Syst Pract Action Res DOI 10.1007/s11213-015-9354-3

Rosalind Armson: Growing Wings on the Way—Systems Thinking for Messy Situations Triarchy Press, Axminster, ISBN: 978-1-908009-36-4 Neil Richardson1,2

Ó Springer Science+Business Media New York 2015

This bright, well-illustrated three-hundred-and-twenty-page paperback is definitely one that should be on the reading list of systems enthusiasts. With many years of experience in both teaching aspects of the discipline and consultancy work, the author has included thought-provoking business examples in her text—plus important family complications which ‘wickedly’ defy definition yet are likely to be close to the heart of many readers. Ms Armson is not hesitant in nudging us towards options and alternative interpretations (not easily done in practice if groupthink dominates your organisation) and her twelve page index will be useful across systems, psychology, management, and other subjects. In chapter sixteen—An inquiring mind—are four concepts which at best will stretch through time, from undergraduate studies into the ever-busy world of work: enthusiasm, humility, curiosity, and respect. In fact, the author would be justified in opening a martial arts dojo with these maxims displayed boldly at the entrance! Any hesitations? I can’t match the applause delivered by reviewers (on the back cover) who believe this text would suit newcomers; rather, encompassing several different systems approaches, it should sit on a shelf alongside other texts for those familiar with at least one branch of the discipline. A very rich text, Growing Wings favours quirky yet not outlandish chapter names with short content rather than explaining inherent strengths and difficulties in branches of systems thinking. For instance, could an influence diagram/multiple-cause diagram miss an important element because participants daren’t include the tyrannical behaviour of some macho factory manager who is actually part of the problem situation? Regarding Fig. 10.3, the phrase ‘Mum’s capacity for communication’ might reasonably replace three of the phrases shown and also influence ‘Mum’s

& Neil Richardson [email protected] 1

North Kirklees CCG, Wakefield Old Road, Dewsbury, UK

2

Moorside Rd, Kirkheaton, Huddersfield HD5, UK

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health’. Capturing major aspects of heterogeneous reality in a diagram stands as more than a tricky exercise. Although the potential buzzword ‘understandascope’ (p. 330) appeals to the ear, it subsumes (most likely an unintended intellectual take-over bid) numerous established ideas: from lay folk’s street maps to the rational systems definitions found in Soft System Methodology. Is there any abstract device which can’t be classified under the umbrella of understandascope? Surprisingly, SSM doesn’t appear in Tables A1 or A2; hence its simple recursive framework is not expounded. When representing the provision of wrapped sandwiches to hungry archaeologists as a human activity system (Fig. 14.1) it isn’t necessary for the system to be expressed at the level of detail which acquires ham, cheese, etc., makes and wraps sandwiches, though three different statements on the same theme (p. 232 and 240) don’t make the matching of definition to model straightforward. Equally surprisingly, the instance of modelling a cardiology department’s monitoring of low-risk patients (Fig. 14.4) omits the phrases ‘Obtain low-risk patients’ and ‘Release low-risk patients from monitoring’— perhaps staff had no issues over persuading patients to attend check-ups. This diagram might also confuse enthusiasts by displaying two descriptions of the same model. Returning to the title Growing Wings on the Way, I advocate any branch of the ‘soft’ style of systems thinking to be like a butterfly, not heavily loaded with tools, questions, and techniques, but a lightweight approach, thus able to make occasional user-friendly landings on the surface of messy social affairs.

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