LP748- week 4
KarenS
LP748_Week4_PPRecording.pptx
LP748: Leadership and Systems Approaches to
Wicked Problems
Summer 2026,
Williams James College, OLP, PsyD
Week 4: Stakeholders, Systems Thinking & Complexity
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Wicked Perspectives, Systems Thinking, and School Lunch Systems
Week 4 — Exploring how complex systems shape everyday experiences, and why the same lunch table can look very different depending on where you sit.
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WEEK 4 OVERVIEW
What We're Exploring This Week
This week we move from understanding wicked problems in theory to examining them through multiple lenses — perspectives, systems, ethics, and real-world consequences.
Multiple Perspectives
Seeing the same system through different stakeholder eyes
Systems Thinking & Why Systems Work
Understanding feedback loops and unintended consequences
Ethics and Inclusion
Asking who benefits, who is burdened, and who is left out
School Lunch Systems
Using school meals as our lens into wicked problem complexity
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Looking Back — and Moving Forward
Before we go deeper, let's ground ourselves in where we've been and where we're heading. The key question threads both weeks together.
Week 3 — Where We've Been
The Lunch Lady case study
Influence without formal authority
Stakeholder engagement strategies
Wicked systems in real-world practice
Week 4 — Where We're Going
Systems perspectives and mental models
Different stakeholder realities
Ethics and inclusion in complex systems
Consequences — intended and unintended
Key Question: How can the same system be experienced so differently by different people?
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The School Lunch System Is Bigger Than Lunch
At first glance, school lunch seems like a simple operational issue. But pull on any thread, and you uncover a web of interconnected social, economic, and political systems. A wicked problem is rarely about the issue itself — it is about the systems connected to it. (Meadows, 2008)
Health & Hunger
Food insecurity, public health outcomes, and child nutrition policy
Educational Outcomes
Hunger affects concentration, attendance, and academic performance
Community & Culture
Cultural identity, community wellbeing, and local food traditions
Equity & Access
Poverty, school funding structures, and the politics of access
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Meadows: Why Systems Work, Surprise Us, and Get Stuck
Systems are not broken simply because they produce problems. Often, they are producing exactly what their structures were designed to produce. (Meadows, 2008)
Why Systems Work So Well
Resilience & Adaptation
Systems are often remarkably resilient. They adapt to changing conditions, self-organize, and maintain stability over time despite disruptions.
Adapt to changing conditions
Self-organize under pressure
Continue functioning despite disruptions
Maintain stability over time
Despite changing policies and funding challenges, school meal systems continue to operate because the system adapts and reorganizes itself.
Why Systems Surprise Us
Unintended Consequences
Systems often produce outcomes nobody intended.
Cause and effect separated by time
Interventions create ripple effects
Stakeholders experience the system differently
We focus on events instead of patterns
A policy designed to feed students may unintentionally create stigma, lunch debt, or barriers to participation.
Why Systems Get Stuck
System Traps
Systems often reproduce the outcomes they were designed to produce. Common traps include:
Funding constraints
Administrative complexity
Policy fragmentation
Stigma and participation cycles
Short-term decision making
To change outcomes, we must examine the structures producing them — not just the symptoms. (Meadows, 2008)
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Example: The Lunch Debt Dilemma
Lunch debt is a vivid example of a well-intentioned policy producing contradictory outcomes. The goal is simple: feed students. But the system's effects ripple far beyond the cafeteria. Same system. Different experiences. (Gagliano et al., 2023)
Intended Outcomes
Students receive a nutritious meal
Increased program participation
Support for families who need it
Unintended Consequences
Stigma around free or reduced-price meals
Lunch shaming — public marking of students in debt
Family stress and financial burden
Reduced participation due to embarrassment
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Enter the Six Thinking Hats
Edward de Bono's Six Thinking Hats framework gives us a structured way to explore complex problems from multiple angles — without getting stuck in debate or positional thinking. Rather than asking who is right, we ask: what can we learn from each perspective? (de Bono, 1985)
The Power of Parallel Thinking
Each hat focuses attention on one type of thinking at a time — facts, feelings, risks, benefits, creativity, or process. This prevents the group from talking past each other and ensures every dimension of a problem gets examined.
Built for Wicked Problems
In wicked problems, competing perspectives are features, not bugs. The Hats framework makes space for all of them — validating complexity rather than forcing premature consensus.
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Applying the Hats to School Lunches
Let's put the first four hats to work on the school lunch system. Notice how each hat surfaces a different layer of reality — none of them wrong, all of them necessary.
🤍 White Hat — Facts
Participation rates
Nutrition outcomes
Program funding levels
Debt amounts by district
❤️ Red Hat — Feelings
Shame and embarrassment
Pride in feeding children
Frustration with bureaucracy
Relief when help arrives
🖤 Black Hat — Risks
Rising program costs
Food waste inefficiencies
Policy failure at scale
Inequitable enforcement
💛 Yellow Hat — Benefits
Improved health outcomes
Better academic performance
Reduced food insecurity
Stronger school communities
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More Hats — Creativity and Process
The final two hats bring the framework full circle — from exploration to action. The Green Hat invites bold ideas; the Blue Hat ensures the group stays on track. Together, they move thinking from insight to coordination. (de Bono, 1985)
💚 Green Hat — Creativity
What if we imagined the system differently?
Universal free meals for all students
Community and business partnerships
School gardens and local sourcing
Student-led meal design programs
💙 Blue Hat — Process
How do we manage the thinking itself?
Structured policy implementation planning
Cross-stakeholder collaboration protocols
Facilitating difficult conversations
Coordinating between district, schools, families
Different hats reveal different realities. No single hat holds the whole truth — that's the point.
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Ethics, Equity, and Inclusion
Systems are not neutral. Every design choice in a system reflects values — and those values determine who is helped and who is harmed. In school meal systems, equity questions are not peripheral — they are central. (Badyal & Moffat, 2025)
Who Benefits?
Are program benefits reaching those who need them most, or are administrative barriers filtering out the most vulnerable families?
Who Is Burdened?
Low-income families, students with disabilities, and cultural communities may face disproportionate stress from systems designed without them in mind.
Who Participates — and Who Is Excluded?
Participation data often masks who is quietly opting out due to stigma, cultural mismatch, or logistical barriers.
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Why Wicked Problems Resist Solutions
Wicked problems are not unsolvable because people aren't smart enough — they resist solutions because every stakeholder is operating from a legitimate but different definition of success. There is no single "right" answer, only trade-offs.
Each stakeholder — students, families, food service staff, administrators, policymakers — may define "a good school lunch system" in ways that directly conflict. This is why wicked problems rarely produce universally satisfying outcomes.
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Connecting to Your Wicked Problem
As you prepare your journal this week, use school lunches as a thinking scaffold — then apply the same questions to your own wicked problem. These prompts are designed to surface the hidden layers of any complex system.
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Map the Perspectives
What stakeholder perspectives exist in your system? Who holds formal power, and who holds informal influence?
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Identify the Feedback Loops
What feedback loops are operating? Are they reinforcing the problem or creating opportunities for change?
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Trace Unintended Consequences
What outcomes is the system producing that no one planned for? Who bears the cost of those consequences?
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Examine Power and Voice
Who has decision-making power? Whose voices are absent or marginalized in the current system?
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Name the Ethical Tensions
What values are in conflict? What ethical responsibilities do designers and leaders have in this system?
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Moving Forward — What This Week Is Really About
This week is not about solving the school lunch problem. It's about building the capacity to see systems clearly, hold multiple perspectives simultaneously, and act with greater wisdom in the face of complexity.
See Systems
Recognize patterns, feedback loops, and structures that shape behavior
Understand Perspectives
Value every stakeholder's experience as a legitimate data point
Recognize Power
Map who holds authority, who shapes narratives, and who is silenced
Examine Ethics
Ask hard questions about fairness, responsibility, and impact
The more perspectives we can hold simultaneously, the better prepared we are to engage wicked problems with integrity and creativity.
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References
de Bono (1985)
de Bono, E. (1985). Six thinking hats. Little, Brown and Company.
The foundational text introducing the parallel thinking framework applied throughout this week's discussion of stakeholder perspectives.
Meadows (2008)
Meadows, D. H. (2008). Thinking in systems: A primer. Chelsea Green Publishing.
Core framework for understanding interconnected systems, feedback loops, and unintended consequences in complex problems.
Gagliano et al. (2023)
Gagliano, K. M., Yassa, M. O., & Winsler, A. (2023). Stop the shame and the hunger: The need for school meal program reform. Children and Youth Services Review, 155, 1–11.
Research examining the stigma and unintended consequences of school lunch debt policies on students and families.
Badyal & Moffat (2025)
Badyal, D., & Moffat, B. (2025). Ethics, equity, and inclusion in systems design.
Framework for examining who benefits, who is burdened, and how power operates within educational systems.
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