How can Behavioral systems thinking help you deliver better experiences?
If you don't know much about behavioral systems thinking, it is a way of sense making sense that focuses on interacting systems rather than isolated causal connections.
In plain terms, instead of looking at the individual to explain behavior, we want to instead look at the system and the relationships between different behaviors, drivers, and actors. = Individual + System
(It's important to mention that by no means can you map or make sense of a whole system)
From mapping the system, you can also add an analysis of behavior and look for literature to understand what interventions or strategies could help you overcome the challenges and reach the outcomes for your employees or customers.
I was lucky to have learned this from UCL Centre for Behaviour Change and had both Susan Michie and Robert West as instructors (they offer training from time to time on it which you also can take ).
Aside from this, I am lucky to have some amazing people on my team who have great experience in this area, and from whom I learn every day.
So why should you care about behavioral system thinking?
It allows for solutions to take into account indirect causal influences, feedback loops, and spillover effects.
One of the things that I also think is important is the fact that when doing behavior change, you may have to keep evaluating, and based on the changes made, you need to intervene again, as change is rarely a one-time thing - it's a constant.
It is also worth mentioning that when building a map you should determine the components, and the relationships and make sure you keep an operational definition of the map.
The map should help you identify and decide on the actors and the target behaviors and outcome - then you can start adding the influences using a behavioral model like COM-B - which means that it is important you learn how to do a behavioral analysis.
Remember, when working on these in your organization that not all stakeholders will need to see the complexities of the behavioral systems map, but you can use areas and zoom in to build smaller maps that you will work on (perhaps as prototypes, MVPs, or RCTs)
You could also bring those areas into a more linear map, such as a journey map, or a service blueprint and create scenarios.
Remember - the success of behavior change lies not in behavioral science standing alone, but in behavioral science being mixed with other methods.
In our projects at Aim For Behavior which range from Organizational/Culture Change, Health Behavior, Innovation and Smart Cities we work with companies and help them understand their context and add a more holistic approach than just the individual behavior change - and this is one of the things we use to help us.