School of System Change

We know that growing a global community of change agents is our best chance to accelerate a transition to a sustainable future. Want to know more?

Stories of Change

How does change happen?-

ABOUT THE STORIES OF CHANGE

The School of System Change collaborated with foundations, academics, creatives and others to create the Stories of Change, a series of videos and tools for designing and delivering system change practices. In our development process for each story, we engaged a community of partners to transform these stories of change into multimedia videos and facilitated learning experiences.

The aim of this project is to create accessible resources to co-learn and help change agents to design more systemic strategies/action. This project supports system change facilitators to introduce systemic frameworks using stories of change in history to a wider audience.

We currently have developed three videos and their accompanying facilitation packs about a story of change as seen through a systemic framework. Each accompanying facilitation pack guides systems change facilitators how to prepare and facilitate group discussion using the Stories and Change and find more information about the story and framework. We are in the process of developing more Stories of Change with our funding partners.

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Understand change to create change

-01 MULTI-LEVEL PERSPECTIVE + THE BIRTH OF ROCK N ROLL

Multi-Level Perspective (MLP) explains how transitions manifest through interactions between different levels of societal systems. We can use the MLP for systemic diagnosis--such as diagnosing complex challenges within societal systems such as mobility, housing or food. This Stories of Change video focuses on the seemingly sudden rise of Rock ‘n’ Roll in the 1950s, and our resources discuss how the MLP can help us understand the story behind this radical shift in the American music industry.

Additional resources

MULTI-LEVEL PERSPECTIVE Facilitator's Pack

MULTI-LEVEL PERSPECTIVE Webinar Recording

MULTI-LEVEL PERSPECTIVE Insights & Questions from 29 Sept 2020 Webinar

02 ICEBERG MODEL + THE RISE OF THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT

The Iceberg Model, typically used in systems diagnosis, can help us explore blindspots, question assumptions and challenge mental models underneath pivotal events, such as Rosa Park's arrest in 1955 in the Civil Rights Movement. Only 10% of an Iceberg’s total mass can be seen above water—the remaining 90% exists below the waterline. As a society, the majority see and respond to events, happening at the tip of the iceberg.

Additional resources

ICEBERG MODEL Facilitator's Pack

ICEBERG MODEL Webinar Recording

ICEBERG MODEL Insights & Questions from 13 Oct 2020 Webinar

03 LEVELS OF PARADIGM FRAMEWORK + THE REGENERATION OF RESILIENT COMMUNITIES IN MEXICO CITY

Regeneration, as a mindset, is focused on building the capacity and capability in people, communities, and other natural systems to restore, renew or revitalize. How can regenerative design help us understand the whole systems to shift toward resilient and equitable systems that integrate nature?

Additional resources

LEVELS OF PARADIGM FRAMEWORK Facilitator's Pack

LEVELS OF PARADIGM FRAMEWORK Webinar Recording

LEVELS OF PARADIGM FRAMEWORK Insights & Questions from 27 Oct 2020 Webinar

04 THREE HORIZONS FRAMEWORK + HUMANISING HEALTHCARE IN FIFE, SCOTLAND

The Three Horizons framework is a simple and intuitive tool for thinking about the future. It helps groups explore systemic patterns to identify which of the dominant patterns are no longer fit for purpose, how the emerging trends can shape the future, and what visionary action is needed to collectively move us towards a viable future. In this story, we tell the story of Shine - a project born in Fife, Scotland, about using the Three Horizons framework to try and think differently about winter planning for NHS Fife.

Additional resources

THREE HORIZONS Facilitator’s Pack Beta
THREE HORIZONS Webinar Recording April 2022

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Support the Stories of Change

We want to take the Stories of Change to the next level! We are developing more Stories of Change and a living-learning platform that is open-source and to facilitate systems change practice and make it fun! If you would like to learn how you can support our on-going work, please contact Laura Winn at [email protected].

ABOUT THE SCHOOL OF SYSTEM CHANGE

We are equipping people with the capabilities to lead system change initiatives addressing complex sustainability challenges. The School offers flexible access to the best learning experiences, tools, case studies from the field, while growing the community of practice.

More information about the School’s offering can be found under its Course page.

Learn more about the School

Latest

Felicity Butler

Principal Change Designer
Trading in the currency of hope as we work to create a just and regenerative future

At what is a critical moment for the sustainability movement, Forum for the Future’s flagship Future of Sustainability campaign shed light on what the past can teach us about our future. These insights formed the basis of our first US in-person event in more than two years. Here, Forum’s Managing Director – Americas, Sandra Seru, shares her reflections from an evening spent trading hope.
Regenerative Agriculture and Food Systems Summit

The Regenerative Agriculture and Food Systems Summit brings food and beverage brands, ingredients suppliers, food producers, supply chain monitoring platforms, AgTech companies, and consultants together to tackle the challenges and identify the opportunities in harnessing the full potential of regenerative agriculture practices in the food industry.
Growing our Future UK

Working together to accelerate the transition to regenerative food and agriculture in the UK

The Five Capitals - a framework for sustainability

The Five Capitals Model provides a basis for understanding sustainability in terms of the economic concept of wealth creation or ‘capital’. Any organisation will use five types of capital to deliver its products or services. A sustainable organisation will maintain and where possible enhance these stocks of capital assets, rather than deplete or degrade them.
Reinventing the way the world works.

Forum for the Future is a leading international sustainability non-profit. We specialise in addressing critical global challenges by catalysing change in key systems, from food to apparel, energy to shipping. We do this by convening transformational collaborations to drive change, by partnering with organisations to help them lead by example, and by building a global community of pioneers and change makers.
Jobs

We are a growing organisation and we are regularly on the look out for new recruits to join our teams around the world.
Sustainability and system change

Climate change, malnutrition, inequality, poverty, ecological degradation. The global challenges we face are so urgent and tricky that we need a solution to match their scale and complexity. This is where system change comes in. We use systems thinking to understand the web of interrelations that create complex problems, anticipate unintended consequences, and identify how and where to take action to meet the SDG goals.
Become a system change agent

Learn more about upcoming system change programmes and express your interest.
What is Net Positive?

We reinvent strategies for a 1.5°C world. Our Net Positive approach helps business put back more into society and environment than it takes out. Unilever’s pioneering commitment to eliminate fossil fuels from its operations and directly support the generation of more renewable energy than they consume was driven behind the scenes by Forum.
Growing our Future USA

Working together to accelerate the transition to a just and regenerative agriculture system in the United States.
Trailblazing sustainability strategies

Leadership in the 2020s is about your organisation’s ability to positively influence its operating context. We help you to understand the opportunities, and then how to unlock them.
Cotton 2040

Cotton 2040 aims to create a resilient cotton industry in an increasingly climate-disrupted world by bringing together stakeholders across the value chain.
6 ways Unilever has achieved success through sustainability - and how your business can too

A year ago this week, Unilever launched its Sustainable Living Plan (USLP), one of the most ambitious strategies that a global company has ever embarked on. Pioneering a bold new business model, the company pledged to double in size at the same time as halving its environmental footprint.