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Boiling the Ocean: Complexity, Service Design, & Systems Thinking 

Boiling the Ocean: Complexity, Service Design, & Systems Thinking 

- Through the application of Systems Thinking it is evident that a small shift in one thing can result in big changes across the whole.
- Complex problems are the result of interconnected causes with many interlaced unknown factors.
- Intervention within complex issues will typically see new problems emerge as a result. - Efforts to impose change will result in a partial positive impact. However, in the long term, there will likely be negative unintended consequences if changes are not integrated well into the system.
- It is only when there are structural changes being made to a system that we begin to see a positive sustained impact across all areas of the system as well.

Andy Polaine

July 02, 2020
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  1. Boiling the Ocean:
    complexity, service
    design, & systems
    thinking
    ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Future of Now
    Andy Polaine – Service Design & Innovation Training and Coaching
    Andy Polaine
    2nd July 2020

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  2. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Listen to the puppet, you should.
    Image © Lucasfilm/Disney

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  3. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    These are not the
    flowers you think
    they are
    Image source & ©: https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2018/03/bike-share-oversupply-in-china-huge-piles-of-abandoned-and-broken-bicycles/556268/

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  4. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    These are discarded
    bikeshare bikes – the
    physical consequences
    of “digital” disruption.
    Image source & ©: https://www.wired.com/story/photo-of-the-week-a-dizzying-view-of-a-bicycle-graveyard-in-china/

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  5. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    VC funding, user
    focus and scale
    Photo by Lucian Alexe on Unsplash

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  6. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Excessive
    growth has
    consequences
    Photo by Damir Spanic on Unsplash

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  7. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    This is related to…
    Photo by Wolfgang Mennel on Unsplash

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  8. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    … this, which is
    related to…
    Photo by Antoine Giret on Unsplash

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  9. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Photo by Sifan Liu on Unsplash
    … this, which is
    related to…

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  10. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Photo by Alex Haney on Unsplash
    … this, which is
    related to…

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  11. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Photo by Charles Deluvio on Unsplash
    …this.
    And on and on it goes.

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  12. Photo by Charles on Unsplash
    No interface works without an
    ecosystem and few “products”
    are standalone these days.
    ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    It’s not complicated.
    It’s complex.
    Designing for complexity
    means designing for the
    detail and the big picture
    simultaneously.

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  13. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Sometimes you
    need to boil the
    ocean.
    Photo by Ricardo Resende on Unsplash

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  14. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Designing for exponentially nested
    ecosystems requires tackling complexity
    head on, zooming between layers.
    Political, economic,
    social, technological,
    environmental, legal
    ecosystems
    Business ecosystems
    Multi-channel service
    Single touchpoint

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  15. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    If we fail to tackle complexity
    with complex thinking, we’re
    doomed to oversimplify and
    produce simplistic solutions
    that fail.
    “The complex is not complicated”
    pln.me/complex

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  16. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Jacob Lund Fiskar
    “Nonlinearity is inherently much harder to
    deal with than linearity. In fact, a
    tremendous amount of effort goes into
    linearizing problems to make them
    understandable and solvable.
    The solution to the simplified problem is
    not necessarily the solution to the original
    problem. Furthermore, the simpler problem
    does not show the richness of solutions of
    the original problem.”

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  17. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Money, borders, laws, markets, norms
    — all these things that feel so concrete
    and fixed were once designed.
    This means they can be
    re-designed.

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  18. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    02.
    Some examples

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  19. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    How disconnected
    touchpoints can wreck an
    ecosystem

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  20. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Hi Myki! You look cool.
    Just touch on and off
    then, yeah?

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  21. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Oh, okay.

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  22. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    How about
    swiping it?
    No?

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  23. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Wave it in
    front? No?

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  24. Sorry, I can’t quite
    read that in time.
    ©2020 Andrew Polaine

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  25. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Maybe the machine
    will help. Oh dear.

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  26. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Please explain? Yarra tram “tips.”
    “When you travel with myki on a tram you don't always need to touch off at
    the end of your journey.
    That's because you can now travel from one end of a tram route to the
    other on a Zone 1 fare.
    On three tram routes - 75, 86 and 109 - the ends of the line furthest from
    the city have a short Zone 2 section (which overlaps with Zone 1).
    If your tram trip is entirely in Zone 2 you must touch on and touch off to get
    the lower Zone 2 fare, otherwise there is no need to touch off on a tram.”
    Source: http://ptv.vic.gov.au/tickets/myki/touching-on-and-off/

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  27. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Source: http://ptv.vic.gov.au/tickets/myki/touching-on-and-off/

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  28. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Aha! Slow
    card readers,
    eh?

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  29. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Original budget $340m.
    $1.55B later… (2016)
    Source: https://sites.google.com/site/cheaperthanmyki/home (archive here)
    Space shuttle launch (2011) $426 million
    Mars Rover mission (2007) $777 million
    Value of London Stansted Airport (2012) $1.5 billion
    Total assets of Ford Motor Company, Australia (2011) $1.5 billion

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  30. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    How major shifts at the top
    level of zoom affect all the
    details.

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  31. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Image by Fusion Medical Animation on Unsplash
    Smallest level
    of zoom

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  32. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Image by Fusion Medical Animation on Unsplash
    Big level of
    zoom

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  33. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Human level
    of zoom

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  34. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Photo by hello-i-m-nik on Unsplash

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  35. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Photo by Edwin Hooper on Unsplash

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  36. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    How do you
    boil the ocean?
    Photo by Samuel Scrimshaw on Unsplash

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  37. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    How do you boil
    the ocean?
    One cup at a time
    Photo by NordWood Themes on Unsplash

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  38. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Donella Meadows
    “A small shift in one thing can produce big changes in
    everything.
    “Growth has costs as well as benefits, and we typically don’t
    count the costs — among which are poverty and hunger,
    environmental destruction, etc. — the whole list of problems
    we are trying to solve with growth! What is needed is much
    slower growth, much different kinds of growth, and in some
    cases no growth or negative growth.
    “The world’s leaders are correctly fixated on economic
    growth as the answer to virtually all problems, but they’re
    pushing with all their might in the wrong direction.”
    Source: http://donellameadows.org/archives/leverage-points-places-to-intervene-in-a-system/

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  39. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Graphic: CC licensed by Toby Morris in collaboration with Siouxsie Wiles and published by The Spinoff

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  40. Source: http://donellameadows.org/archives/leverage-points-places-to-intervene-in-a-system/
    Places To Intervene In A System
    (in increasing order of effectiveness)
    12. Constants, parameters, numbers (such as subsidies, taxes, standards).
    11. The sizes of buffers and other stabilizing stocks, relative to their flows.
    10. The structure of material stocks and flows (such as transport networks, population age structures).
    9. The lengths of delays, relative to the rate of system change.
    8. The strength of negative feedback loops, relative to the impacts they are trying to correct against.
    7. The gain around driving positive feedback loops.
    6. The structure of information flows (who does and does not have access to information).
    5. The rules of the system (such as incentives, punishments, constraints).
    4. The power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system structure.
    3. The goals of the system.
    2. The mindset or paradigm out of which the system — its goals, structure, rules, delays, parameters — arises.
    1. The power to transcend paradigms.
    —Donella Meadows
    ©2020 Andrew Polaine

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  41. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Activity
    Semantic zoom

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  42. Jon Kolko’s Semantic Zoom
    ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    0
    Product
    -1
    oduct Line
    r Brand
    +1
    Feature or
    Function
    +2
    Control o
    UI Eleme
    Kolko, J. (2011). Exposing the Magic of Design: A Practitioner’s Guide to the Methods and Theory of Synthesis. New York: Oxford University Press.

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  43. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    0
    Product
    -3
    Global, World
    -2
    Company or
    Marketplace
    -1
    Product Line
    or Brand
    +1
    Feature or
    Function
    +2
    Control or
    UI Element
    +3
    Attribute or
    Detail
    Figure 7.19
    Display of all seven of the concept map zoom levels.
    Jon Kolko’s Semantic Zoom
    Kolko, J. (2011). Exposing the Magic of Design: A Practitioner’s Guide to the Methods and Theory of Synthesis. New York: Oxford University Press.

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  44. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Time to hit the MURAL

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  45. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Activity
    1.In your breakout rooms and in MURAL, explore your
    assigned zoom level.
    2.Sticky note everything you can think of at that level. Be
    careful, it’s easy to slip into a higher or lower zoom level.
    3.Afterwards, we’ll all take a look at how much (or little)
    complexity we’ve explored.
    5
    minutes

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  46. ©2020 Andrew Polaine
    Thank You!
    Web: polaine.com
    Twitter: @apolaine
    Podcast: pln.me/p10
    Newsletter: pln.me/nws

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