1776. Desperately Seeking Synthesis: Blending Elements of Systems Thinking, Strategy Design, and Operational Research to Address the Challenges of VUCA
Invited abstract in session WA-50: Systems Thinking 3, stream Systems Thinking.
Wednesday, 8:30-10:00Room: Parkinson B11
Authors (first author is the speaker)
| 1. | Andrew Firth
|
| Aperture Strategy Ltd |
Abstract
For some considerable time, managers in all walks of life have recognised increasing challenge from an environment now recognised to be volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous. Numerous proposals have been made to counter this challenge, but for the large part, they fail for much the same reason; they are little more than a ‘silver bullet’ approach. All have their merits – and indeed their proponents – in isolation, but to deal with complexity anything other than a synthesised approach is a contradiction in terms and doomed to failure.
This paper argues that an approach that blends selected techniques, methods, and methodologies drawn from and inspired by Systems Thinking, Strategy Design, and OR techniques offers more than the sum of its parts to managers who remain desperately seeking ways to meet the challenge of the VUCA environment. It proposes an approach that synthesises their respective advantages and makes the case for its adoption to address the significant systemic challenges we currently face.
Keywords
- Strategic Planning and Management
Status: accepted
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