Wicked Problems

“Some problems are so complex that you have to be highly intelligent and well informed just to be undecided about them.” --Laurence J. Peter

with thinking, tools, and methods that are useful only for simpler (“tame”) problems. Problem wickedness is a force of fragmentation. Most projects today have a significant wicked component. Wicked problems are so commonplace that the chaos and futility that usually attend them are accepted as inevitable. Failing to recognize the “wicked dynamics” in problems, we persist in applying inappropriate methods and tools to them. --Jeff Conklin, Ph.D.