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.

Get involved to learn more

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

Provide feedback on the 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

Provide feedback on the 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 (forthcoming)

LEVELS OF PARADIGM FRAMEWORK Webinar Recording

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

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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

Nature and climate: our single existential crisis

As the opening ceremonies of the Convention on Biological Diversity kick off in Kunming, China, Jane Lawton, Forum’s Chief Development and Communications Officer, and Dhaval Negandhi, Associate Director for Climate, call out the critical need to connect the international debates and action on nature and climate, and advocate for three critical shifts that will ensure we can solve for the key challenges of our time.
Global Financial Controller

Are you an inspirational, collaborative, values-led individual who can deliver effective, enabling operational leadership across Forum?
Mabel C. L. Mungomba

Mabel is CEO of Belcomm Limited, a Marketing and Brand building agency, and UPSTART Skills Bank which focuses on training and consultancy in Organization Development, Strategic Planning, Enterprise development, Leadership, Change Management and assisting progressive organizations design strategic plans and tailor made development programs for their staff.
Constança Belchior

Constança is a facilitator and designer of collaboration and innovation processes for sustainability and regenerative development. She belongs to a collective dedicated to transformative change - in teams, organisations and fields of action - grounded on an integral and living systems approach.

Nature and climate: our single existential crisis

As the opening ceremonies of the Convention on Biological Diversity kick off in Kunming, China, Jane Lawton, Forum’s Chief Development and Communications Officer, and Dhaval Negandhi, Associate Director for Climate, call out the critical need to connect the international debates and action on nature and climate, and advocate for three critical shifts that will ensure we can solve for the key challenges of our time.
Global Financial Controller

Are you an inspirational, collaborative, values-led individual who can deliver effective, enabling operational leadership across Forum?
Food systems transformation: what shifts are needed and how do we get there?

As the world’s first ever Food Systems Summit approaches, the spotlight on the need to transform the way we produce and consume food is intensifying. But what does the future look like? What shifts will get us there? And just how can we drive deep transformation with game-changing and long-lasting potential? Lesley Mitchell, Forum’s Associate Director - Sustainable Nutrition, explores.
Driving Co-benefits for Climate and Health

People can’t thrive on a dying planet. Explore how the private sector can accelerate progress on climate change and public health by taking a systems lens, and developing strategies that can deliver co-benefits for both.
Radical shifts are needed in what we mean by farming and how we think about land

Food and agricultural systems need deep transformation, requiring nothing less than fundamental reframing of what land and ‘farming’ means to businesses, argues Forum's Director of Global Programmes, Caroline Ashley in BusinessGreen.
Despair, hope and what will be needed for deep transformation: reflections on the IPCC Report

This month saw the release of the latest IPCC Report, and there’s no shortage of blogs and articles summarising its key conclusions. So what is there to add? Forum’s new Associate Director – Climate, Dhaval Negandhi and Climate Strategist Iain Watt share key reflections on the latest IPCC report findings and the deep transformation required to create a just and regenerative future.
28 Sept: Applying systems change approaches: Learning from #OneLess London

#OneLess London provides a practical and effective model that is highly applicable to a wide range of contexts and cultures all around the world. Join us in September to learn about the systems change approach #OneLess has used to shift the way Londoners access drinking water, hear from special guest speakers and connect with like-minded organisations.
22 Sept: Applying systems change approaches: Learning from #OneLess London

#OneLess London provides a practical and effective model that is highly applicable to a wide range of contexts and cultures all around the world. Join us in September to learn about the systems change approach #OneLess has used to shift the way Londoners access drinking water, hear from special guest speakers and connect with like-minded organisations.
Progress towards the Man Made Cellulosic Fibres 2030 Vision and the way forward

We take stock of the small wins that have happened since launching the Man-Made Cellulosic Fibres 2030 vision, and examine what else is needed to accelerate the sector's transformation towards one that is resilient and regenerative.
Dhaval Negandhi

Associate Director, Climate Lead

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.
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.
Protein Challenge 2040

The Protein Challenge 2040 is the first global coalition of its kind, aiming to tackle the question: How do we provide up to 10 billion people with enough protein in a way that is healthy, affordable and good for the planet?
What is a sustainable business model?

What is a sustainable business model? The term signals the need to go beyond innovating products or services, and change the fundamentals of how a business makes money.