, the three body problem is problematic due to the irrationality and unpredictability of movements. Just like the nth order of consequence, or exponential effects, the three body problem makes it hard, or impossible to predict a shape that alters and changes over time.
And of course none of my experiences is an actual three body problem, but it applies as a good model for both wicked problems and exponential effects for the nth order of consequence. The theory is interesting to dissect and works very well on how to explain the complexity of moving targets, unpredictability, and how to go about it.
In these terms, I have encountered many three body problems, and one of the most successful examples I have regarding "solving the impossible" was when I was working at a large, international games developer and got results that no one have been near before. Or after.
Solving the Impossible: Strategies for Addressing Wicked Problems
The main challenge is to find out the root cause of the forces of the problem, whereas they are hidden, in plain sight, in primary or secondary effects, or in a cascade of consequence steps.
In very simple terms, the problem with the three celestial bodies is that they affect each other. Creating unpredictible patterns when you are looking at the problem at a whole. But these problems can never be solved as a whole, the need to be broken down with a breakdown analysis of components, parts, effectors, forces, and influences. And there needs to be an awareness of a(e)ffects in streams both upwards and downwards. That is why the term three body problem is useful.
If we can slow down these effects gradually so that they do not affect each other as much, we would be able to create a stable environment over time.
Analytical Tools for Addressing Wicked Problems
Effectively addressing wicked problems necessitates a nuanced understanding of human behavior. For instance, insights from behavioural economist Dan Ariely's research in 'Predictably Irrational' shed light on the intricacies of human decision-making, offering valuable perspectives for devising effective solutions. For example the book illuminates the disparities between individuals' stated preferences and their actual behaviours, offering valuable insights for problem-solving strategies. To me, the work they are conducting it amazing, inspiring. If you are interested in how human capital (how we treat people) can predict the Stockmarket, I recommend listening in to this podcast.
Drawing from my experience in a multinational game development company, I spearheaded initiatives to address complex challenges akin to the 'three-body problem.' By implementing innovative strategies and tools, our department achieved unparalleled efficiency gains, surpassing industry benchmarks by far which included production, quality, quantity, innovation, and re-usability.
Within a fraction of the usual timeframe, our department achieved remarkable results—delivering ten times more features at a quality level four times higher than previous standards. And these was also was able to be used globally by other studios, teams, engineers, and artists.
Creating Stable Environments: Applying Insights from the Three-Body Problem
Steps of a breakdown mapping analysis
领英推荐
So, in extremely simplistic manner, regarding the three body problem in a celestial body. If you were able to create small anti-gravity devices. For example satellites or sails that others could easily replicate and manoeuvre. These would be able to gradually slow down the gravital impact and over time create a stable environment.
And of course, this is not how physics work, but in the terms of human behaviour and wicked problems, this would be applicable.
And I also want to clearly state that I am no physician, scholar, or theorist. But I am interested in how things work. Why, the effects and then I do experiments around this to be able to better understand the scenarios and world we live in.
Explaining me and my basic formula:
Stupidity (not educated, so no prestige) + curiosity + imagination + drive = me.
To navigate the complexities of wicked problems, it is imperative to develop analytical tools that can effectively address the multifaceted nature of these challenges. These tools should prioritise simplicity without sacrificing depth, enabling almost real-time data analysis and informed decision-making to effectively address the dynamic nature of wicked problems.
In a lot of environments in todays world, when doing research and analysis in organisation development, it is possible, or maybe even probable, that the thesis for analysis have changed so much from the inception that the thesis could be obsolete.
In our situation at the large games developer, the complexity that no one could solve, I created "anti-gravitational" devices that enabled each "body", or solar-system, top be able to apply these devices to their specific set of problems instead of generic.
So, in that example, we were able to create the most efficient department and tools. We were over five times more efficient compared to the next "best" department. We were even so efficient that some in senior management did not understand what we did until years after. Personally I continued to get calls and emails asking about what we did, how we did it, and on how people tried to replicate and fail at it.
Reflections and Insights: Lessons Learned from Experience
Part of being in a large corporation is that people skim of each others ideas and try to steal the credit from others. And of course this happened here as well, so I set up a series of small tests to see who we could trust. Presented parts of the solution and ideas to people and had workshops for one or two hours, and see what they did with it. Just enough for people to be able to get it, but not the actual, core functionality. The drivers of the solutions.
Therefore, it was not surprising when, eight months later, these ideas and solutions were presented to the whole organisation — albeit without a comprehensive grasp of the underlying three-body problem and its solutions.
We got asked to be part of a central organisation and were being told that we were going to be 50% more effective than the rest of the organisations.
When asked if they wanted to slow us down by 50%, they did not understand, or could probably comprehend, that we had actually had done. Because in their eyes, we where going to be more twice as efficient as a traditional team. But they did not understand that we were many times more efficient that them.
So, let me try to give you a very simple example of comparisons:
- If a team of 5 is producing 100 units in 1 month. This equals to 100%.
- If a team is 50% more efficient, that equals 150 units in 1 month. E.g. 150%
- We operated at 5 times more (500%). Producing 500 units in 1 month. e.g. 500%
- So, slowing us down by 50% (relative comparison to our velocity) would have produced 250 units in 1 month. So more efficient than the traditional team, but far from our efficiency.
Reflecting on my experience overseeing nine projects across multiple studios, I recognise the importance of thorough data validation and verification in addressing wicked problems. These experiences underscore the need for continuous learning and adaptation in complex environments.
Conclusion: Collaborative Solutions and Ethical Practices
Don't steal other peoples ideas, give credit where credit is due and be kind to others.
And don't be afraid to fall, it happens to us all.
I will share more details in coming articles regarding specific tools, problems, insights, examples, and experiments.
What is your experience with a wicked, or three body problem?
#wickedproblems #gametheory #threebodyproblem #development #behavioraleconomics #gamesdevelopment #innovation #society #