Using Systems Thinking to Stay on Goal

We once learned to focus (win) and lose -- together.

Spear-throwing (70,000 B.C.) – the modern-day emailing– is considered the world's first sport. Wrestling followed in 15,000 B.C. Racing, swimming, bowling, chariot archery came next. The first team sports were probably ball-game Pitz (2,500 B.C.) and the baseball variant Seker-hemat (2,400 B.C.).

In ancient civilizations, sports prepared us for war. They encouraged us to focus on our sphere of influence, move on from temporary setbacks until the game was lost, and respect team-mates' skills and positions. Team sports also teach us to rebound from bad plays, stay focused on the goals. We gain practice in mini-crucibles. When we confront failure in other contexts, we recall: "I used to be able to put defeats away, and I can do it again."

Many of us were on teams as kids but forgot these fundamental lessons. And we manage and work with others who might have less experience with team-sports. Younger generations are also much more educated and concerned about issues they cannot readily control, such as climate and politics. Social engagement, especially online, is a way to combat loneliness but also increases stress and distraction.

In the real world playing field, the dynamics are different. You were told to focus on your part of the field while keeping track of what others were doing – not trying to do their work nor pretending to be better than them at their assigned task. People are dependent on you to get things done. But unless you are Manuel Neuer on the winning German World Soccer Team, you should stay in your goal post. Trying to play the field leaves the goal wide open.  

Today managers need to compartmentalize to stay on goal and retain sanity.

Staying on goal has been incredibly hard for middle managers and leaders this year. Many managers and leaders have been driving four agendas at once:

1. Managing teams and organizations to remain relevant.
2. Managing to keep people mentally and physically safe from the impacts of COVID-19.
3. Managing to promote diversity & inclusion. 
4. Managing to help people come to terms with racism.

At the same time, fear of missing out (FOMO) is a constant challenge, and it is hard to resist the temptation of doing our tasks when there are so many distractions--in the world, at home, and at work.

When we become managers, a real shift occurs to focus on a mission -- and not just a set of tasks. The world becomes more lonely. In good times we didn't focus on building support networks as we happily raced ahead. But being a manager during COVID-19 is both busier and more lonely with remote work. And managers are now emotional shock absorbers. Playing our position and staying focused requires discipline and focus on conserving energy. How can we help ourselves?

When the going gets tough, the tough break it down.

Today's complexity requires managers to be able to approach ambiguity to clarify a way forward. Leveraging systems thinking is essential because each situation is distinctly different, and a manager must be able to transfer prior experience to the new unknown. 

Systems Thinking is an iterative process that seeks better approximation of real-world phenomena by coupling mental models with constant real-world feedback. Systems thinking is an approach to solving problems by decoupling challenges into smaller operational parts. The power of the approach comes from focusing on these individual problems or issues and not fixing the entire system at once.

There are many types of Systems Thinking; the DSRP framework, coined by Derek Cabrera, Ph.D. at Cornell, illustrates one approach. 

The “D” means making a distinction between what is and what is not.

The “S” means approaching ambiguity as a part of a whole system.

The “R” means understanding how one thing relates to other things.

The “P” means understanding the perspective of all key stakeholders.

During a crisis, the military instructs individuals to focus on activities within their sphere of influence to mitigate anxiety and be more productive.

Our world has narrowed. So should we.

Unfortunately, not all organizations will sustain high levels of productivity in this new normal. The workforce may have made a successful initial pivot but might be ill-equipped to continue to operate due to the lack of managers with the cognitive absorptive capacity to create the unity of effort necessary to guide their teams. 

Competitive activities, like sports, develop a mental model on how we approach adversity. A similar mental model is necessary for military activities. The military is continuously in a training cycle practicing for conflict that it does not want to have but must be prepared to conduct. This requires placing individuals in the organization under immense amounts of stress periodically to ensure the mental and emotional muscle does not atrophy.

Organizations may need to consider developing mini-crucibles to develop and enhance the managerial muscle that can only be developed under stress. This can be in the form of deadlines, presentations to superiors, or even placement outside their normal activities. These situations are similar to playing a striker as a defender to experience the game from that perspective. Shifting our perspective and understanding how things interrelate can help us build connections and focus the way we might have on that soccer field years ago.

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Please send us feedback and ideas. This work is part of a series of pieces on how military training expertise can assist middle managers during COVID-19 and beyond. Our prior post was on “Piercing the Fog of Zoom,” tips to get clarity when everything is in constant shift and the trappings of power and hierarchy are frayed. Our next post will be “Talk is Precious,” focused on rediscovering the art of conversation in the virtual world.

Dr. Hise O. Gibson is an Academy Professor of Systems Engineering at the United States Military Academy at West Point. He graduated with a B.S. in Operations Research from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and a Doctorate of Business Administration in Technology and Operations Management from Harvard Business School. His expertise is the intersection of operational effectiveness and human capital development to enable more effective ways to maximize the integration of Technology, People, and Processes throughout an organization.

Carin-Isabel Knoop leads the Harvard Business School's research and case writing group and has written more than 200 case studies on organizations and managers around the world. At night she thinks about how to make their challenging lives better. This led to research and publications in the area of mental health in the workplace and an interest in human sustainability. She is a pragmatic idealist and fanatic postcard writer.