The System Savvy Leader: Adaptive perspectives drive impact

Hosted by Julie Cunningham, Peter Murchland, and Jim Dowling

In this video

What you'll learn

Each of 6 schools shapes design outcomes intentionally.

Traditional, Agile, Disruption, Lean, Strategic, & Design, are all right and each is biased & incomplete

How Systems Thinking incorporates the others' principles

The Capability of enterprises to adapt itself to internal and external conditions demands holistic design

Why design principles matter more than methodologies

Understanding application of principles through discussion of what derails and delays your work

Why this topic matters

Enterprises are complex adaptive systems that will adapt intentionally or unintentionally. The six schools of thought listed above are counterproductive to design of complex adaptive enterprises as systems, they influence solution teams towards simple solutions and to dismiss breakthrough solutions.

You'll learn from

Julie Cunningham

Juie applies cognitive and complexity science to learning experiences.

Julie Cunningham is a seasoned Leadership Facilitator and Executive Coach with 25+ years’ experience across diverse industry sectors. She draws on a wide body of research in cognitive and complexity sciences to design applied learning experiences that translate theory into practice. Julie specialises in building leadership capability from the boardroom to the shop floor, with a strong emphasis on learning by doing. Her pragmatic approach helps leaders navigate uncertainty, drive behavioural change, and thrive in complex, evolving environments.

Peter Murchland

Peter builds conversational bridges for actions among segments of enterprises.

Peter works at the intersection of business and IT for his entire career, involving work in public, private and community sectors across education (including higher education and research), health, justice, defence, trade & transport and utilities. Typically, he engages in business architecture and transformation programs, assisting executives to realise the desired outcomes from their investment is organizational and operational capability investment No assignment has failed to present language challenges! His first encounters always involve coming to understand how an organisation talks about itself and its operations. He regards himself as a highly experienced babelfish (cf Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy).

Jim Dowling

Jim is an orchestrator of leader alignment and action.

A business maker, learner, and coach with a keen interest in helping individuals, teams and enterprises realize their performance aspirations. After leaving Engineering and Information Technology, Jim found his work/playground in a place where people, process, technology, and business can align to produce amazing results. Jim has led Teaming, Leadership Alignment, Leader Development, Enterprise Design, Enterprise Architecture, Business Transformation, Strategy Clarification, and Change Readiness programs for organizations in Europe, The Americas, and Asia.

Go deeper with a course

Capability Development
Jim Dowling, Amber Román, and Richard Lynch
View syllabus