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Mike Lyons explains why systems thinkers distinguish between complex and complicated problems, even though people use the words interchangeably. You'll sort four example systems into groups before learning the formal definitions.
Mike Lyons explains why systems thinkers distinguish between complex and complicated problems, even though people use the words interchangeably. You'll sort four example systems into groups before learning the formal definitions.
When you think about the work you do, would you say most of it is complicated, or would you say most of it's complex? I don't know about you, but I tend to use those two words sort of interchangeably. If something is hard, I might say it's a complex problem, or I might say it's a complicated problem. In everyday conversation, we tend to just use them to mean the same thing. But when we're talking about systems, the two terms actually have very different meanings. So here in this next few moments, I want you to take a look at these four different systems and ask yourself, do you think the system is complex or complicated? I know we haven't defined these terms yet, so it's okay if you're not sure. Just ask yourself, what do they have in common? What do they have that's different? And see if you can sort of line them up with these two terms. And in the next lesson, we'll get into more about what these two terms actually mean.
