Systems Bookcase

The Systems Bookcase is a foundational motif in the Pattern Book. First proposed in The Regenerative Structural Engineer, the Systems Bookcase serves as a thinking aid, a conversation starter and a mapping tool for understanding why systems behave the way they do.

In brief, the model splits a complex system, such as the construction industry, into five levels:

1. Design — what actually gets built or made.
2. Operations — the rules, regulations and guidance that shape design.
3. Mindsets — the beliefs, ethics, values and culture that frame the operations.
4. Goals — the outcomes that the system produces.
5. Paradigm — the overarching philosophy of the system.

Each level is a shelf on the bookcase, starting with one at the bottom to five at the top. Each shelf holds “books” — entries that represent ideas, tools, or norms that operate at that level of the system. The key condition is that a book can only sit on a lower shelf if it aligns with the entries on the shelves above.

From the Pattern Book for Regenerative Design.

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Role in the Pattern Book

The Systems Bookcase serves five key roles in the Pattern Book.

• Making sense of the systems we are in — helping us understand how they shape our experiences.
• Organising concepts — helping to find a way to link together things as diverse as physical form and philosophy.
• Analysis — helping to ask questions that help us understand the system.
• Framing of regenerative design — enabling us to see regenerative design as a goal, and the challenge of regenerative design in a paradigm that doesn’t want it.
• Understanding leverage — an entry point for understanding levers in a system.

Project Prism – applying the Systems Bookcase to analysis or reflection

Use this technique to break down and analyse a complex human system. 

Step 1 – Populate the shelves

Design — what is built?

• What do we see in the system? What is built? Buildings, infrastructure, landscaping. 
• What design choices have been made? What bucks the trend? What are outliers?

Operations — what rules shape design choices?

• What rules shape the design of what we see? If we tried to change the design, what kinds of changes would be encouraged — and which would be discouraged?
• What information flows in the system that governs what is built and how it is operated?
• Where are the incentives? How are the people involved organised into hierarchies? Who holds power?

Mindsets — what values shape the rules?

• What values create the rules in the system? 
• What values shape decision-making?
• What is the culture in the system? What ideas are popular? What is the zeitgeist?

Goals — what outcome is the configured system to produce?

• What is the aim of the system? What outcomes does it actually produce (rather than the ones it claims to)?

Paradigm — what is the overarching philosophy?

• What is the overarching world view of the system (e.g. growth, holism, security, freedom, security)

Step 2 – Interrogate the system

Exploring leverage

• If you could change one book on the Operations shelf, what would it be?
• If you could change one book on the Mindsets shelf, what would it be?
• If you could change one goal of the system, what would it be?

Exploring regenerative design

• Imagine this system with the goal of regenerative design at the top of the bookcase — what would shift below?

Facilitation using the Systems Bookcase

Collaborative systems mapping

For use with teams as part of a design exercise, as a creative prompt  → see Kalideascope; or as an analytical tool in critical thinking → see OODA Loop.

• Provide the group with a blank systems bookcase model (download from the Constructivist website).
• Use the Project Prism technique described above.
• Look for contradictions. A design that appears to contradict an operating rule suggests a weak rule. A rule that goes against a mindset may not last, or it may challenge that mindset.
• Infer missing books from what you see happening on lower shelves.
• Ask what would happen if we shifted a rule or mindset.

Business planning, policy design and long-term strategy

For use with leadership teams developing plans. 

• Use the Project Prism technique to get the conversation started.
• Ask how the business is shaping the system versus responding to the system.
• Use Changing Mindsets to explore which values or assumptions frame the strategies that follow.
• Follow on with the Library of Systems Change motif to explore how the leadership team might change their system over time.

Finding leverage

For groups of people organising around trying to create system change.

• Use the Project Prism (above) technique to get the conversation started.
• Discuss whether they should be focusing on changing the operating rules, mindsets or goals.
• Reflect on where they have influence → see Crew Crowd Congregation and Ambition Loops.

Conclusions

The Systems Bookcase on its own is regenerative-ambivalent. But putting the goal of regenerative design on the Goals shelf, the Changing Mindsets on the Mindsets shelf and the Living Systems Blueprint on the operations shelf, we begin to clarify what a regenerative construction industry might look like.

User guide

Using the Systems Bookcase in different contexts

• As part of an intuitive introduction to regenerative design — having established the Systems Bookcase model, use it to position the goal of regenerative design.
• As part of a systems-led introduction to regenerative design — follow on from the Systems Bookcase with the Three Horizons. This opens up the conversation about how systems can change over time.
• In critical thinking — use the Systems Bookcase as part of the orientation phase in the OODA loop, and use the Living Systems Blueprint to help to populate the lower shelves.
• In Continuous Place-Based Design — use as part of the brief-defining phase, using the bookcase to organise your observations and begin to establish a brief for thriving.
• Working with developers and asset managers — use the Project Prism technique (above) to explore the client’s brief, placing the elements you see on the bookcase. Then use the Concept Progression map to identify the appropriate set of language to use with this client.
• In transforming supply chains — use the bookcase to explore the different factors at play in a supply chain and follow up by exploring balancing and reinforcing feedback loops.
• In business strategy — use to analyse how projects align with operations, mindsets and goals, then move on to the Three Horizons to explore the tension between present-day delivery and longer-term aspirations.
• For local and national policy and regulation —  the Project Prism technique (above) to break your specific area of interest into its component parts. Map where interventions are already taking place. Then move on to Changing Mindsets to explore the prevailing mindsets that have shaped this domain.

Related motifs

Complex Systems, Goal of Regenerative Design, Kalideascope.