SYSTEMS LEADERSHIP FOUNDATION PROGRAMME - LEADING EFFECTIVELY IN A COMPLEX WORLD

In today’s fast-evolving environment, leaders must navigate multifaceted and interconnected challenges. Without a systems perspective, communication and decision-making risk being misaligned or short-term. This 2-day Systems Leadership Foundation programme equips participants with essential frameworks and tools to think systemically and communicate strategically. It builds the foundation for leaders to plan, structure, and present ideas with impact in complex, multi-stakeholder environments.

Participants will:

• Apply systems thinking tools to improve communication clarity and message alignment

• Structure presentations with deeper insight into audience perspectives and systemic drivers

• Use systems models to identify leverage points and plan Theory of Change narratives

• Build confidence and clarity in delivering high-stakes or technical presentations

Learning Outcomes

Participants will:

• Understand how synthesis (systems thinking) complements analysis in communication

• Use Levels of Perspective to align messages to different stakeholder mindsets

• Apply Hierarchy of Choices to structure logic across scope, strategy, and implementation

• Understand the nature of structural tension using the Creative Tension Model

• Translate complex systems into systemic narratives for collaboration and co-creation

Day 1: Systems Thinking Foundations for Strategic Communication

• Systems Thinking vs Analytical Thinking: Introduction to systems as a mindset for synthesis and influence

• Mapping Complexity and Leverage Points: Recognising interdependencies and identifying systemic leverage

• Hierarchy of Choices: Aligning vision, scope, and action to communicate with logic and coherence

• Creative Tension: Understanding the nature of structural gap and how that can lead to vicious or virtuous cycles of intervention

• Levels of Perspective: Reframing diagnostic content to suit diverse stakeholder mental models to evaluate systemic structures causing the patterns and events.

Day 2: Structuring and Delivering Presentations with Systems Intent

• Translating Systems Thinking into Presentation Framing: From systemic insight to communication clarity for collaboration

• Executive Messaging and Narrative Design: Using story arcs and message maps to engage logically and emotionally through Quality of Conversation

• Audience Mapping for Persuasion: Matching tone, content and data to the thinking style of decision-makers and activating Double-Loop learning

• Slowing Down and Decision Making: Understanding logical leaps and making better decisions through Ladder of Inference

• Connecting the Narrative: Understanding the inter-relatedness of Systems Models.

2 Days

Level 3 - New Managers

Level 4 - Managers

Level 5 - Senior Managers & Directors

Coming from a background in Design Thinking and Project Management, I initially saw Systems Thinking as simply another complementary toolset. What these two days offered, however, was something far deeper. They gave me unprecedented clarity on how my work connects within a much larger system, how decisions made at one level ripple across many others, and why even well executed projects can struggle when the surrounding system is not aligned.

Key takeaways were the Hierarchy of Choices framework and understanding how strategies are interconnected with purpose and vision. I also gained clarity on leader + influence and how I should dive deeper into stakeholder/mental models. Thanks Thomas! 

Senior Executive (Innovation & Engagement), Public Service Division 

My biggest takeaway from the course is it helps to make salient the invisible mental models that block real change. To kill a monster, we must know its shape. 

Senior Executive (Corporate Development & Innovation), Public Service Division