Michael Lissack Building Personal Practices for Complexity Navigation While our focus has been primarily on organizations, the journey toward mastering complexity begins with personal practices—ways of thinking and acting that enhance your ability to navigate complexity effectively. Several practices are particularly valuable: Cultivate systems awareness. Practice looking beyond immediate causes and effects to understand the broader systems in which you operate. Notice patterns of interaction, feedback loops, unintended consequences, and emergent properties. This systems awareness helps you anticipate how interventions might ripple through interconnected networks, enabling more thoughtful action. A healthcare leader practicing this approach noticed how a new policy intended to improve one aspect of patient care was creating unintended consequences in other areas. Rather than simply addressing the symp- toms, she mapped the broader system to understand the underlying pat- terns, leading to a more integrated solution that improved overall care. Embrace multiple perspectives. Deliberately seek out viewpoints different from your own, especially when addressing complex challenges. This isn’t just about gathering diverse opinions but about genuinely under- standing how others make sense of the situation. This practice enhances your ability to see beyond your own mental models and develop more comprehensive understanding. An executive practicing this approach restructured his decision-making process to systematically incorporate perspectives from different functions, levels, and stakeholder groups. Rather than treating this as a ceremonial consultation, he engaged deeply with these diverse viewpoints, resulting in more robust decisions that anticipated challenges and opportunities that would have been invisible from a single perspective. Develop comfort with uncertainty. Practice making decisions and taking action without complete information or guaranteed outcomes. This isn’t recklessness but a calibrated approach that balances the risks of ac- tion with the risks of delay or inaction. This practice builds the emotional
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