The Relevance of System Thinking in Project Management

Running head: PROJECT MANAGEMENT 1
Project Management
Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliation

PROJECT MANAGEMENT 2
Abstract
Systems thinking is an essential requirement for all complex problems like portfolio
management, project management, organisational management and quality management.
This paper describes the relevance of system thinking to project management by illustrating
its usefulness to the project manager, portfolio manager and programs. To resolve different
problems within a project, project leaders use system thinking. System engineers use the
concept of system thinking to provide a clear understanding of a project. PPPM is to allow
project managers several approaches for developing and identifying project management
strategies when working on shared resources.
Keywords: System thinking, project manager, portfolio manager, project, program
and portfolio management (PPPM) and system engineer.

PROJECT MANAGEMENT 3
Introduction
System thinking is defined as a discipline that views something as a whole and not as
parts, which see patterns of change unlike stationary snapshots that helps to understand the
interconnection of different parts that give the systems its distinct feature. System thinking
acknowledge that the world consists of hierarchically structured social and technical entities
that are interrelated that often generate a behaviour which cannot be projected through
analysing of the behaviour of individual system parts in isolation. The essence of this paper is
to describe the importance of system thinking to project management by showing how its
usefulness to the project, portfolio manager and programs (Archibald & Archibald, 2013).
The paper will discuss various learning outcomes related to system thinking and project
management on a weekly basis from week one to week nine. Each week will comprise
several learning outcomes, which will consists of a summary of the outcome and evidence of
the learned outcome. Lastly but not least the paper will provide a discussion of the outcomes
learned for the nine weeks and conclude the units by giving a summary of all the outcomes
learned during the whole unit.
a. LO1
i. Summary
The use of system thinking in project management allows the manager to see the
need for transparency as well as thorough comprehension of the manner in which
the different elements of the system influence the efficiency of the whole system.
System thinking recognises the interrelationship between interacting project
elements, which in the process aid in identifying leverage points where
interventions will have the biggest influence over time (Mingers, 2014).
Additionally, system thinking makes sure that the overall performance of a system

PROJECT MANAGEMENT 4
is designed for considering all significant aspects when implementing change.
Example of system thinking aid in the identification of and management of risks
that originate from dependencies.
ii. Evidence
System thinking is a strategy that add significance to the system by
minimising the necessity for re-planning and improving the risk level to allow
projects to accomplish their objectivity within budget and on time. To realize
successful systems, a system engineer should support a set of lifecycle
procedure all the way from the start during the conceptual design and carry on
throughout the lifecycle of a system.
b. LO 2
i. Summary
There are many system thinking gears and practices that are used by project
managers to resolve project problems such as theoretical model, decision
matrix, affinity diagram, spray diagram, and sequence diagram among others.
A conceptual model is an illustration of a system made of concepts that aid the
project manager to understand the subject represented by the model. On the
hand, a spray diagram is an outcome from dissimilar thinking processes which
enables a team to generate and capture thoughts and related ideologies about a
specific problem. Example of system thinking practices is viewing the world
in a particular manner, since this view affects how one can approach the
situation.
ii. Evidence