When I started writing this newsletter, I set out to share a series of instantly useful exercises that anyone could deploy to get smarter about the problems they are trying to solve. However, as I’ve shared these exercises with more people, I have also gotten some requests to say a bit about the system behind them. That’s what inspired this new series of posts. Here goes…
All of the exercises I share here are based on one of six innovation dynamics. These are six ways of looking at a social problem to understand human behavior, recognize the social norms behind it, and develop ideas to change it.
The first dynamic is ACTORS. Actors are any people, groups, or organizations who play a role in your social problem.
In my experience, almost anybody who has spent any amount of time working on a problem has an intuitive sense of who the main players are. But we all spend so much time thinking about the problems of our specific organizations or interest groups that we rarely zoom out to see the whole picture. That’s always the first step with actors: do your best to list all the groups who matter.
Now before you object that everyone in the world is affected by your problem, consider this important constraint. For an actor to count, you should be able to explain the particular role they play in the world of your problem. So yes, your great-aunt Sheila is affected by air pollution, but unless she plays a specific role in the problem, she can be grouped with “citizens affected by air pollution.”
Try to list all the actors you can until you run out of ideas. Then you’ll want to add more detail about the actors you’ve got by exploring two themes. First, consider the motivations and interests of each actor in the problem. What makes them do what they do? Next, consider the relationships among the various actors. Do they see themselves as belonging to different “teams”? Do they play specific roles for each other?
As you’ll learn if you explore some of the exercises below, there are many, many different ways you can further explore the actors connected to your problem. But once you’ve got a good sense of who these folks are, there are essentially two ways you can use them.
First, you want to look for patterns of behavior among the actors that may be holding the problem in place. These patterns are usually clues that you’ve found a social norm that needs to be challenged.
Second, you should ask “How might the actors connected to this problem change?” This includes not just adding or subtracting actors, but imagining new relationships or motivations. Play with the list and imagine new possibilities. You might just stumble upon a new way to tackle your social problem.
Here are a few questions you can ask to start thinking about actors right now:
Who are the most important groups for understanding my social problem?
What motivates these groups? Are some of their motivations opposed to each other?
What relationships exist among the groups? Are there particular alliances or enduring conflicts that shape the world of the problem?
Let’s say you could add or subtract one actor from the world of the problem right now. Who would it be and why?
Now imagine that you can’t change any of the actors, but you can alter the motivations or relationships that connect them. What change do you think would have the greatest impact?
Here are some of the previous exercises I’ve shared that are based on the actors dynamic:
Round up the usual suspects: What do all the main players have in common?
New teams: What can you see when you imagine your problem being taken on by a new alliance?
Whispers in their ear: Who has the most influence over the main players in your problem?
Awards show: Who stands out in the world of your problem and what does that tell you?