Amazon Reviews
16 of 20 people found the following review to be helpful:
Truly points out why organizations are not fully aligned., June 9, 1999
By
As a 20 year professional in Organization Development, this book illuminates one of the most frustrating elements of a change agent...the ability to have the client or target experience their own responsibility for the current situation. Without that, one is powerless to effect productive change. One can still effect change, but it will be retaliatory or not understood in the context needed to allow people to see the issue clearly and not as a result of someone elses opinion.
This book clearly illustrates these concepts and more and is a must read for everyone who wants to facilitate change effectively and productively.
Isn't that everyone.
5 of 6 people found the following review to be helpful:
Human Systems are Keys to Partnership and collaboration, March 26, 2003
By Michael Lair
I first struggled with the concepts because I am a student of organizational systems via Deming and the like. But this is a completely different viewpoint that provides a fantastic complement to the work of Deming, Weisbord and others looking at Open-systems theory.
If you want to see the impact of Human Systems and the dynamics that influence an organizations ability to partner, collaborate, and move beyond the powerful vaccuum of the human behaviors that stall organizational growth, this will provide a whole new way to view the relationships of people, power, and personal leadership within open-systems.
Mr. Cummings is right about the simplicity of the book in his review, it IS cartoon like at places. But let's be reminded how icons have changed the computer world and have worked to connect with people who need to remember things clearly, simply, and practically. People are visual learners and this book takes advantage of that reality. It's not written to be an IQ test - but to be clear and concise in boiling down the intricate and delicate issues, and choices, of human interaction in organizations.
It focuses on helping the reader learn and apply. If that works for you - make it so.
44 of 63 people found the following review to be helpful:
A simplistic view of systems thinking., October 26, 1999
By Michael Cummings
Sorry, I have to disagree with the rest of the reviews above. A serious student of systems thinking will find this book almost childlike. It looks like it was written based on the experiences of someone in a controlled lab instead of the real world. Some concepts are valid and worthwhile, such as the way in which position in the organization determine how people see the system affecting them. But most of the rest of the book is a struggle to get through, due to it's simplistic nature. The font used is almost cartoonish in nature, and the entire book probably could have taken up 40 pages if written in normal font type-spacing.
Someone seriously interesting in systems thinking should read. Ackoff, Senge' or Gharajedaghi. Not this book.
My favorite systems book is "Systems Thinking managing chaos and complexity" by Jamshid Gharajedaghi. That is a brilliant piece of work which deserves serious study.
Regards,
2 of 2 people found the following review to be helpful:
Seeing Systems is a brilliant book, January 25, 2008
By Hearth
Seeing Systems is a brilliant book; Dr. Oshry has here succeeded in
relating a set of practicable principles in a highly readable and
entertaining fashion. The particular charm of Seeing Systems -- what
distinguishes it from other books of its type -- is in its pedagogical
style; it is designed not only to describe, but to teach the theories
which are there presented for inspection. The teaching itself is
twofold; the first part (which Dr. Cummings seems to think should be
the only part) consists in explaining an abstract theoretical model
for systems thinking. The second part is phenomenological, in that it
seeks to help the reader identify and sympathize with a range of
experiences that occur in system life. To this end, Dr. Oshry employs
evocative description and sympathetic re-enactment to great effect.
The result is that the contents of the book are easiest to remember
when that of other books are easiest to forget -- that is, when one is
caught up in a whirlwind of intense experiences.
The phenomenological part of the book manifests itself in the
distinctive manner of phenomenology; as winding and discursive. There
is no remedy for it, other than to stop doing phenomenology. If it
were not phenomenological, Seeing Systems would be as Dr. Cummings has
described it -- a mere shadow of "Systems Thinking: managing chaos and
complexity". Its prosody would be direct, as direct as it was dull;
its illustrations quite businesslike, and forgettable. It would never
be lightened with something so childish and so right as a mob of black
dots at a committee meeting. It would be a primly respectable little
book, fit to grace an executive desktop and be charming until opened.
And I for one should not read it.
Thankfully, Seeing Systems is not such a shadow. It deigns to stay
charming even after it is opened. It is not like other books in the
same field; but those books have been written already, and by other
authors. It is a book unto itself, and is all the better for it.
8 of 11 people found the following review to be helpful:
A "must read" for anyone in organizations or relationships, September 21, 1996
By Hearth
Barry Oshry provides an insight into what he terms the "dance of blind reflex"; those patterns of behaviors we experience in organizations or relationships of any kind. He writes in a conversational tone which allows one to observe their less-than-desirable patterns of behavior and offers a choice. He reinforces that we can change the "dance" but it starts with being able to see the "dance" first. His book is a great start
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