The origin of the word system comes from the Ancient Greek "synistanai" meaning "to bring together or combine." (2002, Washington University Press). There are many similar definitions (Appendix A) but essentially a system is a collection of organised interrelated parts/elements that function as one single entity within a boundary to achieve a specific objective.
A group of friends is an example of a system. The objective of a system is the reason it exists for this argument we will assume its objective is "Social interaction for mutual benefit". The elements that make up this system of friends would be the individual people.
The Boundary of a system is where the system ends and the environment begins. Systems usually exist in an environment and the boundary is important because it defines what elements are parts of the system and what are parts of the environment. The importance of this is more apparent in information systems. Boundaries do not necessarily need to be tangible entities such as a wall or even a national boarder. For our group of friends the boundary would be a detailed list of people who are friends'. The boundary could not be something such as language because it does not accurately define who is in the group of friends and who is not.
A Human Being is a system it contains elements such as arms, legs, muscles etc. that function as a whole to achieve an objective, which is "self preservation". The boundary of this system is the skin or outer layer.
So far only tangible things have been discussed as systems but systems do not necessarily need to be entirely tangible take information systems such as the stock market. It contains elements such as buyers and sellers not always people sometimes the buyer or seller maybe a computer acting as an agent. In any case it still contains many elements tangible and intangible that work together to achieve a specific objective. In this case the objective it "To facilitate the transfer of stocks" that is the function of the stock market.
The System properties outlined have focused on the elements or parts and their objective and boundary. Studying the parts of the system cannot lead us to a greater understanding of a system as was thought before the mid 20th century
System thinking started mud 20th century and drives away from the previous academic vies of studying
the parts to understanding the abstract whole.
System Theory was developed in the 19th century. It was developed to explain historical development as dynamic process. This theory uses a complex system to explore the behavior patterns that humans experience. System psychology focuses on affective, motivational, cognitive and group behavioral patterns. Systems theory in therapy applies to a group setting like couples, organizations, or families. Systems therapy identifies specific behavior patterns within the group and how each member will respond to anxiety within the dynamic. The value of the system theory is by using the people involved will change their behavior patterns to more productive behaviors (Goodtherapy.org, 2017). By changing their behaviors he or she will stop using the behaviors that are causing problems in his or her life.
“When technology is seen as a combination of devices, skills, and organizational structures, it becomes natural to think of it as a system.”
The “system” in this sense can be defined in many different ways. Oxford Dictionary provides the following, A set of things working together as parts of a mechanism or an interconnecting network; a complex whole. Therefore, we can say that many different things within the system of the community failed the victims, families, and the murderers.
Meadows, D. H. (2008). Chapter 1. In Thinking in systems (p. 12). White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green publishing company.
Listening to the TedTalk, Rachel gave some examples of the three levels of systems. According to Kirst-Ashman,” micro system refers to an individual” (Kirst-Ashman, 2011, p. 30) and the example that Rachel uses using the micro system as she asked the audience to raise
In order to fully grasp the features of Parsons' social system it is necessary to examine such a concept in the context of his all-embracing system theory, or more in particular his theory of action. However, theoretical vices become apparent, thus it is imperative to briefly address the concept from an alternative perspective, such as Dahrendorf's theory, in order to highlight varying features of the concept of a social system, but also the interpretative nature such a concept entails. Therefore this essay primarily will deal only with those highlights or 'features'.
“Structure refers to the organization of the system at a point in time (DuBois, Miley and O’Melia, 2012 p.37).” “The way individuals and subsystems within a systems arrange theme selves is the structure of the system ( DuBois, Miley and O’Melia, 2012, p.37).
Systems thinking: helps build the framework for the individuals to gain knowledge and the tools to visualize the “big picture”
Forrester, J. W. (1995). The Beginning of System Dynamics. The McKinnsey Quaterly , 4 - 16.
“ Organizations are collectivities oriented to the pursuit of relatively specific goals and exhibiting relatively highly formalized social structures” (page 29). The rational system is a group of individuals, bound together as an organization, designed to reach predetermined goals. The rational system models sees organizations as a mechanical model. A machine that has multiple parts that also works individually but also work together for the better good of the whole. All the individuals of the group can be replaced with a new one if it doesn’t meet the standards of
The GST describes how a system works, and is understood as “an organized unit with a set of components that interact and affect each other” (Catalano, 2006, p. 59). A system acts as a whole because of the interdependence of its parts.
Betty Neuman created the system model from concepts influenced by “de Chardin’s philosophical beliefs about the wholeness of life; Marxist philosophic views of the oneness of man and nature; Gestalt and field theories of the interaction between person and environment; general system theory of the nature of living open systems; Emery’s and Lazarus’ views of systems; Selye’s conceptualization of stress; and Caplan’s articulation of levels of prevention” (Fawcett, 2001).
Systems theory as stated before, gives us a better understanding of the behavior that goes on within a family. If a family negatively affects a client, it doesn’t mean the theory doesn’t work. It means the environment is affecting something the family is doing and there are changes that need to be made to create a positive outcome. The example that was used was the concept of goal orientation in a family. If a family doesn’t have a goal, it doesn’t mean the family doesn’t follow this theory, it means the social worker needs to identify what is happening in the subsystem as to why there aren’t positively oriented goals. This theory helps with the development of a person and family by looking into the situation as the social worker to perceive why a client has certain problems or issues because of how they were raised a particular way based on environmental
According to John D. Carl, “systems are considered technologies; [and] new systems offer similar opportunities and changes that new objects might bring” (Carl, J.D., 2011, p.301). Re...
As the workers transition from focusing on their part of their job and begin to see how their part connects to the overall system, not only have the leaders taught the workers systems thinking, the leaders also have transformed their company into a learning organization (Chan, 2015; Lee & Green, 2015). This essay is to highlight how systems thinking, learning organization, and personal mastery function together within an organization. The first part of the paper provides an in-depth comparison of systems thinking and learning organization. The last part of the paper explores the importance of personal mastery to a team and an organization.