What is the system iceberg? This is a method to look at a problem and find many possible solutions to it.
I am going to explain it using the problem of “Litter”.
Iceberg levels
The system iceberg has 4 levels with each a different question to ask yourself.
1. Events
at this level you ask yourself: “what are the events you see with your problem?” This could for example result in the answer: “You see litter in the park”. We could create an event solution to our problem, for example: “We pick it up”
2. Pattern
At this level we ask ourselves, “What are the patterns that help our problem?”, “What do wee see more of when looking at our problem?”, when we look at our example, “we see the litter increasing over time, and the most on weekends”. now we can create change to our pattern by anticipating it. “You and your friends do a weekly clean-up.”
3. Systems and Structures
Picking up the litter every week is not going to solve it for good, so we can ask ourselves, “what physical structures make this happen?” and when we ask ourselves that, we can see that there are no trashbins in our imagined park. So to create change you decide to write a letter to your town council to add trashbins to the park.
4. Mental models
Some poeple would still litter if there are trashbins. So we can go even 1 step deeper and look at the mental models by asking ourselves: “what mental roles play part in our problem?” and by asking ourselves that question we find out that a lot of people don’t think that it is their responsibility to clean up the park, thinking that their actions as 1 person don’t make a difference. So to create change you decide to make lessens and to go teach at schools about the problems with littering.
Wrap-up
You might now be thinking that mental models are the best change since it has deeper impact. But you have to keep in mind that the deeper the change, the harder it is to do.
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