ECOSYSTEMS THINKING
An approach for exploring change management through relationships
Context
Development of internal methods and thought leadership at Luxoft / Smashing Ideas
Client: Luxoft / Smashing Ideas
Teammates: Ilona Chebotareva
Following a change management engagement with a large commercial airline navigating the human factors of a significant technological transition, my coworker and I debriefed the process and laid out a new approach for thinking about change management at the intersection of human-centered design and systems thinking.
I then refined the framework and workshopped it with members of the Luxoft / Smashing Ideas Strategy and Design teams to hone it into an approach that could be used in our work, calling it Ecosystems Thinking. This approach was employed by teams on subsequent projects, with clients including American Airlines, Bristol Myers Squib, and Zurich Insurance.
As part of my research for the Ecosystems Thinking approach, I revisited the systems thinking textbook, Thinking in Systems by Donella H. Meadows. I used Meadows' elements of systems thinking to distill the elements of Ecosystems Thinking.
Principles
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Zoom out first, then decide on appropriate system boundaries.
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Reframe system problems as human problems.
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Focus on relationships and interconnections, not individuals or audience groups.
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Design for stronger, clearer, healthier relationships to enable collective wellbeing through transition.
