A concept of systems thinking is the idea of emergent properties. Emergent properties are effects that come from the various system components interacting.

These may go unnoticed to the person who thinks through problems linearly. They may not see the intended or unintended side effects that the system produces.

In Management Science: Decision Making Through Systems Thinking, authors H.G. Daellenbach and D.D. McNickle state, “Unfortunately, all too often emergent properties are not desirable or even planned.”

They go on to say, “One of the compelling reasons for using a systems approach to problem solving is exactly to predict planned desirable emergent properties and unplanned undesirable emergent properties resulting from a given decision better. It is then possible to take suitable counter-measures or alter the original design to alleviate or avoid undesirable emergent properties at the planning stage, before they occur.”

We see this all time. Years ago, I was living in a city that was seeing business after business leave the area. This meant fewer tax dollars coming into the city. The city used this money to improve the infrastructure and add amenities. Residents would brag about the great reasons for living in that city and low taxes compared to neighboring communities. But now that extra money was gone.

This meant that city officials had to find ways to reduce spending. Obviously, this started to impact the residents. Too often I would hear neighbors complaining. They didn't understand why they previously were able to have such great amenities. They were only seeing that something was being taken away.

At one point a very large business wanted to build a new facility in the city. This would help bring in the lost tax dollars. But the local residents got together to oppose the new business. They argued that it would ruin the natural habits of wildlife.

Many of these residents didn't connect the fact that blocking businesses from entering the city meant the city officials couldn’t bring in new businesses to recover the tax dollars that disappeared when other businesses left.

Residents wanted the benefits of each system change. But they didn't want the consequences (emergent properties). They wanted the tax money from businesses but wanted to keep the land unchanged.

This example highlights the importance of understanding the full system. Opposing the new business might be the best thing to do. But we need to be aware of the emergent properties (lack of incoming tax dollars) of this decision.

Too often we look linearly at a complex system. We pull out the information that supports our opinion at the moment. We never realize that the emergent properties might have unintended consequences.

But if we can better understand the system, we can change how we approach problems. We can try to work with the business to locate their new building where an old abandoned building currently sits. We can determine what amenities will be cut if funds don’t increase, which may shed new light on how important that natural habitat is.

Maybe it makes that decision easy, but maybe it means the parks will lose the funding to keep up with them. It could mean any number of things and without looking at the full system and all of the emergent properties we will likely gloss over some elements and highlight others, without really understanding the full scope.

When you look at a problem, make sure that you look at the full system when you decide how to tackle that problem. What may seem like an easy decision might in fact have unintended consequences. These are due to the way the various elements of the system interact. Doing this will give more insight during the planning stages so you can address emergent properties before they become problems.