Closing the Loop: Systems Thinking for Designers

As design continues to impact our products, services, and solutions at scale, it is more important than ever to understand the systems and context that surround design decisions. Closing the Loop will introduce you to a powerful systems thinking mindset and provide you with the tools and frameworks to define the systems that surround your work.

“Cababa’s book comes at a crucial moment for design, and points the way toward a more inclusive, meaningful future for our work.”
—David Dylan Thomas, author, Design for Cognitive Bias

Who Should Read This Book?

This book is for practitioners who want to incorporate systems–thinking methods into their practice. Design researchers, strategists, and experience designers will benefit from the book’s tools and instruction to broaden their perspectives, as well as people from technology, healthcare, education, and other spaces in which human–centered design is incorporated.

Takeaways

Readers will learn to:

• Combine user–centered design with systems thinking to understand interconnections and interventions to create goals that benefit society.
• Expand their thinking about what constitutes problem–solving in order to reframe problem spaces.
• Map the status quo in order to better envision the future.
• Kick off primary research by conducting interviews with subject matter experts.
• Use stakeholder maps as a form of analysis and synthesis output.
• Create a causal loop map to articulate systems forces in the form of cause and effect.
• Develop a theory of change to plan initiatives that will lead to the desired outcomes and impact.
• Use the futures wheel as a tool to imagine the impact of decisions.