Systems Thinking and learning

To stay ahead of the fast changing word the need to learn permanently - individually and as an organization. This includes to increase our knowledge constantly but also to throw existing knowledge away - if not needed anymore. Unlearning what became obsolete and relearn are critical skills today. The old way to learn at the first part of the life and then just apply our knowledge for the rest of our life is not enough anymore to stay relevant.

We need to embrace a more systemic approach to learning also acquiring different skills to build a more holistic view of the world. The idea is to expand our knowledge, avoiding to set ourselves boundaries being too much focused on a specific area of expertise for example.

In future, true excellence will only achieve people who think broad, divergent, and creative exploring new areas of knowledge.

The systems thinking is a great way to understand the complex system to learn, unlearn and relearn. The challenge is to handle the tremendous flow and overwhelming quantity and complexity of information that overtakes us every day. There is not only an credible quantity of information but also different levels: we can differentiate if we deal just with information like descriptions or definitions (what, who, when, where), knowledge like strategy, practice, method, or the chosen approach (how) and wisdom represents principles, insights, morals, or archetypes (why). That means to structure and to give sense and meaning to all information we acquire we have also to engage with this third level of digesting information with reflective and critical thinking.

In systems thinking we talk about to zoom out and being thus able to connect the dots and assembling the big puzzle of information to create knowledge and to reach the state of wisdom. A systemic approach helps us to see that the system is more than the sum of the parts (information) and helps us to understand and to deal better with the complexity of the information system. Interestingly, it is not the individual parts of the system but the flow of information which creates the interconnections in a system.

This making-meaning process can also be seen as a learning conversation and a mindset of “humble inquiry”, a term coined by Edgar Schein, Professor at MIT. Learning conversations requires humility and mindfulness in a psychological safe environment. In his recent book “Humility is the New Smart – Rethinking Human Exellence in the Smart Machine Age” Edward D. Hess stresses the importance to re-focus on our human strengths, and to cultivate the New Smart behaviors like reflective listening, emotionally connecting and relating with others. That means to step back from our ego-centric behavior to engage in making-meaning collaborations putting the common interest first and not our personal achievements.

 As a Hyper-Learner, we need to practice humility and start to (re-)connect in a mindful manner with our self, understand and managing the emotions and be fully present in the moment.

Every transformation need a higher purpose and a definition of the desired state. A focus is essential in helping us to endure life’s challenges and ups and downs. This is true on a personal level (becoming a Hyper-Learner for example) or organizational level, if you want to transform a company culture. And science and practice agrees on the fact that we can get to our goal only by changing our behaviors. Here as well is an interestingly parallel with the systems thinking: the theory of systems all systems have a purpose and only through behaviors we are able to contribute this goal.

What does this mean if we apply this systemic approach to learning? It means that we have to pay attention on the way how we are looking at the whole of complex problems and should move our focus and attention away from fragmented parts. It is more about questioning our underlying beliefs and to look more for the interrelationships of our fragmented knowledge to build a holistic picture of how things really works by keeping the higher purpose in mind.

We have to engage in meaningful doubt and skepticism that our beliefs about how and why things work like they do and to avoid to become fixated.

This clearly needs an open mindset to not only confirm what we think is right and the challenge is not to fall in the trap to not only proving hypotheses, but placing equal effort into disproving them. Single-minded and too much focused thinking on a concrete problem for example tends to just prove the correctness of hypotheses we have often produce erroneous conclusions about what is true. We have to engage in meaningful doubt and skepticism that our beliefs about how and why things work like they do and to avoid to become fixated.

But to question our beliefs is neither a comfortable nor easy state for most people and to overcome our rigid mental models. It takes a tremendous effort to put our glasses aside and being aware of the biased way we see the world embracing a more holistic and systemic approach.

To take informed decisions takes courage and critical and reflective thinking of system 2 like defined in Daniel Kahneman groundbreaking book Thinking, Fast and Slow. The basic prerequisite for this is to have the ambition for our self, being our Best Self and to find our Inner Peace by quieting your ego, and being more mindful.

Further readings:

Andersen, Erika: Learning to Learn (https://hbr.org/2016/03/learning-to-learn)

Edmondson, Amy C.: "The Competitive Imperative of Learning." HBS Centennial Issue Harvard Business Review 86, nos. 7/8 (July–August 2008): 60–67.

Edmondson, Amy C.: The fearless organization, - Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for learning, Innovation and Growth.

Hess, Edward D.: Humility Is the New Smart: Rethinking Human Excellence in the Smart Machine Age.

Hess, Edward D.: Hyper-Learning: How to Adapt to the Speed of Change.

Kahneman, Daniel: Thinking, Fast and Slow.

Kets de Vries, Manfred: Why Wisdom Can’t Be Taught, https://knowledge.insead.edu/blog/insead-blog/why-wisdom-cant-be-taught-6456

Meadows, Donella, Thinking in Systems: A Primer