Discovery
Use feedback from actual work to recognize patterns, changes in performance, and departures from the organization's purposes.
A management discipline for operational performance
Discover reality.
Understand the structure.
Realign the system.
Repeat.
Operations change. People adapt. Performance emerges from the interactions among people, technology, work processes, and organizational structures. Systems Learning helps managers stay connected to what is happening and continually improve the conditions for successful performance.
Preorder the Book ↗Explore Systems Learning ↓
Tony Muschara · Jim Marinus
The Discipline
Learn from the system while it is operating.
An organization is a complex adaptive system. Its performance cannot be fully understood by examining individuals or isolated events. Managers need to see how work is actually performed, how conditions interact, and how the system's structure influences what people can do.
Feedback comes from observations, conversations, operating experience, performance trends, weak signals, and unexpected successes. Together, these provide a developing picture of the operation, including where the operating point may be moving and where margins are becoming thin.
For Managers
See more of the operation while it is succeeding.
Managers are responsible for keeping work, resources, technical systems, and organizational arrangements aligned with the purposes of the operation. Systems Learning provides a way to learn from performance while work is underway, examine how interacting conditions shape results, and use that understanding when deciding what to sustain or adjust.
The Learning Cycle
Discovery. Understanding. Realignment.
The Systems Learning Framework connects what managers learn from actual operations with an examination of the structures shaping performance and considered adjustments to those structures.
Understanding
Examine the current system structure, the interactions shaping performance, and the mental models behind the way the organization is arranged.
Realignment
Make considered, high-leverage adjustments to the structure, strengthen capability and capacity, and observe what changes.
The Aim
Get more of what you want
and less of what you don’t want.
Use what the operation is telling you to make considered adjustments that improve performance and preserve the capacity to adapt as conditions change.
The Book
Systems Learning
Managing Human & Organizational Performance
Tony Muschara and Jim Marinus
The third book in a series following Risk-Based Thinking and Critical Steps, Systems Learning develops a practical, risk-informed discipline for managers responsible for operations in which human performance is essential.
It examines organizations as complex adaptive systems and develops the Systems Learning Framework, connecting Discovery, Understanding, and Realignment to the management of human and organizational performance. A detailed examination of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 shows how organizational structures influence performance in consequential operating conditions.
CRC Press · Preorder through Routledge.
Preorder the Book ↗Critics’ Reviews
What reviewers are saying
Perspectives on the book from operations and systems practitioners.
“I highly recommend this book as a great way to enhance a manager’s approach to safety and loss control.”
“They integrate systems thinking, complexity, and learning in a way that is both rigorous and accessible to practitioners.”
“This book provides guidance to systems management at all levels on how to improve.”
“Systems Learning reframes human performance as a risk and strength to be managed systemically.”
“Systems Learning is a compelling and highly practical guide for leaders who must navigate the realities of human performance in complex, adaptive organizations.”
The Authors
Tony Muschara & Jim Marinus
Systems Learning builds on the work developed in Risk-Based Thinking and Critical Steps, extending the series into the continuous management of human and organizational performance.
Explore related work at Critical Steps and Risk-Based Thinking.
Contact the Authors
Connect with Tony and Jim
For questions about the book, discussions, or professional inquiries, visit the authors’ websites.