COVER -- CONTENTS -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- Part 1: Engaging with messy situations -- 1. Messy issues, messy situations -- 2. Framing the bigger picture -- 3. Drawing rich pictures -- 4. Identifying themes -- 5. Escaping mental traps -- 6. Managing my own complexity -- Part 2: Understanding messy situations -- 7. Thinking about my thinking -- 8. Understanding systems -- 9. Diagramming -- 10. Making sense of messy situations -- 11. Diagnosing messy situations -- 12. Thinking about diagramming -- Part 3: Exploring purposeful action inmessy situations -- 13. What?, How? and Why? -- 14. How will it work? -- 15. How will we know it is working? -- Part 4: Inquiring through action -- 16. An inquiring mind -- 17. An inquiring system -- 18. An inquiring approach -- Appendix: The roots of systems thinking -- Glossary -- Index -- About the author -- About Triarchy Press -- Other Systems Thinking titles from Triarchy Press.