Talk:Systems thinking/Archives/2016

Input/Output Analysis
For open systems the comparison between the input and output surely allows us to evalate what the system consists of or at least something about how it works. None of this has yet been included.

Even for a closed system which is closer to the holistic concept more commonly found in natural configurations, one can take input and outputs at different points in the system and consequently learn about what lays between them.

Kenneth Boulting expressed it in his inimitable poetic way:

A system is a big black box/ Of which we can't unlock the locks/ And all we can find out about/ Is what goes in and what comes out.//

Perceiving input-output pairs,/ Related by parameters,/ Permits us, sometimes, to relate/ An input, output, and a state.//

If this relation's good and stable/ Then to predict we may be able,/ But if this fails us heaven forbid!/ We'll be compelled to force the lid!//

Macrocompassion (talk) 13:51, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

Expansion required

 * Systems theory and systems concepts
 * Hard and soft systems
 * Peter Checkland’s soft systems methodology
 * Beer’s viable systems model
 * Theory of constraints
 * Deming’s theory of profound knowledge
 * Organisational learning
 * Understanding and managing processes
 * Seddon’s systems thinking concepts - Purpose-Measure-Method
 * Purposive and transactional systems
 * Understanding systems boundaries
 * Structured systems analysis and design methodology
 * Systems dynamics
 * Understanding and modelling the concepts of value, variation, time and constraints