From Silos to Systems - Our First Primer and What Emerged

We launched the Primer workshop series with a simple objective: to make systems thinking more accessible, energizing, and grounded in real-world practice. Last week, we welcomed thirteen participants from nonprofits, social enterprises, business, and academia into our first-ever public session. Here’s what we explored together, what surfaced, and where we’re headed next.

Real Issues, Real Systems

Participants chose their own systems to explore, grounding the experience in their lived realities. The systems surfaced included:

• The rise of vaping among youth

• The mental health crisis

• Parental stress around Primary One registration in Singapore

These grounded examples fostered shared insight and deep empathy—and reminded us that systems thinking isn’t abstract. It’s personal, practical, and powerful.

One of our participants Prajakta Deshpande, reflected:

“Navigating problems through a systems lens was something new and hopeful for me. I walked out of the room with hope and curiosity to learn and implement this in my studies and work.”

A Collective Beginning

In our closing circle, participants shared words like “intuitive,” “connection,” and “hope.” These reflections affirmed for us that even a short session can unlock insight and spark collective possibility.

Thank you to everyone who brought your honesty, stories, and questions into this first session. Systems change doesn’t happen alone—and we’re excited to keep building this learning journey with you. We anticipate that each future Primer will bring its own energy and perspective—shaped by the people, questions, and systems in the room. The format may stay consistent, but the learning will always be fresh.

Want to join a future session?
Our next public From Silos to Systems Primer will be held in November 2025— register here.

Looking for a deeper dive?
We’re also launching our two-day Systems Strategy Lab —a more intensive exploration of systems mapping and collective sense-making. Register your interest here.

Starting with Nature’s Wisdom

We began with the Cards for Life—a nature-inspired deck that invites participants to draw insight from living systems. Through words like “compost,” “synchronize,” and “yield,” each person introduced themselves and what they are trying to bring into the world. It was a gentle but powerful reminder: we are nature. And the dynamics that shape ecosystems—feedback loops, thresholds, emergence—are also at play in our teams, communities, and systems change efforts.

Building a Shared Foundation

We warmed up with an interactive Systems Thinking 101 quiz to explore key principles like interconnectedness, cloud problems and time delays. Then, we used the Iceberg Model to uncover the mental models and structural patterns beneath visible events. To balance depth with perspective, we also introduced 3D Mapping—a physical, collaborative process to model the current system and sense into a more generative future.