Book : Modelling for Learning Organisations (2000)

Summary

Test policies, discover flaws, and find hidden leverage points. System simulation allows you to predict the outcome of current and future situations on the whole system by testing different scenarios.

Conventional wisdom says that we can learn from our errors, but errors in the business world can be prohibitively costly. To truly understand how complex business organizations function requires different tools than most managers have been given. Yet managers need methods to understand how their organization works in order to test policies, discover flaws in thinking, and find the hidden leverage points within the complex systems they manage. Through a system simulation, the dynamics of the whole system, not just the individual parts, becomes apparent. The outcome of current and future situations becomes possible to predict and with this information, managers can focus on the changes that need to be made.

The distinguished contributors to Modeling for Learning Organizations include Jay W. Forrester, Peter Senge, and Arie De Geus. You will learn about leading applications such as:<

• Shell’s work on modeling the oil producers.
• The Management Flight Simulator, a computer-based case learning environment pioneered by John Sterman and others at MIT
• The landmark Claims Learning Laboratory at Hanover Insurance companies.

For managers, professionals, academicians, and everyone who recognizes the profound implications of modeling, this book is an excellent resource. It offers a broad understanding of the modeling process, discusses a multitude of case studies, and provides a review of the most recent simulation software.

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