“The authors bring a passion for social justice, equity, and inclusivity to the dialogue about changing the unjust systems that create disparate population health outcomes.” ©Doody’s Review Service, 2022, Suzan C Ulrich, Dr.PH, MSN, MN, RN, CNM, FACNM (Resurrection University) Leading Systems Change in Public Health: A Field Guide for Practitioners is the first resource written by public health professionals for public health professionals on how to improve public health by utilizing a systems change lens. Edited by leaders from the de Beaumont Foundation and the University of Illinois Chicago School of Public Health with chapters written by a diverse array of public health leaders, the book provides an evidence-based framework with practical strategies, processes, and tools for enacting meaningful change. Complete with engaging stories and tips to illustrate concepts in action, this book is the essential guide for current and future public health leaders working within and across individual, interpersonal, organizational, cross-sector, and community levels. The book addresses subjects such as change leadership, health equity, racial justice, power sharing, and readiness for change. It addresses best practices for enacting change at different levels, including at the personal, interpersonal, organizational, and team or cross-sector level, while describing the factors, the processes, skills, and tools required for leading complex change. It not only covers the process of leading systems change but also the importance of community organizing and coalition building, identifying a shared understanding of the problem, how to leverage the lessons of implementation science, and how to understand the relationship between sustainability and public health. Practical examples and stories highlight challenges and opportunities, systems change in action, and the importance of crisis leadership – including lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic. Key Features: Enables practitioners to improve public health by utilizing a systems change approach Applies systems change strategies to help discover solutions for improved community health equity and racial justice Integrates practical public health examples and stories from innovative leaders in the field Includes tools for how to implement internal processes that generate creative and effective system change leadership

This volume of Transforming Institutions follows from and builds on its predecessor of five years ago (Weaver et al., 2015) with a mix of case studies, models, and analyses. The authors and editors provide key perspectives for advancing change initiatives in higher education and STEM education. The Transforming Institutions conferences and book series began with the first convening in 2011 at Purdue University, organized by the Discovery Learning Research Center (DLRC), and continues with the 2019 and 2021 Transforming Institutions Conferences. The meeting sought then, as it still does, to bring together researchers, academic leaders, national organizations and funding agency representatives to discuss the practical aspects of changing institutional practices to align with the large body of evidence in the field. The editors and authors of this volume consider this work to be a beginning and hope it will be a call to action for every reader.View this book online at: http://openbooks.library.umass.edu/ascnti2020/

"David Stroh has produced an elegant and cogent guide to what works. Research with early learners is showing that children are natural systems thinkers. This book will help to resuscitate these intuitive capabilities and strengthen them in the fire of facing our toughest problems."—Peter Senge, author of The Fifth Discipline Concrete guidance on how to incorporate systems thinking in problem solving, decision making, and strategic planning—for everyone! Donors, leaders of nonprofits, and public policy makers usually have the best of intentions to serve society and improve social conditions. But often their solutions fall far short of what they want to accomplish and what is truly needed. Moreover, the answers they propose and fund often produce the opposite of what they want over time. We end up with temporary shelters that increase homelessness, drug busts that increase drug-related crime, or food aid that increases starvation. How do these unintended consequences come about and how can we avoid them? By applying conventional thinking to complex social problems, we often perpetuate the very problems we try so hard to solve, but it is possible to think differently, and get different results. Systems Thinking for Social Change enables readers to contribute more effectively to society by helping them understand what systems thinking is and why it is so important in their work. It also gives concrete guidance on how to incorporate systems thinking in problem solving, decision making, and strategic planning without becoming a technical expert. Systems thinking leader David Stroh walks readers through techniques he has used to help people improve their efforts on complex problems like: ending homelessness improving public health strengthening education designing a system for early childhood development protecting child welfare developing rural economies facilitating the reentry of formerly incarcerated people into society resolving identity-based conflicts and more! The result is a highly readable, effective guide to understanding systems and using that knowledge to get the results you want.

Complex times call for clear solutions—If initiative overload and fragmentation are keeping your best plans from becoming reality, it’s time to start leading differently. The key to bringing about the kind of successful and sustainable change you need is the Coherence Framework, a dynamic, customizable road map made up of four essential components: Focused direction to build collective purpose Cultivating collaborative cultures while clarifying individual and team roles Deepening learning to accelerate improvement and foster innovation Securing accountability from the inside out Coherence provides the insights and tools to drive effective leadership. Now you can gain a deeper understanding of Coherence with The Taking Action Guide to Building Coherence in Schools, Districts, and Systems. Coherence is a book that demands action – it moves from the narrative of fixing one teacher at a time, to asking about the coherence of the system (be it school, national, or world issues). Fullan and Quinn create an important narrative about direction, working together, deepening learning, and securing accountability. The book sparkles with examples of coherence in action, it makes no excuses for employing the wrong levers of change. This is the blueprint for a new vocabulary of education action; it shows where we need to go next, and is another example of Fullan at the top of his game. John Hattie Director, Melbourne Education Research Institute and Author of Visible Learning "School systems that struggle are riddled with incoherence—mismatched strategies, competing cultures, and illogical initiatives. Fullan and Quinn explain clearly how coherence can solve the problem. Based on solid research and lessons drawn from effective practice, Coherence provides a comprehensive model to guide educators as they learn and lead their way to better schools." Susan Moore Johnson Jerome T. Murphy Research Professor Harvard Graduate School of Education

Weaving together prescriptions with a series of cases, Systemic Change Management describes the value and how-to of a systemic or enterprise approach to organizational change. Each capability presented here promotes change, but when used together create synergies that magnify their individual impact within and between collaborating organizations.

We face a world of increasing turbulence and uncertainty. As a result, social systems at every level including countries, government institutions, business organisations, labour and civil society have to operate in situations of high causal ambiguity and complexity. This is a world characterised by turmoil, conflict, and seemingly insurmountable social, technological, political and ecological problems. It is a world where cause and effect are not easily separated in space and time, where problem-solving approaches relying on knowledge and skills from individual disciplines is incapable of addressing multi-faceted problems and difficulties, and our attempts at problem solving and improvement are short-lived resulting in transitory change accompanied by more problems and unintended consequences. It is therefore imperative that academics, executives, professionals, managers and other practitioners be equipped with conceptual tools, methodologies, and practices for working under such conditions. Conventional analytical approaches (though useful) are insufficient to handle high levels of complexity, mutual and circular causality and inter-dependence. There is a need for more holistic, pluralistic and participatory approaches in order to survive in a highly interconnected, complex, turbulent environment. This calls for a shift in understanding and working with complexity. It requires a trans-disciplinary mindset, a focus on wholism as opposed to reductionism, a people-centered value orientation, a blend of analytical skills with synthesis, the rationality of science combined with intuitive understanding and appreciation of the art of being human, and a posture of intellectual humility that promotes collective endeavours in learning, living, relating and working in a complex world. The main purpose of this book, which consists of thirteen double blind peer reviewed chapters, is to draw on systems thinking and complexity theory to present and develop theoretical frameworks, conceptual models, methodologies and practical techniques to promote the understanding of complex systems, and to identify ways of intervening to bring about systemic change for improvement. These will apply to all kinds of social systems and organisations, and hence will be appropriate for public sector organisations, corporations, non-government institutions and civil society in general.

The book describes what it means to say the world is complex and explores what that means for managers, policy makers and individuals. The first part of the book is about the theory and ideas of complexity. This is explained in a way that is thorough but not mathematical. It compares differing approaches, and also provides a historical perspective, showing how such thinking has been around since the beginning of civilisation. It emphasises the difference between a complexity worldview and the dominant mechanical worldview that underpins much of current management practice. It defines the complexity worldview as recognising the world is interconnected, shaped by history and the particularities of context. The comparison of the differing approaches to modelling complexity is unique in its depth and accessibility. The second part of the book uses this lens of complexity to explore issues in the fields of management, strategy, economics, and international development. It also explores how to facilitate others to recognise the implications of adopting a complex rather than a mechanical worldview and suggests methods of research to explore systemic, path-dependent emergent aspects of situations. The authors of this book span both science and management, academia and practice, thus the explanations of science are authoritative and yet the examples of changing how you live and work in the world are real and accessible. The aim of the book is to bring alive what complexity is all about and to illustrate the importance of loosening the grip of a modernist worldview with its hope for prediction, certainty and control.

Where should you start if you are faced with massive systemic challenges or want to cultivate a shift towards sustainability in global systems? Where are the leverage points for systemic change? This book provides examples of what organizations and companies like the Sustainable Shipping Initiative, WWF and Nike are doing, along with practical strategies and an overview of system change theory. Section one outlines systems thinking, especially how we can use a "living systems" perspective as a tool to understanding sustainability and change.Section two pulls out practical strategies for action from theoretical models and "must-read" literature. Section three illustrates how organisations are implementing these strategies – including examples from the Sustainable Shipping Initiative, Nike, Sustainable Food Lab, Finance Innovation Lab, Shell Foundation and Rockefeller Foundation.Section four provides tips for you as a practitioner navigating this territory. Many of the ideas behind cultivating system change can be difficult to understand until they are put into practice. This "practitioner's companion" ends with questions that will prompt reflections and spur you to action. Keep it to hand as you change the system!

Perspectives on Impact brings together leaders from across sectors to reflect on our approaches to social change. Sharing diverse examples from their work, these authors show how we must think more systemically and work more collaboratively to move the needle on the biggest social, humanitarian, and environmental challenges facing our world. Chapters by: Niko Canner, Shanti Nayak, and Cynthia Warner (Incandescent) Duncan Green (OxFam) Farah Ramzan Golant (Girl Effect, kyu) Sara Holoubek (Luminary Labs) Joi Ito (MIT Media Lab) Leila Janah (Samasource, LXMI, Samaschool) Amirah Jiwa George Kronnisanyon Werner (Republic of Liberia) Chris Larkin (IDEO.org) Eric Maltzer (Medora Ventures, Middlebury College) Jane Nelson (Harvard Kennedy School) Craig Nevill-Manning and Prem Ramaswami (Sidewalk Labs) Jacqueline Novogratz (Acumen) Deena Shakir (GV, formerly Google Ventures) Jose Miguel Sokoloff (MullenLowe Group) Lara Stein (TEDx, Women's March Global) Piyush Tantia (ideas42) Fay Twersky (William & Flora Hewlett Foundation) Sherrie Rollins Westin and Shari Rosenfeld (Sesame Workshop) Perspectives on Impact and its sister book, Perspectives on Purpose, bring together leading voices from across sectors to discuss how we must adapt our organizations for the twenty-first century world. Perspectives on Impact focuses on the recalibration of social impact approaches to tackle complex humanitarian, social, and environmental challenges; Perspectives on Purpose looks at the shifting role of the corporation in society through the lens of purpose.