An Undisciplined Look at Systemic Design

 30 years ago I wrote an article that has remained one of the most enduring of all my writings.

reference

Nelson, H.G. (1994), The Necessity of Being “Un-Disciplined” and “Out of Control”: Design Action and Systems Thinking. Performance Improvement Quarterly, 7: 22-29. 

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1937-8327.1994.tb00634.x

[30 years later, we (RSD 13) asked Harold Nelson to revisit this article, written and published in Performance Improvement Quarterly in 1994—30 years ago. Eds.]

Original abstract

This paper introduces design, integrated with systems thinking, as a

necessary if not sufficient means for meeting the challenge of how to

create or recreate organizations and institutions that better serve

the needs and desires of clients, customers, and stakeholders in a

rapidly changing world. Design is a dramatically different way of

moving conceptual thinking into concrete action as contrasted to the

scientific or artistic traditions which are primarily designed to

describe or explain the natural or phenomenal world. The limits of

problem-solving strategies when applied to complex organizational

change leave design as the strategy of choice. The designer’s role is

animated by other-expression rather than self-expression. From

within this role, designers engage in the task of creating the un-

natural world by being un-disciplined using systems thinking and by

being out-of-control as part of the creative process of design.

An Undisciplined Look at Systemic Designing RSD 13 keynote

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