This document provides an overview of Soft Systems Methodology (SSM). It outlines the aims and objectives of SSM workshops which are to provide an overview of SSM principles and practice and a limited experience using its elements. Key aspects of SSM covered include distinguishing problems from problematic situations, creating rich pictures to capture different themes and issues, developing root definitions and activity models of relevant systems, and using models to structure debate on desirable and feasible changes. The document also provides references for further reading on systems thinking and SSM.

1. Introduction to Soft Systems
Methodology (SSM)
Jon Thristan
Project Consultant at Gallery Systems
jthristan@gmail.com

2. Workshops Aims and Objectives
AIMS
• To provide an overview of the principles and practice of SSM
• To provide a very limited experience of using elements of Soft Systems
Methodology
OBJECTIVES
• Distinguish between ‘difficulties’ or ‘problems’ and ‘messes’ or
‘problematic situations’
• Create a Rich Picture that captures information about one of your
problematic situations, identifying various themes and issues
• Identify a system relevant to the situation informed by PQR, CATWOE
and TW criteria, specifying a Root Definition of a relevant system
• Construct a model of the activities required to achieve the
transformation implied by the system
• Provide brief overview of comparing models with problematic situation,
in order to support discussion and the identification of improvements
which are systemically desirable and culturally feasible

3. References and further reading
• All of the ‘pencil’ diagrams/models are taken from the work of Peter
Checkland, the originator of Soft Systems Methodology. I think these
are the best summaries of SSM.
• Other illustrations taken from Open University course materials: TU812
Managing systemic change: inquiry, action and interaction
• I try to provide an account of SSM that corresponds to Checkland’s
intentions, but of course it’s my interpretation
• I think the clearest, most concise exposition of SSM is contained in:
Peter Checkland and John Poulter, Learning for Action: A Short
Definitive Account of Soft Systems Methodology, and Its Use for
Practitioners, Teachers and Students
• If you’d like to find out more about systems thinking, I think a good
introduction, via excerpts from the writings of key systems thinkers, is
provided by: Martin Reynolds and Sue Holwell (eds.), Systems
Approaches to Managing Change: A Practical Guide
• More challenging: Ison, R.L. Systems Practice: How to Act in a
Climate-Change World

4. References and further reading: different
lineages of systems thinking

5. Perspective
1. Pick up a pen or pencil. Holding it front of you, raise it above your
head, with the point towards the ceiling. Rotate the point clockwise,
describing a circle.
2. Still rotating the pen or pencil slowly lower it, first so that it is rotating
at eye-level, then so that you are looking down at the pen or pencil
rotating at around waist level, from above
3. What direction is the pen or pencil moving in?

6. Facts

7. Framing

8. Relational Dynamics
1.Walk 5 paces
2.Describe the process by which walking
happens

9. Theories

10. Worldviews
Terrorist or Freedom Fighter?

11. SSM Summarised
The world is
mysterious…
Organise learning as a
system…

12. LUMAS model: learning for a user by a
methodologically informed approach to a
situation

13. A shift in thinking: from Hard to Soft
Systems

14. ‘Hard’ and ‘Soft’ systems stances

15. Problems and Problematic Situations: 5 minute
activity and discussion
1. Think of a concern, a problem or an issue that you think you’ll be able
to solve this evening, or maybe at some point over the course of this
week
2. Think of one of the trickiest, most difficult problems or issues that you
have experienced. This could be a work issue or something more
personal
3. What are the differences between the two? Jot down some ideas.

16. Problems vs. Problematic Situations
Problems
• Often know in advance what the answer will look like
• Can have lots of elements involved, but the connections between them are not dynamic
• Not as many people involved
• Some degree of agreement amongst people affected about the nature of the problem
• Problems usually fairly well bounded: affects limited set of things, people, processes etc
Problematic Situations
• Can be little agreement on what the problem is; often general sense of unease, produced by
lack of certainty
• Because lack of agreement, hard to say that a solution would look like
• Hard to define a single problem
• The problem doesn’t seem well bound: involves lots of elements, related in different ways
• Problems persist; maybe there have been previous attempts to address
• Involves lots of different people – and perspectives
• Change all the time

17. Systems Thinking: the idea of a system

18. Systems Thinking
Definition of a system: a collection of entities that
are seen by someone as interacting together to do
something
Source of
food?
Landscape
feature?

19. Systems Thinking
• Personal ‘trajectory’
• This maybe partly
explains why ‘today feels
like yesterday’

20. Basic Process of SSM
Checkland summarises
the ‘bare bones’ of SSM
process as:
• Perceive a real-world
situation as
problematic - as
calling for action to
improve it
• Produce models of
purposeful activity
relevant to this
situation (not
describing it)
• Use the models as
devices to explore
the situation
• Structure a debate
about desirable
feasible change
• Make changes
(repeat…)

21. Typical Activities during an SSM Inquiry

22. SSM: Finding Out. Making Rich Pictures

23. SSM: Finding Out. Making Rich Pictures
• Complex human situations involve multiple interacting relationships –
easier to represent in pictures than linear prose
• Therefore, as knowledge of situation is gathered (by talking to people,
interviewing, attending meetings, document archaeology etc) draw a
picture of your understanding
• What to capture? Main entities, structures, viewpoints, processes,
issues, conflicts, emotions. Everything that seems significant to you
– and to others.
• Use symbols, arrows, pictures, icons etc. Avoid words as far as
possible
• Draw and re-draw; create multiple rich pictures as understanding
evolves
• Be open, be a ‘sponge’
• Don’t worry about quality of drawing
• Can be shared and used to initiate discussion: ‘this is how I see the
situation’; can be used in workshop settings

24. SSM: Finding Out. Making Rich Pictures
• Draw a rich picture of your problematic situation (10 mins).
• Don’t worry about quality of drawing
• Work quickly! Try to include different elements, connections, feelings
• Include yourself in the picture
• You already know LOTS about the situation you have experienced as
problematic – organise through drawing

25. SSM: Finding Out.
Analysis 1: the intervention
Keep a journal of
issues and issue
owners
Analysis 1 as
input to
model
building:
linkage
between
activities

26. SSM: Finding Out.
Analysis 2: social analysis
Keep a journal and record
learnings about social landscape,
with a date: what do you learn
from interactions about the
prevailing ‘culture’; about
norms, roles and values

27. SSM: Finding Out.
Analysis 3: politics and power
Keep a journal and record
learnings about power and the
way it is exercised

28. SSM: Model Building
Root Definitions
• Next, as part of SSM process of inquiry into a problematic situation produce
models of purposeful activity
• Why models of ‘purposeful activity’? Because all complex human situations
contain people acting purposefully
• Build models from a single, explicit ‘worldview’ – therefore they are NOT
representations of reality. For example, if I was interested in system of home
improvement, I could consider it from the perspective of a householder who
believes that DIY makes it possible to improve the appearance of property
• First produce a written statement that describes the activity system to be
modelled as a Root Definition
• SSM provides guidance on how to do this:
• Use the PQR formula: a system to do P, by means of Q, in order to help
achieve R i.e. answer questions of: ‘what, how and why?’
• For example, a householder owned and operated system to paint the garden
fence (P), by means of hand-painting (Q), in order to improve the
appearance of their property (R)
• The ‘Q’ element describes a ‘transformation process’ (a plausible one
given the ‘P’). ANY purposeful activity can be described as a
transformation process whereby an entity is transformed from one
state into a different state

29. SSM: Model Building
Making Activity Models: Root Definitions
• The transformation processes involved in purposeful activity always
involves an entity being transformed into a different state:
• Garden fence [entity] unpainted > garden fence [entity] painted
• For complex activities, describe the entity in an abstract way
• Health care needs of citizens [entity] not met > Health care needs of citizens [entity] met
• You at the start of the workshop > You at the end of the workshop (in a different state)
As Input-Output Model:
Initial State Changed State

30. SSM: Model Building
Making Activity Models: Root Definitions
• Supplement PQR formula with CATWOE mnemonic: use as a reference
to describe a general model of a purposeful activity
CATWOE adds elements
to a description
developed via PQR
formula i.e. a
purposeful activity,
defined by a
transformation process
and a worldview will
require e.g. People (A)
to carry our the T; will
impact people (C);
takes as given an E –
which acts as
constraint; could be
stopped or changed in
some way by (O)

31. SSM: Model Building
Making Activity Models: Root Definitions
A householder-owned and staffed system to paint the garden fence, by
hand-painting, in keeping with the overall decoration scheme of the
property in order to enhance the appearance of the property
• Clear that householder’s perspective adopted
• This householder believes in ability of DIY to improve (I don’t, for
example… look at my attempts at DIY…)
• Describes what system does: (paints the fence); how (by hand-
painting) and why (enhance appearance). AND worldview assumes link
between these
• Supplement the Root Definition by considering what measures of
performance would enable the operation of the system to be judged
• Criteria related to whether the Transformation (T) process is working
(efficacy); whether T is being achieved with minimum resources
(efficiency); whether T helps achievement of longer-term goal
(effectiveness)
• Primary Task or Issue-based RD? i.e. core operation (existing) more a
concern or issue which might cut-across organisation silos (QV idea of
Value Chain – can stimulate more debate)

32. SSM: Model Building
Making Activity Models: Root Definitions

33. Have a go at producing a Root Definition for a system relevant to your
problematic situation (10 mins)
• Identify a theme or issue
• Consider an explicit worldview
• Start by considering PQR
• Check that these elements can be plausibly related to each other via
consideration of the T sought and the selected W
• If you have time, further develop the Root Definition by adding the
remaining elements from the CATWOE mnemonic
• If you had time… consider the 3E criteria
• And repeat for different transformations and worldviews
• Try the interesting, unusual, non-obvious
• The Root Definitions and Activity Models are devices to support
learning
SSM: Model Building
Making Activity Models: Root Definitions

34. SSM: Model Building: Activity Models
• Model building is described by Peter Checkland as:
putting together the activities needed to describe the transforming
process
• i.e. defining, ordering and linking the activities needed to achieve a
transformation
• Produce a model via the Root Definition – not some real world version,
already known to you!
• Aim to identify the operational activity 7 +/- 2 activities
• The models can be recursive i.e. for each activity you could ‘drill-down’
and model in more ‘7 +/- 2’ detail

35. General form of an activity model

36. SSM: Model Building: Activity Models

37. SSM: Model Building: Activity Models:
Example

38. Have a go at producing a Conceptual Model of your Root Definition (10
mins)
• Try for 7 +/- 2 activities
• Order the dependencies logically
• Model the activities implied by your root definition – not some real
world example known to you
• You can include activities needed to prepare inputs and activities that
are concerned with the output i.e. the entity transformed
• If you had time you could have considered criteria related to the 3Es
SSM: Model Building: Activity Models

39. • We entered a problematic situation/found ourselves in a problematic
situation
• We produced rich pictures and carried out Analyses 1,2,3 and began to
develop a rich appreciation of the situation
• Via list of potential ‘issue owners’ or identification of themes/issues
began to name and describe models of purposeful activity relevant to
the situation
• Further develop our understanding
• Use models as devices to structure discussion with
stakeholders about the situation
• What might be changed?
• How could it be changed?
• What would be an improvement
• Eventually: actual action to change
SSM: Discussion and Debate

40. • Compare the models with the situation in order to generate questions
– NOT using models as ‘ideals’ (they are formed from a single
worldview therefore cannot exist in the real world)
• How to structure discussion:
• Informally, in group setting, review the models produced and
compare with the situation. Questions might be: ‘here is an activity
in the model, how is it done in the situation? Is it done? How are
these activities linked? How do we know whether an activity
works?’ The fact that models are based on worldviews surfaces
other, implicit worldviews, which underlie the situation
• Formally, create a matrix of elements from the model and
selected questions (maybe of you are facilitating a process of
inquiry that you have largely conducted):
SSM: Discussion and Debate

41. SSM: Discussion and Debate

42. SSM: Discussion and Debate:
Defining Actions

43. SSM: Discussion and Debate:
Defining Actions

44. Peter Checkland’s Summary of SSM’s 5
actions

45. Activity model of a system to conduct an
inquiry into a problem situation
‘Learning’ as emergent property
of the system.

46. Coda: Reflective Practice
Basic stance of SSM:
using SSM ideas and principles
to make sense of the complexity
of the real world

47. Coda: Reflective Practice
Practitioner perceives
complexity in the world
‘outside’ – and thinks
about what to do at the
same level as the
perception: ‘I could a,b,c’
Experienced SSM
practitioner not simply
perceiving complexity –
the perception is lifted
to a meta-level: the
practitioner is able to
inspect their own thinking
– and think about it

48. Q&A
JON THRISTAN
GALLERY SYSTEMS
jon.thristan@gallerysystems.com