The Practice

The Practice

Systems thinking + systems design + systems engineering

= systems change.

Before there's a platform there's a room full of people with divergent opinions. Getting to agreement is the harder part of this work, and it's the part we have been doing for thirty years. The practice is where the design happens. The Exchange is where it lands.

Seventeen engagements with fourteen organisations, 2015 – 2024.

01 · Why now

01 · Why now

Systemic interventions have finally
gone mainstream.

Over the last decade there's been a surge in awareness of the relationship between systems change and systems thinking, design and engineering. That's largely because the current approaches to planetary challenges are rationally and mathematically indefensible — and enough people now say so out loud. Community-driven design has emerged as the necessary response to global-north agenda-setting, and data mobility, sovereignty and agency have become unavoidable considerations for anyone working on social, ecological and economic challenges.

02 · Three motions

02 · Three motions

One practice, three motions.
They're not interchangeable.

Organisations that arrive asking for engineering usually need design, and organisations that arrive asking for design usually need a fortnight of thinking first. We will tell you which one you are in before we quote.

Motion one

Motion one

Systems thinking

Systems thinking

Understanding what the system actually is before proposing to change it. Who holds what, which flows are real and which are asserted, and where the coordination is failing rather than where it appears to fail.

Understanding what the system actually is before proposing to change it. Who holds what, which flows are real and which are asserted, and where the coordination is failing rather than where it appears to fail.

Motion two

Motion two

Systems design

Systems design

Getting a room of organisations that do not yet agree to agree — on a shared schema, a shared taxonomy, and a shared definition of the problem. Participatory, facilitated, and slower than anyone wants it to be.

Getting a room of organisations that do not yet agree to agree — on a shared schema, a shared taxonomy, and a shared definition of the problem. Participatory, facilitated, and slower than anyone wants it to be.

Motion three

Motion three

Systems engineering

Systems engineering

Building the thing the design implies, and maintaining it. This is where most consultancies hand you a report instead. We have somewhere to put the answer, which is why the design is testable.

Building the thing the design implies, and maintaining it. This is where most consultancies hand you a report instead. We have somewhere to put the answer, which is why the design is testable.

Worth knowing

Worth knowing

The three motions are sequential and the first two cannot be skipped. Every engagement is scoped against the motion you are actually in, not the one you asked for.

The three motions are sequential and the first two cannot be skipped. Every engagement is scoped against the motion you are actually in, not the one you asked for.

03 · Evidence · 2015 – 2024

03 · Evidence · 2015 – 2024

Seventeen engagements.
Fourteen organisations.
One decade.

Every engagement below is named, with the organisation and the motion it belonged to. The record is publishable and independently verifiable.

17

Engagements

14

Organisations

30

Years of practice

04 · The record

04 · The record

Who we've done it with, and what the work was.

Source · Armillaria project record, 2015 – 2024.

Organisation

Motion

The work

Swiss Agency for Development & Cooperation

Swiss Agency for Development & Cooperation

Systems design

Systems design

Systems design consulting, and Project 1800

Systems design consulting, and Project 1800

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Systems design

Systems design

Systems design consulting with the WASH group

Systems design consulting with the WASH group

GAVI

GAVI

Systems design

Systems design

Innovation ecosystem design consulting

Innovation ecosystem design consulting

World Intellectual Property Organization

World Intellectual Property Organization

Systems design

Systems design

Systems design consulting with WIPO Green

Systems design consulting with WIPO Green

SuSanA · Sustainable Sanitation Alliance

SuSanA · Sustainable Sanitation Alliance

Systems design

Systems design

Systems design consulting

Systems design consulting

Bertelsmann-Stiftung

Bertelsmann-Stiftung

Systems design

Systems design

Impact finance ecosystems — design consulting and publication

Impact finance ecosystems — design consulting and publication

Zebras Unite

Zebras Unite

Systems + infrastructure

Systems + infrastructure

Systems design consulting, then infrastructure design consulting

Systems design consulting, then infrastructure design consulting

Inclusive Capital Collective

Inclusive Capital Collective

Ecosystem + infrastructure

Ecosystem + infrastructure

Ecosystem design consulting, then infrastructure design consulting

Ecosystem design consulting, then infrastructure design consulting

COBI

COBI

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design consulting, then partnership — marine conservation, Mexico

Ecosystem design consulting, then partnership — marine conservation, Mexico

Port of Portland

Port of Portland

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design consulting

Ecosystem design consulting

Puerto Rico Impact Investing Group

Puerto Rico Impact Investing Group

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design partnership

Ecosystem design partnership

Islamic Finance Collective

Islamic Finance Collective

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design partnership

Ecosystem design partnership

Interchain Foundation

Interchain Foundation

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design consulting

Ecosystem design consulting

Innovación Azul

Innovación Azul

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design

Ecosystem design partnership

Ecosystem design partnership

05 · What an engagement is

05 · What an engagement is

Four things, in whatever combination you need.

None of these is a product and none is sold on its own. Which ones you need depends on which motion you are in, and that is a conversation, not a form.

Consulting is bespoke. There is no rate card, and there never will be.

Impact finance ecosystem design

Impact finance ecosystem design

01

Designing how capital moves between the organisations that hold it and the ones that need it — including who decides.

Designing how capital moves between the organisations that hold it and the ones that need it — including who decides.

Innovation roundtables and convening

Innovation roundtables and convening

02

Getting the people who have to agree into one room, repeatedly, until they do. Multi-stakeholder, facilitated, minuted.

Getting the people who have to agree into one room, repeatedly, until they do. Multi-stakeholder, facilitated, minuted.

Participatory design and facilitation

Participatory design and facilitation

03

The design is made by the people who will live with it. We hold the process, not the pen.

The design is made by the people who will live with it. We hold the process, not the pen.

Data schema and interoperability

Data schema and interoperability

04

Shared taxonomies, shared schemas, and the architecture that lets one organisation’s record mean something inside another’s system.

Shared taxonomies, shared schemas, and the architecture that lets one organisation’s record mean something inside another’s system.

Per engagement

Per engagement

$25,000 – $150,000

How it is quoted

How it is quoted

After a conversation

Worth knowing

Worth knowing

Consulting is priced by discussion, unlike the platform, which is priced on its own page. If you need a number before you will take a call: the band above is the band, and where you land inside it depends on how many organisations have to agree.

Consulting is priced by discussion, unlike the platform, which is priced on its own page. If you need a number before you will take a call: the band above is the band, and where you land inside it depends on how many organisations have to agree.

06 · Who does the work

06 · Who does the work

6

people. No account managers.

people. No account managers.

The person who facilitates is the person who designed it.

The person who facilitates is the person who designed it.

The person facilitating your roundtable is the person who wrote the schema and will be in the room at handover. There is no bench, no pyramid, and nobody you have not met.

The person facilitating your roundtable is the person who wrote the schema and will be in the room at handover. There is no bench, no pyramid, and nobody you have not met.

Start here

Most engagements start with a conversation about what is actually failing.

Not a proposal, not a rate card, and not a demo. Tell us who has to agree and what they disagree about, and we will tell you which of the three motions you are in.