Fifty years of systems thinking for management

The point of this paper is to provide an account of the last 50 years of systems thinking applied to management that is insightful and useful to those interested in the theory and practice of operational research (OR). In seeking to fulfil this purpose, it employs Boulding's well-known ‘hierarchy of complexity’ to think through the reasons for the emergence of different strands of applied systems thinking and to detail their strengths. In theoretical terms, operational researchers will find a number of the key issues that have engaged their field (eg, hard versus soft approaches) mirrored in debates that have taken place between systems thinkers. They may discover new theoretical avenues to follow to advance their discipline. OR practitioners may also be surprised by the nature and scope of the systems applications described and conclude that systems approaches should be added to their own intervention strategies. At the least, the paper is designed to reinvigorate discussion around the relationship between OR and systems thinking that has occasionally surfaced over the last half century but has never been satisfactorily concluded.

[1]  Jamshid Gharajedaghi,et al.  Reflections on systems and their models , 1996 .

[2]  Michael Jackson,et al.  Systems Thinking: Creative Holism for Managers , 2003 .

[3]  Mark D. Uncles,et al.  Handbook of Systems Analysis: Overview of Uses, Procedures, Applications and Practice , 1986 .

[4]  N. Dufty,et al.  Book Reviews : Form and Content in Industrial Democracy , 1970 .

[5]  Fred Emery,et al.  Toward a New Philosophy of Management , 1993 .

[6]  P. Cilliers,et al.  Complexity and post-modernism: understanding complex systems , 1999 .

[7]  G. Midgley.  Systemic Intervention: Philosophy, Methodology, and Practice , 2000 .

[8]  W. Mason.  Creating the Corporate Future , 1982 .

[9]  Ludwig von Bertalanffy,et al.  General System Theory , 1969 .

[10]  E. Trist,et al.  Some Social and Psychological Consequences of the Longwall Method of Coal-Getting , 1951 .

[11]  Pehr G. Gyllenhammar,et al.  People at work , 1977 .

[12]  R. Stacey.  Complexity and Creativity in Organizations , 1996 .

[13]  John Mingers,et al.  Realising Systems Thinking: Knowledge and Action in Management Science , 2006 .

[14]  David Bell.  The Art of Judgement , 1987 .

[15]  W. Bennis,et al.  The Social Psychology of Organizations , 1966 .

[16]  J. D. Ryan.  Handbook of Systems Analysis — Craft Issues and Procedural Choices , 1988 .

[17]  Hugh J. Miser,et al.  Handbook of systems analysis : cases , 1995 .

[18]  Albert Cherns,et al.  Principles of Sociotechnical Design Revisted , 1987 .

[19]  Mik Wisniewski,et al.  Beyond Dispute: The Invention of Team Syntegrity , 1994 .

[20]  John Holt,et al.  Critical Systems Thinking: Directed Readings , 1992 .

[21]  P Branthwaite,et al.  Democracy at work. , 1991, The New Zealand nursing journal. Kai tiaki.

[22]  Colin Eden,et al.  SODA - The principles , 2001 .

[23]  David Simms,et al.  The Heart of Enterprise , 1980 .

[24]  David C. Lane,et al.  Should system dynamics be described as a ‘hard’ or ‘deterministic’ systems approach? , 2000 .

[25]  M. C. Jackson,et al.  Evaluating systems thinking in housing , 2008, J. Oper. Res. Soc..

[26]  K. Weick.  The social psychology of organizing , 1969 .

[27]  John Mingers,et al.  Multimethodology : the theory and practice of combining management science methodologies , 1997 .

[28]  Christian Bierwirth,et al.  Principles of Systems , 2000 .

[29]  Varinder K. Aggarwal,et al.  Science of Synthesis , 2005 .

[30]  Raul Espejo,et al.  The Viable System Model , 2020, Systems Approaches to Making Change: A Practical Guide.

[31]  Peter Checkland,et al.  Systems Thinking, Systems Practice , 1981 .

[32]  J. G. Miller.  Living systems. , 1972, Currents in modern biology.

[33]  G. Kreweras.  Creating the corporate future: Russell L. ACKOFF Wiley, New York, 1981, xi + 297 pages, £10.85 , 1982 .

[34]  R. Mason.  Challenging strategic planning assumptions , 1981 .

[35]  D. Tranfield,et al.  The Nature, Social Organization and Promotion of Management Research: Towards Policy , 1998 .

[36]  John Seddon.  Freedom from Command and Control , 2003 .

[37]  Jonathan Rosenhead,et al.  Rational Analysis for a Problematic World Revisited , 2001 .

[38]  C. Barnard.  The Functions of the Executive , 1939 .

[39]  L. Bertalanffy.  The theory of open systems in physics and biology. , 1950 .

[40]  Simon Peck,et al.  Group Model Building: Facilitating Team Learning Using System Dynamics , 1996, J. Oper. Res. Soc..

[41]  S. Beer.  The Brain of the Firm , 1972 .

[42]  Frederick P. Wheeler,et al.  The Viable System Model: Interpretations and Applications of Stafford Beer's VSM , 1990 .

[43]  Tony Hindle,et al.  Rational Analysis for a Problematic World , 1990 .

[44]  Ida R. Hoos,et al.  Systems Analysis in Public Policy: A Critique. , 1974 .

[45]  Morris B. Holbrook,et al.  Complexity and Management: Fad or Radical Challenge to Systems Thinking? , 2002 .

[46]  Russell L. Ackoff,et al.  Resurrecting the Future of Operational Research , 1979 .

[47]  L. von Bertalanffy,et al.  The theory of open systems in physics and biology. , 1950, Science.

[48]  S. Schwartzman,et al.  The New Production of Knowledge: The Dynamics of Science and Research in Contemporary Societies , 1994 .

[49]  Gustavo Stubrich.  The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization , 1993 .

[50]  J. Mingers,et al.  Self-Producing Systems: Implications and Applications of Autopoiesis , 1996 .

[51]  R. Lessem.  STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATIONAL DYNAMICS , 2005 .

[52]  Michael Elstob,et al.  Critical Heuristics of Social Planning , 1998 .

[53]  T. H. HAWKINS.  People at Work , 1951, Nature.

[54]  F. J. Roethlisberger,et al.  Management and the Worker: An Account of a Research Program Conducted by the Western Electric Company, Hawthorne Works, Chicago , 1939 .

[55]  Margaret J. Wheatley,et al.  Leadership and the New Science: Learning about Organization from an Orderly Universe , 1992 .

[56]  C.J.H. Mann,et al.  Systems approaches to management , 2002 .

[57]  M. Snowdon.  The Heart of Enterprise , 1979 .

[58]  Nigel Howard,et al.  Organisational Fitness: Corporate Effectiveness Through Management Cybernetics , 1995 .

[59]  J. G. Jenkins.  Management and the worker: An account of a research program conducted by the Western Electric Company, Hawthorne Works, Chicago. , 1940 .

[60]  Peter Checkland,et al.  Learning For Action: A Short Definitive Account of Soft Systems Methodology, and its use for Practitioners, Teachers and Students , 2007 .

[61]  M. C. Jackson,et al.  Beyond problem structuring methods: reinventing the future of OR/MS , 2006, J. Oper. Res. Soc..

[62]  Tom Schuller,et al.  Democracy at Work , 1985 .

[63]  Jesper Simonsen,et al.  Soft Systems Methodology , 2020, Systems Approaches to Making Change: A Practical Guide.

[64]  John N. Warfield,et al.  World dynamics , 1973 .

[65]  Patricia Shaw,et al.  Complexity and Management: Fad or Radical Challenge to Systems Thinking? , 2002 .

[66]  James E. Rosenzweig,et al.  Organization and management : a systems and contingency approach , 1979 .

[67]  Clive H. Elphick,et al.  Brain of the Firm , 1981 .

[68]  F. Glen.  The social psychology of organizations , 1976 .

[69]  K. Boulding.  General Systems Theory---The Skeleton of Science , 1956 .