An example method for developing Southbeach Notation Models

Whilst Southbeach Notation itself does not impose any methodology, it is sometimes useful to see how other people have been using it. This example is one way of assessing a situation, brainstorming improvement options, and establishing action plans involving the need to consult large numbers of people. It includes a very simple Southbeach model of a manufacturing firm by way of illustration. Several iterations of the model are shown to demonstrate how a model may be built up through structured questioning. At each stage, the new agents that are added to the model are highlighted in yellow.

Four phases of activity are described below:


More details on example activities and pointers for each phase are provided below:


Model the situation:

Identify & interview stake holders

What are the priority areas?
What are the goals?
What’s helps achieve the goals?
What are these dependent on?
What’s counteracting the goals?
What are the real issues?
What causes those issues?
What’s the root cause?
What other resources do we have?

Assess the differences in perspective
Break differences of opinion down into their parts to get to the issues
Agree what’s important and why, remove the rest

Cost, harmful, and considered a risk, counteracts Profit, which is useful and the goal of the firm. We keep this model deliberately trivial for the purposes of illustration and gradually expand on it below.

Tips

Don’t ask leading questions
Your opinion is irrelevant; Mine their knowledge
Watch body language; Ask pointed questions
Differentiate opinion or hearsay from fact
Seek corroborating evidence

What is most important? What are the goals and risks?
What is most useful? What is most harmful?
What led/is still leading to this situation?
What resources are available? What are the enablers?
What are the risks, blockers & constraints? How can we mitigate against them?
What is the ideal outcome?


Elaborate and refine the model
Who else should be consulted?
- Specialists?
- Customers?
- Suppliers?
- External experts?

What’s missing from the model? (stand on each block and ask...)
- What else does this produce?
- What else produces this?
- What else does this counteract?
- What else counteracts this?
- What are the enablers and positive forces for change?
- What are the blockers and inhibitors?

Here we look at what produces the Cost and Profit and what is counteracting them. Sales leads to Manufacturing, which generates both Revenue and Cost. The revenue contributes to the profit and the Cost counteracts it. The Profit is also counteracted by Corporation Tax.

Tips
Keep asking what causes this until you get to the root cause
See all sides of the argument
Decompose contradictions into their parts
- “Cut costs” + “Increase marketing budget” = ???
- - Choose between one or the other?
- - Move budget from elsewhere?
- - Improve marketing efficiency?
Remove unnecessary information
Differentiate hobby horses from the real issues
E.g. absence of something is not necessarily an issue – it could be the interviewee leaping to conclusions about what the solution is…. “The problem is we have no leadership”… or is it just that this person does not agree with the leadership?


Brainstorm Improvement Options

Each of the questions below targets a different creativity centre in the brain, and focusses on a different part of the problem in the system. Consider each question carefully and make sure to answer them specifically (e.g. consider the harmful effects of pollution: protect from harm (e.g. using a mask to avoid inhaling pollution) is quite different from reduce harm (e.g. using unleaded fuel), is quite different from reduce ability to produce harm (e.g. reduce engine size or speed limit), is quite different from prevent harm (e.g. pedestrianize the town centre), is quite different to avoid harm (e.g. don't go into the town, stay in the country).

Ask what could improve the situation?
- What are the enablers for this?
- What are the blockers and how can we overcome them?
Ask what could worsen the situation?
- How could we prevent this?
- What are the risk mitigations for this?

Increase usefulness
- Introduce more kinds or quantities of useful agents into the system
- Find a way for useful agents to last longer or be more efficient or effective
- Change agents somehow so they are more useful or have more uses
- Make more use of...
- Increase the ability to produce the useful, Find other ways to produce the useful
- Go to where the useful agents already exist or are available
- Find another way to get the useful that is not affected by the harm
- Find another way to get the useful that has not harmful side effects
Decrease harm
- Prevent harmful agents from coming into existence
- Remove harmful agents altogether
- Change agents somehow to decrease their harmfulness
- Reduce the ability to produce harm
- Protect useful agents from harm
- Avoid the harm

Improve
- Find a way to increase the usefulness without increasing the harm
- Find another way to get the usefulness that does not produce the harm
- Separate the conflicting behaviours or tensions
- - in time / space / by perception / condition
- - Transition to super-system / sub-system / alternate system / inverse system
Step back and consider alternatives
Move to the next generation of the system
Remove the need for the system

Here the ideas for improving the system are shown as blue boxes. Blue boxes are not yet part of the system being diagnosed, but rather, represent the recommendations arising from the analysis of the Southbeach Model of the system. Here Offshoring is designed to counteract Cost, as is Reduced Stock, which is achieved by implementing a Build to Order process. Sales are increased through additional Marketing activity.

What are the risks?
What are the external influences that could adversely affect us?
In what way might we be harming or harmed by the environment?

Here we examine what additional external factors may affect the system. Competitors, considered harmful, counteract Revenue. Warranty Activity contributes to Cost which erodes Profit. This causal chain is saying that both Competitors and Warranty Activity indirectly erode Profit, so we had better do something about it.

What can we do about those risks?
Can any of those harmful factors be turned to use?
How can we work in better harmony with the environment?

Research & Development is recommended here to identify Potential (dotted box) new Products that could counteract Competitors who do not have comparable products, giving us some of the market share that was previously with competitors, as well as directly increase Revenue by winning new customers attracted by this new Product. Continually asking 'what other benefits does this have?' yields R&D tax rebates which increases Profit further. Warranty Activity is reduced by an Improved Quality Assurance process. Note that the new process and products will have their own costs, which will erode profit. These are not shown here as they are a necessary part of the idea evaluation - the business case for each blue activity block - they are not a part of the system we are improving until those blue blocks are implemented.

Tips
Brainstorm improvement options, in the above categories, or directed in some other way
Collect improvement ideas
Group ideas together to create better ideas

Run professionally facilitated workshops
Use independent third parties who are not blinkered by history and have no bias
Consult experts as needed, from within the firm and outside
Use the wisdom of crowds – run virtual idea management campaigns using services from firms such as imaginatik.com
Consider what others in the market are doing

Consider the implications, what could the unforeseen consequences of your actions be? How can you protect against them? How can you make your solution last?

Planning Tips
What are the consequences of taking these actions, Useful and Harmful? (Impact analysis)
What preparatory steps should be taken?
What resources are available?
What other activities could our plan integrate with or leverage?
Consider what change management activity will be needed
How can we ensure adoption of the new solution?
Communicate and Educate far and wide
How can we ensure realisation of the benefits?
Consider planning in a benefits realisation phase
Establish metrics
Identify roles and responsibilities
Establish governance and necessary support or operational processes

Can the UK manage investment in its energy infrastructure to avoid future brownouts?

(Our thanks to technology and policy futurologist, Chris Yapp, for the inspiration to publish this example). Here is an example of the use of a Southbeach grid, to clarify the factors that could lead to powere brownouts in the UK. The model clarifies actions and plans in the present, and possible futures.

If we decommission coal and nuclear power stations on current dates and energy consumption rises this will increase the possibility of brownouts on a scale similar to New England a few years ago. This can be alleviated by extending the lives of these power stations till new capacity comes on board. That reduces the brownout risk at one level. However extending the life of power stations beyond their design limits risks unplanned outages which are harder to deal with. What lowers the risk on one timescale raises risk of a different nature on a different timescale.

But a question remains? What can cause new capacity to come onboard?



To get more insight from this model, we have added an agent to represent the intention (potential) to plan and prepare for building new power production capability. This 'thought' can exist in the present, and it is what brings new capacity onboard in the future.

If it does not occur (not realised) then the brownouts will occur if the decommisioning continues. If the plans don't come about, they do not counteract the life extension projects, and the life extension will therefore continue, with the risk of unplanned outage risks.

Both extending the life of stations, and planning for new build, are useful (green), but are in some kind of opposition (tension). Both cannot fully 'live' together - and it is this tension we would explore for further analysis as indicated in the model below.



There are therefore three risks to power in the UK:

Risk1: If new capacity does not come on board in the future, brownouts will not be counteracted.

Risk2: The surplus life extension will lead to unplanned outages.

Risk3: Planning intentions in tension with extending the lives of the existing power stations.

Further analysis would proceed by interviewing experts around the three causes of uncertainty - centred on the focal point: planning. Over time, models would become more detailed, and more compelling, and the root causes of uncertainty would be revealed. These models could then suggest directions for changing the situation.

UK energy policy

In this model, we show a summary of the landscape in which the UK develops energy policy. The model seems to imply that energy choices (coal, renewables, nuclear, gas) - coupled with national interests and the politics of global warming, are creating an uncertain environment for planning, investment, choices and options.

21 Drivers for the 21st Century - War, Terrorism, Insecurity (outsights.co.uk)

Southbeach can be effective at visualizing and asking questions about 'scenarios'.

Scenario planning is a strategic planning method that some corporations and many public sector organizations use to make flexible long-term plans. It is considered by some as part of 'corporate innovation'. Related terms include futures studies, horizon scanning, forecasting and roadmapping.

Outsights is a leading practitioner of scenario planning and horizon scanning - helping clients (including public sector organizations and NGOs) to anticipate, interpret and act on important developments in the external world. Their latest work is entitled '21 Drivers for the 21st Century'. Here is a small Southbeach model based on the summary ideas within one scenario.



Forthcoming Southbeach|MyCreativity can add rules to such models, to bring sripts, questions and best practices to life in the context of the current model. Here is an example showing this in action:

UK to introduce vetting of adults who spend time with children

Southbeach can be used to express important social issues and debates between government, policy makers, lobby groups, the media and citizens - so as to ask deep questions about the kind of society we create for the next generation as we sleep walk and widen the reach of the existing surveillance society. Models can be developed from multiple perspectives, exposing fallacies in the causal logic of those who argue to seek to restrict our remaining liberties. Here is one perspective.

Contrasting perspectives - Spirals of change

This example shows how different perspectives on a situation can be compared and contrasted by using multiple Southbeach Notation diagrams to show the potential consequences of different behaviors or solutions.

The two models below show the same situation, with different choices being made at each stage of development, and different consequences resulting, which cause further choices to be made.

These models were created from the perspective of someone who believes in 'planning for the future', as shown by all the agents below being useful (green) and many of the agents above, starting with 'short term'ism' are harmful (red).

Whilst neither of these models are either complete or balanced, they serve to show a perspective on different approaches, with what are considered to be the key elements of the argument laid out to make it clear what is being said.

A further activity after creating models like this might be to create more detailed and complete models that provide both sides of the story, and weigh up the pros and cons of taking actions in the short term versus taking a longer term approach.

The trouble with Wind Farms - economic and environmental

There are problems with wind farms. Opposition is growing. The following Southbeach models were developed as examples to show the dilemna and contradictions. If you disagree with these models, develop some of your own, and send them to feedback at southbeachinc dot com.

Europe's largest wind farm is not producing enough power. So advocates for wind farms are advocating an expansion of scale. As if 140 turbines 110m high were not enough! Here's the problem. Large wind farms near to be close to areas of population, to drive down costs of power distribution and servicing. But they also have to be in area of open ground and subject to high wind. That means, the green areas close to conubations are precisely those at risk, and valued by the community. Here is another view:

In this model shows the insufficient power production of wind farms counteracting the economic case. That case can only be made by contributory factors of location, location and location. The expanding scale of wind farms, and their ideal location (for the economic case to be made) are in contradiction. The economic case is strongly related to the availability of the wind 'resource'. Environmentalists are split:

And it's not just industrial scale problems faced by Wind Farms. Noise, even for single turbine units 'micro generation' is already disturbing animals, and neighbours. To make matters worse, the high winds required for more power (see models above) are precisely the conditions under which turbines produce more noise. It's a lose lose situation.

Simple Business Improvement Model

This Southbeach Notation diagram illustrates some of the Southbeach Semantics in a simple model of a business. Its purpose is both to describe the situation and provide a basis from which to agree on key facts (e.g. there are insufficient sales) and priorities (e.g. marketing is the focus of attention). Southbeach models exist to support the analysis process in improving the situation. Thus, each element of a Southbeach model can provide a pivot point for improvement. Some examples are provided below.

Here is how to read this diagram:

Spending produces (arrow) materials which are used (small box end) by the manufacturing process to create (star) products which produce sales which produce revenue which produce profit. The profit is the goal (solid green box), and it is counteracted by the spending, considerd harmful and hence shown in red. Spending also produces marketing which increases the sales from the products. However, competitors (harmful) counteract the production of sales. Sales are shown as insufficient (dashed box) and marketing is the focus of attention (yellow highlight). Note the filled circle at the start of some effect lines indicating that the agent is necessary for the effect to occur, e.g. Spending is necessary to increase materials, manufacturing, and marketing.

Note the short dashed lines across some of the effects. These indicate that the effect occurs after a delay. For example, there is a delay between acquisition of the materials and use of those materials by the manufacturing process to create the product.

Here are some improvement alternatives illustrated by this diagram:

All green boxes are useful, so increasing them is likely to increase the usefulness of the overall system. Red boxes are harmful, so need to be reduced, but a balance must be struct as although spending is considered harmful, it has multiple useful effects - spending is necessary - so the reduction of spending is only useful if it can be achieved without reducing the useful products of that spending (materials, manufacturing, and marketing). Similarly, delays on useful effects are opportunities for improvement as they represent a delay in realisation of potential value held in the system. Note that competitors have no useful function in this system as they are harmful, counteract the useful production of profit, and have no useful side effects (from the perspective of the business), so finding ways to avoid, prevent, remove, or diminish the impact of competitors is worthwhile investment as long as it does not cost more than the profit (i.e. as long as the business is actually viable).

There are more subtle ways in which creativity techniques can be combined with Southbeach models. For example, the sales are insufficient. So how can we resolve that? From the model, we can spend more on marketing to increase the production of sales from products, or we can spend more on manufacturing to create more products - more kinds of products to hit more of the market, or more products to places where it is needed if the market is not uniform in its consumption. We can find ways to diminish the effect of the competitors; by selling the products where our competitor has no influence, by removing the competitor through acquisition, by branching out into markets not addressed by our competitor. We can also move into other kinds of sales than products; perhaps there is revenue to be made by providing service contracts. Combining creativity techniques of various forms with Southbeach models as a mechanism for driving a structured brainstorming approach can be a very powerful way to create improvement directions that will be more complete and more directed to where they are needed most.

The model below shows how these improvement ideas can be arrived at by working around the agents and effects in the diagram:

Blue boxes are improvement actions.

Human dominion over nature?

It used to be that humans had dominion over the world. The world was there to take. We invaded foreign lands, took the resources we needed, and created the built environment. Now we are not so sure. We sit at an uneasy juncture - somewhere between opposing mind sets. We are unsure of how to prevent the dilemmas we face.

(This model illustrates two new semantics in Southbeach 0.9 - 'prevents' and 'contributes to')

Analysing the water crisis in Australia's Marray-Darling Basin

This model was created as part of an open ideation event run by http://circleofblue.org/.

It shows some of the problems being caused by over extractraction of water from the Murray-Darling basin in Australia. And also some of the solutions (blue boxes) being considered. This is a world issue that has manifested in many countries and will continue to manifest as our water consumption increases with population and adoption of water hungry appliances and crops in areas that require artificial irrigation.

Here is how one might go about developing a model like this:

1. Create a model, a hypothesis - describing the problem, and consequences of attempted solutions to date 

2. Elaborate the model with subject matter experts - from all walks, agriculture, industry, government, science, ... - Bring in other people's perspectives on the model 

3. Elaborate further, creating sub-models for drill down into complex or contentious areas 

4. Perform a root cause analysis to understand how this situation arose 

5. Share the model and report with others to gather feedback iteratively

6. Capture the feedback in terms of model elaborations and ideas entered into the report 

7. Create a plan of action, and show the to-be model next to the as-is model 

8. Do an impact and risk analysis on the plan of action and refine it by mitigating risks and protecting against adverse impacts 

9. Create the final report and action plan for improving your situation

10. Execute