by David W. Packer
Dear President Obama, Senators, Congressional Representatives, and Interested Citizens:
In these momentous times, the debate in the United States on the financial stimulus and other economic policies continues to heat up as weeks pass and frustration grows. Actions have been taken but results to date are largely underwhelming. In an earlier post, I talked about the importance of time delays in systems. Once a policy (like "stimulus") has been put in place, clear and visible results almost always take much longer to appear than we expect. The current heat and frustration is, I think, largely a direct result of unrealistically short time expectations.
The period when delays are active is particularly hazardous, because there is little or no visible feedback to reveal the growing impact of our actions. Not recognizing the lag times in complex system structures, many are likely to draw erroneous conclusions. They say things like, "See, nothing is happening, so we must do something else/or more/or give up entirely." Valuable programs are abandoned prematurely, and new ones formed that will likely suffer the same fate. Even worse, most likely to survive are quick fixes that undermine any progress that has been made and produce no enduring advances.
The period we are in now, as we wait for compelling evidence of success or failure of different initiatives, is one of those times when the hazard is huge and uncertainty prevails. This is a perfect storm for error, for stopping good actions or for pulling high-leverage levers but in exactly the wrong direction (as Jay Forrester warned about long ago).
So, with opportunity rife and risk ever present, let's take out our systems lens, look at patterns, think realistically about time delays and system structure, resist jumping to conclusions, and improve our ability to know when enough feedback has emerged from the delay "pipeline" to guide us toward the future we want to create.
I know this is hard to do in a highly charged political environment, as it is for us in everyday life. But the results will benefit us all, and the learnings will endure, I guarantee.
Sincerely,
David W. Packer
David W. Packer is founding partner of the Systems Thinking Collaborative, veteran of the MIT System Dynamics Group and of Digital Equipment Corporation, grandparent of eleven, Ginny Wiley's spouse, and a Red Sox fan, among other things.
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 David W. Packer
"With only a fraction of the recovery money actually out the door, Washington began debating the need for a second round of stimulus amid economic and political crosscurrents." --"Doubts About Obama's Economic Recovery Plan Rise Along With Unemployment" by Edmund L. Andrews, New York Times, July 9, 2009
This news synopsis on the front page of the July 9 edition of the New York Times couldn't help but catch my eye. It's something I've been concerned about for a while, as it focuses on a common systems issue--time delays. Feedback loops and time delays are two major pieces of system structure that dramatically affect what happens over time.
Delays--like motorcycles on a summer day--are everywhere. There are physical ones, such as how long it takes to do something. 
There are psychological ones, such as how long it takes someone to realize and be convinced that something is actually changing in a human system full of noise and extraneous changes. And there are even delays beyond delays--the time it takes to actually start doing something even after recognizing the need; this delay sometimes results from inertia, and sometimes from the false hope that the need will just go away. Finally, there is the delay in how long it takes for the "doing something" to make a difference.
"Results Today" Thinking
Studies show that we almost always underestimate the length of delays, not just by a few percentage points, but by factors of 2, 5, or even 10 or more. We may think a change in what we do will pay off in four months when in fact the impact plays out over several years.
Back to the stimulus plan: A relatively common scenario, I contend, is that we make a change and expect results way too soon because we underestimate the time delays involved. When the outcomes don't happen on our flawed schedule, we declare failure and do something else. Of course, by giving up on the initiative, we will never know whether, given time, it might have created great improvement. In this hypothetical example, we have squandered resources and time, and we have probably stimulated even more short-term "results today" thinking to boot.
Another factor that often compounds the problem is the "worse before better" characteristic of systems. Often, when an action is taken, things actually get worse in the short term before they begin to improve. All of these dynamics, of course, are fodder for detractors, especially in, but not limited to, the political sphere.
Charting the Stimulus
I am not an economist or an expert in stimulus plans, but I do worry about this common scenario playing out and affecting our lives and welfare. Many have expressed disappointment in the lack of tangible economic results of the stimulus package so far, even though we're only six months into a process in which the time delays are clearly some years.
There are two kinds of risks in making an early critique of the program. First, people can be discouraged by the failure to meet their way-too-optimistic expectations, causing confidence to erode and the economy to get even worse (a dangerous reinforcing feedback loop). Second, officials might prematurely boost stimulus spending, which could increase the risk of inflation.
While I do hear designers of the plan talking years, not months, and see news that the spending is just starting to trickle, I yearn for a behavior over time chart that shows the stimulus money authorized, the path of its actual spending, and the expected economic impact. I think such a chart, based on systems principles and having a time dimension of many years, would set expectations, promote a healthy response, and create broad awareness of the system structure at play in this critical time.
Dave Packer is founding partner of the Systems Thinking Collaborative, veteran of the MIT System Dynamics Group and of Digital Equipment Corporation, grandparent of eleven, Ginny Wiley's spouse, and a Red Sox fan, among other things.
photo: Ian Britton/freefoto.com