By Janice Molloy
As in most places, summer in New England means an extravagance of local produce. Even my veggie-phobic son can't turn down a farm-fresh ear of corn, carrot, or handful of green beans. It was against this backdrop of abundance that I recently read Michael 
Pollan's lastest book, In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto--a systemic look at the evolution of the "Western diet" and its devastating effect on the health of people and planet alike. Pollan's sobering analysis is a stark illustration of the dangers of reductionist thinking as well as a call for a more holistic approach to diet and health.
No one denies that obesity and diabetes have skyrocketed in the U.S over the past several decades. Some might argue that this trend reflects a failure of individual self-control. But Pollan points to several larger factors, including U.S. dietary guidelines from the late 1970s that promoted "healthy" carbohydrates over "unhealthy" fats; a rise in the consumption of processed foods; and an emphasis on the nutrients in foods to the exclusion of foods as a whole.
This last item stems from what Pollan calls "nutritionism," a belief that "food is not a system but the sum of its nutrient parts." The implications of this paradigm are huge. When nutrition scientists break food down into its constituent parts, study them one by one, and deem an element to be vital for my health, it doesn't matter whether I get it from a crisp green salad or a bag of highly processed, fortified corn chips. As Pollan states, "a notorious junk food [can] pass through the needle eye of nutritionist logic and come out the other side looking like a health food."
Pollan quotes New York University nutritionist Marion Nestle: "The problem with nutrient-by-nutrient nutrition science . . . is that it takes the nutrient out of the context of the food, the food out of the context of the diet, and the diet out of the context of the lifestyle." So, for instance, for many years, health experts have been perplexed by the "French paradox": the fact that French people suffer a relatively low incidence of coronary heart disease while consuming a diet that is rich in saturated fat. Scientists have searched for the magic bullet--Is it the red wine? The fish? The foie gras?
Holism, the opposite of reductionism, recognizes that a thing can have properties as a whole that are not explainable from the sum of its parts. The French--and Italian and Greek and Japanese and Indian and Mexican--paradox may result from a synergy of factors, including the ingredients used, portion sizes, savoring of meals with friends and family, amount and type of exercise people get, and other, less obvious variables. Unfortunately, as much as we might like to package healthfulness in an energy bar or vitamin pill, it doesn't seem to be that easy.
Pollan concludes the book with a set of general guidelines for escaping the harmful effects of the Western diet. Most of them are common sense, such as shopping the peripheries of the supermarket and avoiding the processed crackers, cookies, and chips that fill the middle. Some demand more effort, like doing all of your eating at a table--a discipline that can be challenging in today's go-go world.
None of these behavioral shifts rise to the level of large-scale systemic change--something I'd love to see Pollan tackle in a future book. By making smart individual choices, we may not make much headway against the rising tide of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer in our culture. But we can improve our personal health and well being--and eat some fabulous meals in the process.
Janice Molloy is content director of Pegasus Communications and managing editor of The Systems Thinker.
Cabbage photo by Nancy Daugherty
By Sharon Eakes
My husband Hal and I rented a houseboat in Florida. When Hal needed a break, I took the helm. I have studied systems and understand delays. I knew that this less-than-graceful vessel did not have power steering, that there was a delay between turning 
the steering wheel to the left and actually going to the left. However, as the boat headed toward shore, I yelled, "Help!" Hal ran to the front of the boat and straightened us out.
I took over again. I talked to myself, saying, "Be patient. Don't turn sharply. Wait out the delay." And yet, when I could see we were headed for some expensive boats on the other shore, I got scared and turned sharply. I zigged and zagged, finding it impossible to wait long enough after each correction, needing to do something.
In systems thinking terms, a delay is when the effect of an action occurs after a break in time. The break may be seconds or years, but in real life, waiting out a delay without intervening can seem interminable. We live with a multitude of system delays in our lives and they can be frustrating.
"Do Something"--The Struggle for Control
In our organizations today, we believe that one of the best ways to improve a system's performance is to reduce or eliminate delays. A good example is offered by Logli Supermarkets in Rockford, Illinois. Logli sells more groceries than any other supermarket in Illinois. Reasons for their success are obvious to any customer. With 23 check-out lines available at all times and a system of free drive-up service, where teams of efficient young people load groceries into your car, the delay from entering the check-out line to driving home is all but eliminated.
Sometimes managing a delay means making it more palatable, which is why decorating physicians' offices has become a new interior design niche. When patients find waiting to see the doctor comfortable and interesting, they are less likely to complain about how long it's taking.
But most of the time, when we try to manage delays, we are in crisis mode. We move quickly, coming up with fixes that may have negative, unintended consequences. Much of the time we don't even realize that we're experiencing a delay. When we act and don't immediately see results, we feel compelled to do more before we even experience the outcome of our initial intervention. Doing something, anything, reduces our anxiety and makes us feel more in control, even if we're really making things worse over the long run. But acting in these circumstances can lead to overcorrection, much like what happened when I caused the houseboat to zig and zag all over the river.
"Do Nothing"--Trusting the Process
So how can we overcome our impulse to act, whatever the consequences? A good first step may be to see and acknowledge the delays in the system. For example, when we reach a juncture where our performance seems to have plateaued or a problem symptom isn't improving, we can say, "We may have hit a classic delay." If our patience is wearing thin, we can ask a few questions before taking action:
- "If we do something, what will happen?
- "If we do nothing, what will happen?"
- "What can we do to live with our anxiety while we figure out the best response?"
A second approach to managing delays is to manage yourself. Sitting on my hands and breathing deeply eventually helped me stop overcorrecting the houseboat. Thus, managing a delay may mean doing something counterintuitive for a while: nothing. We are a "doing" culture, and many of us have a hard time sitting back and waiting. This kind of inaction in the face of an ongoing challenge requires a great deal of trust in the process.
When we stop spending energy trying to change things that are not going to change no matter what we do, we have more energy to work on those things on which we can have an impact.
Sharon Eakes is a personal and executive coach and chair of the Pegasus Communications board of directors. You can subscribe to her free monthly "mini e-zine," Fresh Views.
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By Janice Molloy
In these days of trying to accomplish more with less, the idea of finding "leverage points" takes on added appeal. Leverage points are places in a system where a small change can lead to a large shift in behavior. The tools of systems thinking can help us identify those areas where timely action can make a key difference.
But, there's a catch: Jay Forrester, the founder of the field of system dynamics, has observed that although people often intuitively know where to find leverage points, they unfortunately tend to push the change in the wrong direction.
A forthcoming article in the Journal of Socio-Economics on policies around shoplifting illustrates this inclination. Retailers frequently respond to theft by boosting surveillance and increasing prices to cover the losses and added expenses. Economics professor Gideon Yaniv used a mathematical analysis to show that, if store owners want to maximize profits, they should do exactly the opposite: lower prices and lessen surveillance. Shoplifting then declines because goods are more affordable, and merchants no longer incur additional costs for security details and equipment.
Are there places you have observed where a counterintuitive action might have a big impact?
Sources
Donella Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer (Chelsea Green, 2008)
Kevin Lewis, "Uncommon Knowledge: Low Prices! Easy Shoplifting!" The Boston Globe (May 10, 2009)
photo from www.freefoto.com