QUERY The Death of System Dynamics? (SD6203)

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Posted by  Richard Stevenson <richard at cognitus.co.uk>

Having been engaged with SD since the 1960's - and having run a  successful SD 
consulting business for over 15 years, I now want to  question the entire basis 
of the System Dynamics Society.  My company  - Cognitus Ltd - sponsored the SDS 
for several years.  But recently  the SDS seems to me to have become a self-
serving and introspective  club that resists change and is entirely blind to new 
opportunities  and problems in the real corporate world.

Astonishingly, after 50 years of SD, the Society can now pride itself  on engaging 
just 400 people at its annual conference!  That's just  not good enough.

This is, I admit, a challenging statement.  I'm not going to back  away from it, 
however.  Jay Forrester's original (and exciting!)  vision of "designing 
organisations" has been completely lost by the  SD community.

The problem with SD today is its lack of business focus and a  complete absence of 
self-discipline.  That freedom has given  academics a "right to roam" and probably 
stimulated original abstract  thinking over the years.  But in the real, corporate 
world, SD's  impact has been minimal compared to its potential - and far from  
getting stronger, in fact it is disappearing.

Perhaps the most dispiriting aspect is the "bottom up" approach that  has 
characterised SD since "Industrial Dynamics".  Causal loops,  archetypes, stocks and 
flows....all true but managers just don't have  the time.  It's like saying "I know 
you all speak English but I want  you to learn Esperanto".  Unfortunately, using 
Esperanto imperfectly,  most managers just tend to talk gibberish to each other.

I am also often astonished by the poor quality of much of what at  passes for 
commentary on the SD forum.  There seems to be little or no  distinction between 
crazy student rambling, learned tablets of stone,  detailed technical enquiry and 
academic philosophical meandering.   It's completely random. Who's really in charge?

Posted by  Richard Stevenson <richard at cognitus.co.uk>
posting date  Mon, 22 Jan 2007 19:12:15 +0000