FIELD GUIDE 01

The Problem

with Solutions

.UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES

A solution changes the system it enters.

Sometimes the system responds in ways we didn't intend.

THE PATTERN

We often imagine a problem as something sitting in front of us.

So we intervene.

A company wants to improve productivity. It introduces a performance target. A website wants more engagement. It makes notifications more prominent. A person wants to avoid an uncomfortable situation. They develop a way of coping with it.

In each case, the intervention changes the conditions around the problem. People adapt. Incentives shift. Behaviours change. New relationships form. The result may be exactly what we intended.

Or it may be something else entirely. Sometimes that unexpected outcome becomes the next problem.

THE MISSING LINK

The intervention becomes part of the system.

We often think about solutions as if we are standing outside a problem and applying something to it.

But systems don't stand still while we intervene.

Once introduced, the solution changes the conditions around the problem — and the system responds to that change.

The solution is no longer simply something we did.

It is now part of what is happening.

LOOK FOR IT

You may be seeing this pattern when:

ORGANISATIONS

A metric improves while the underlying outcome doesn't.

DESIGN & PROCESSES

A shortcut makes one person's task easier but moves the work elsewhere.

HUMAN BEHAVIOUR

A behaviour you tried to eliminate simply appears somewhere else.

THE TAKEAWAY

Before asking, "Did the solution work?" ask:

"What did the solution change?"

That question shifts attention from the intervention itself to the system responding to it.

A PATTERN

MADE VISIBLE

An egg is a chicken’s solution to the problem of hatching another egg.

A solution doesn't exist in isolation. It becomes part of the system, and can change what happens next.

There is an underlying pattern between the 'design' of an egg, and ecosystems, computers, cells and many more things.

But an intangible idea can become something you can see, hold — and wear.

Discover the tangible version

YOU'VE SEEN THE PATTERN

Now learn how to work with it