For Innovators
Systems thinking can help to tackle some of the most challenging issues facing our world today. This article offers the basic building blocks that make up a system and its boundaries. It also describes how to think in systems, and how this approach differs from the traditional analytical thinking most people in business and science tend to apply.
Systems thinking leads to better innovations, organizations, societies, and the overall well-being of our planet. This article describes why systems thinking leads to better outcomes, especially in today’s turbulent business environment.
Many different approaches to corporate innovation are based on traditional, analytical thinking. This article explores five well-known approaches: stage-gate processes, design thinking, open innovation, lean start-up, and systemic design. The approach you use should depend on the problem being tackled, the context of the organization, and even the skills of the innovation team.
Just as traditional approaches to thinking concentrate on specific problems or opportunities, the same holds true for traditional approaches to innovation. These approaches were developed at a time when the world was more stable and predictable. This article describes why systems thinking is needed in today’s turbulent world and how it can generate more creative ideas, lead to profitable outcomes, and contribute to a more resilient society and planet.
Systems innovation is an approach that applies systems thinking to generate new products, services, and processes.
Systems innovators see their organization as part of a system. They innovate to create a new product or service as well as to influence the system, recognizing that their success is influenced by others.
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Since innovation is all about testing new ways of doing things and taking risks, it often ventures into unknown territory that is difficult to measure. In fact, it’s not uncommon for innovators to view traditional measurement systems, success metrics, and key performance indicators (KPIs) as roadblocks to out-of-the box thinking. This can lead to innovations not being measured due to uncertainty about what should be measured. Or, such measurement systems might even hold innovators back from developing the kinds of products and services that will move an organization closer to its North Star because they don’t align with short-term metrics.
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Innovators need a clear purpose. This article describes what a North Star is, how to find it, and why it should guide innovations.
Understanding the system you’re operating in helps you respond to changing conditions, seize opportunities, and improve your organization’s performance. This article describes different ways to map your environment to identify innovation opportunities.
Innovators are often asked to predict the future based on what they already know and have experienced. Doing this can constrain innovation and the ability to envision new possibilities. In this article, we describe the limitations of predicting and how, instead, imagining desirable futures can shape our actions today.
For Researchers
Sustainable development offers the promise of economic prosperity into the future by recognizing the importance of sustaining the regenerative capacity of natural resources. Yet, current organizational practices are damaging the natural environment at such a rapid rate that economic development cannot be sustained. In response, many organizations have set targets to reduce their environmental and social impacts to past levels, aiming to restore historical baselines. While learning from the past is essential, we illustrate that an exclusive focus on the past for future actions can actually hamper progress toward sustainability. Instead, we advocate for a future-focused approach that inspires innovative new practices, with specific recommendations for business scholarship.
Bansal, P. (Tima), Lee, J. Y., Mascena, A., Rüegger, S., & Miller, E. M. (2025). Sustainable development at a temporal crossroads: Learning from the past while focusing on the future. Journal of Business Research, 190, Article 115232. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2025.115232
Scholars have long sought to impact management practice. However, the current conceptualization of impact is grounded in dualisms, separating researchers from managers, means from ends, and thought from action. Such a dualistic understanding of impact hampers researchers’ and managers’ ability to achieve impact. Nowhere is this issue more acute than in the context of grand challenges, which require researchers and managers to work together closely. As a way forward, we propose a pragmatist perspective on impact, where impact is not seen as a one-time, unidirectional event, but rather as a relational and recursive process. By overcoming dualisms in traditional approaches to impact, pragmatist impacting can help advance progress on grand challenges and our current understanding of cocreation. In this paper, we illustrate pragmatist impacting and reflect on its opportunities and challenges through our experience at Innovation North, an innovation lab that brought together researchers and managers to cocreate a systems innovation process.
Wegener, F. E., Lee, J. Y., Mascena Barbosa, A., Sharma, G., & Bansal, P. (Tima). (2024). EXPRESS: From Impact to Impacting: A Pragmatist Perspective on Tackling Grand Challenges. Strategic Organization. https://doi.org/10.1177/14761270241238915
In spite of the explosion of interest in sustainability, management research is still nascent in addressing these pressing grand challenges confronting society, such as climate change, inequality, and biodiversity loss. In this article, we review the emergence and development of the field, which we argue can inform future research opportunities.
The early days of sustainability research were marked by two very different approaches to sustainability research. The first extended management and organizational studies incrementally. The second challenged the prevailing dominant management and organization paradigm and argued for a systems perspective. In more recent years, a third approach has emerged that sits in the liminal space between the dominant paradigm and a systems perspective.
In this paper, we argue that sustainability researchers need to re-engage with a systems perspective, which not only spans across levels of analysis, but also across disciplines. By doing so, we argue that sustainability researchers will be better equipped with new theories and methodologies that solve the increasingly urgent and large-scale problems facing society and assure a prosperous future for all.
Lee, J. Y., & Bansal, P. (Tima). Working paper under review. Identifying information removed to protect the double-blind review process. Please correspond with the first author to request a draft.
Traditional innovation approaches—breakthrough and design thinking—often ignore the complex ripple effects they produce in interconnected systems. In a world facing multifaceted challenges like climate change and sustainability, a systems-thinking approach offers a more resilient and holistic path forward. Systems thinking emphasizes understanding interdependencies, redefining problems iteratively, and engaging diverse stakeholders to co-create solutions.
This article outlines a four-step framework: (1) Define a desired future state. (2) Reframe problems so that they resonate across stakeholders. (3) Focus on flows and relationships over discrete products. And (4) implement small nudges to gradually shift the system. Examples from Maple Leaf Foods, Co-operators Insurance, and the CSA Group illustrate how this approach can realign business models for long-term sustainability.
While not a replacement for other innovation methods, systems thinking addresses their limitations in tackling “wicked problems.” It encourages companies to anticipate unintended consequences, build coalitions, and adaptively guide transformation in complex environments.
Bansal, T., & Birkinshaw, J. (2025, September–October). Why You Need Systems Thinking Now. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2025/09/why-you-need-systems-thinking-now
Corporations are currently confronting major, interlocking crises, including climate change, biodiversity loss, inequalities, and social isolation. When under threat, executives tend to focus inward and on the short term. This is particularly unfortunate because it is in such crises that executives need to see beyond the here and now in order to ride the storms. In this paper, we argue that corporate purpose helps organizations fight such myopia and offer four mechanisms through which this works: exposing new insights, seeing issues holistically, helping to sustain focus, and bringing unity and direction.
Lee, J. Y., Bansal, P. (Tima), & Mascena Barbosa, A. 2023. Seeing Beyond the Here and Now: How Corporate Purpose Combats Corporate Myopia. Strategy Science. Forthcoming. https://doi.org/10.1287/stsc.2023.0183
Society faces many wicked problems today such as climate change, income inequality, and biodiversity loss. Not only has business contributed to these problems but it also plays an important role in addressing them. Problems are “wicked” because they are embedded in complex systems that are continuously evolving. As no single actor can understand and solve a wicked problem, prior research has suggested that multiple actors, such as researchers and managers, come together to cocreate solutions. The cocreation process typically relies on the existing knowledge of the actors involved in the process. Yet, the dynamic nature of wicked problems requires actors to not just rely on cocreating on past knowledge but to cocreate tools that address future emerging or evolving problems.
In this paper, we seek to explain how researchers and managers can cocreate forward to address wicked problems. We illustrate the concept of cocreating forward through an innovation lab located at a Canadian business school. The lab brings together researchers, managers, and practitioners from various sectors to cocreate corporate innovation processes for addressing wicked problems. By cocreating forward, we show that research, learning, and practice need not be sequential but rather simultaneous activities.
Sharma, G., Greco, A., Grewatsch, S., & Bansal, P. (Tima). 2022. Cocreating Forward: How Researchers and Managers Can Address Problems Together. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 21(3): 350–368. https://doi.org/10.5465/amle.2021.0233
In 1843, Søren Kierkegaard said, “ It is perfectly true, as philosophers say, that life must be understood backwards. But they forget the other proposition, that it must be lived forwards.” Management researchers are often attracted to the business and society domain because of a desire to impact management practice to create a better world. However, they often do not have the impact that they hope, because researchers tend to rely on historical data, but managers seek insights that inform future actions. In this commentary, we describe our impact journey in three distinct moments in time. In the last one, both researchers and managers live forward.
Bansal, P. (Tima), & Sharma, G. 2022. Three Different Approaches to Impact: Translating, Cocreating, and Performing. Business & Society, 61(4): 827–832. https://doi.org/10.1177/00076503211015926
In this chapter, we describe a process in which managers co-create tools and knowledge with researchers to help navigate the turbulence and unpredictability of global crises. This co-creation process provides managers with a private space to reflect and the tools to act. We draw insights from our experiences with a lab within Innovation North, which is based on the principles of American Pragmatism.
Bansal, P. (Tima), & Sharma, G. 2021. The important role of management researchers in addressing global crises: Insights from Innovation North. In J. M. Bartunek (Ed.), Social Scientists Confronting Global Crises: 23–31. London, UK: Routledge.
Strategy scholars are increasingly attempting to tackle complex global social and environmental issues (i.e. wicked problems); yet, many strategy scholars approach these wicked problems in the same way they approach business problems—by building causal models that seek to optimize some form of organizational success. Strategy scholars seek to reduce complexity, focusing on the significant variables that explain the salient outcomes. This approach to wicked problems, ironically, divorces firms from the very social-ecological context that makes the problem “wicked.”
In this essay, we argue that strategy research into wicked problems can benefit from systems thinking, which deviates radically from the reductionist approach to analysis taken by many strategy scholars. We review some of the basic tenets of systems thinking and describe their differences from reductionist thinking. Furthermore, we ask strategy scholars to widen their theoretical lens by (1) investigating co-evolutionary dynamics rather than focusing primarily on static models, (2) advancing processual insights rather than favouring causal identification, and (3) recognizing tipping points and transformative change rather than assuming linear monotonic changes.
Grewatsch, S., Kennedy, S., & Bansal, P. 2021. Tackling wicked problems in strategic management with systems thinking. Strategic Organization. Forthcoming. https://doi.org/10.1177/14761270211038635
In this essay, we argue that by taking a systems lens, sustainability researchers can better understand the implications of COVID-19 on business and society and prevent future pandemics. A systems lens asks management researchers to move from a firm-level perspective to one that also considers the broader socioecological context. We argue that for business to prevent future pandemics and assure future prosperity, business must recognize the limits to growth, alternative temporalities that do not pit the short against the long term, the nestedness of local phenomena in global systems, and leverage points that can reduce entrenched systems of social inequalities.
Bansal, P. (Tima), Grewatsch, S., & Sharma, G. 2021. How COVID-19 Informs Business Sustainability Research: It’s Time for a Systems Perspective. Journal of Management Studies, 58(2): 602–606. https://doi.org/10.1111/joms.12669
In The Press
Tomorrow’s business can no longer operate under the same principles as yesterday’s. It not only needs to create economic value, it needs to do so by working with society and within planetary boundaries. Tima regularly contributes to a column for Forbes on what it takes to lead tomorrow’s companies.
Browse Tima’s recent contributions to Forbes.
The Network for Business Sustainability shares knowledge about business sustainability to help build a world that is fairer, and more ecologically sound.
Browse Tima’s contributions to the Network for Business Sustainability.
Ivey News captures the student experiences, guest speakers, faculty research, and program activities that showcase Ivey’s legacy of real-world leadership.
Read about Tima and Innovation North in Ivey News.
Innovation North’s Ju Young Lee spoke to a Sustainability Management class, taught by Innovation North’s Garima Sharma, who is based out of the Kogod School of Business at American University. In this 15-minute video, he introduces Innovation North’s systems thinking tool, called the Compass, and walks through each of the 4 spaces of the Compass, illuminated with examples and key insights.
Watch the full video with Ju Young Lee.
Two of Innovation North’s researchers, Valen Boyd and Michelina Aguanno, spoke to a Sustainability Management class at Kogod School of Business at American University, taught by Innovation North’s Garima Sharma. In this hour-long video, Valen and Michelina share how they applied the Compass to challenges in home insurance and finance, followed by a moderated Q&A with Garima.
Watch the full video with Valen Boyd and Michelina Aguanno.
Why does a field dedicated to improving business practice continue to fall short of its purpose, even as pressures are mounting from business school accreditation bodies, peers and wider society for practical impact?
Read the full article on the Financial Times.
Companies face a historic transformation yet change experts are mostly missing from public discourse. The climate challenge is too urgent, and the implementation gap too wide, to leave their expertise locked up in academic journals any longer.
Read Tima and Minali’s article on Times Higher Education.
Although Canada is globally known as a leading agricultural producer, the country’s ability to move agricultural innovation into the marketplace doesn’t rank nearly as high. Innovation North collaborated with the University of Guelph to interview farmers, industry partners and academics about the challenges they face on the farm and how those might be addressed through innovation.
Read the full article on Farmtario.
Most business school academics work at arm’s length from managers. Never has it been more important for researchers to bridge this divide, as climate change, new technologies, complex supply chains and geopolitical destabilisation generate uncertainty and turbulence.
Read Tima and Garima’s article on Financial Times.
Our world has become more complex and shaped by systems. But many organizations have kept a narrow view to innovation. Innovation North’s Compass helps businesses implement sustainable innovation to create a better future.
Read Hannah’s article on Sustainable Innovation for NBS.
As wicked problems—such as poverty, pandemics, climate change, and species extinction—become increasingly urgent, researchers have found a new way to collaborate with managers to develop sustainable business approaches, according to an Academy of Management Learning & Education article.
In this article, Michael Bratsis provides a summary of the research article, which describes how innovators can tackle these problems with researchers. Unfortunately, the article is behind a paywall. Please contact us at Innovation North (info@innovationnorth.ca), if you would like a copy.
It is time for Canadian companies to recognize that we shouldn’t be looking to Silicon Valley for inspiration, but we need our own brand of innovation that involves collaboration.
Read Tima’s contribution to The Hill Times Policy Briefing on Innovation.
Traditional, linear business thinking won’t solve social and environmental issues. Executives need systems thinking. What does systems thinking mean, why is it important, and how can companies adopt it?
Read Ju Young’s article on Systems Thinking for NBS.
Solving the world’s most wicked problems requires executives and academics to work together to reimagine corporate innovation.
Read this Academy of Management Insights article by Garima Sharma, Sylvia Grewatsch and Angela Greco.
Today’s volatile business environment calls for innovation with better foresight and an integrated understanding of systems. Accountants that shift their thinking to systems innovations models will gain a crucial management competency in today’s economy.
Read this joint publication between Innovation North and CPA Canada. (Also available in French.)
This Ivey Business Journal Q&A explores why there is nothing anti-capitalist about sustainability, while making the case for old-school capitalists to a more enlightened form of capitalism through new thinking about innovation.
Read the interview between Tima Bansal and Thomas Watson.
Corporate innovation often produces severe, unintended social consequences. Even as innovation creates value for a firm, it can destroy value within other systems. Here, the authors propose that companies move away from the traditional innovation model focused on the firm to a systems innovation model focused on the firm and its products in relation to other systems.
Read the full Amplify article by Tima Bansal, Ju Young Lee, and Alice Mascena Barbosa.
By building sustainability into innovation, companies can create products, services, and processes that are good for both society and the organization.
Read Ju Young’s article on Sustainable Innovation for NBS.
What does it mean for a business or a corporation to be sustainable? How might businesses innovate to put people and planet alongside profit? How might businesses adopt systems thinking to shift business models and strategies towards regenerative value systems and circular economy? What role should businesses play in politics and public policies to enable global systems changes?
Discover the answers to these questions by watching a conversation between Tima Bansal and Joanne Dong of System Innovation’s Toronto Hub.
We live in a time defined by large-scale environmental and societal challenges. The climate emergency, rising levels of inequality, agriculture and food security, and growing unemployment rates are among many trends affecting all societies and sectors. In light of these, what role can organizations play to help tackle these challenges? How can organizations—whether in the public or private sector—reconstitute their ‘purpose’? How can they reimagine innovation to create shared solutions and build towards a more prosperous society?
Listen to Tima Bansal and two of Innovation North’s Practice Partners on a podcast hosted by The Ivey Academy.
Much of the fashion industry trades on speedy design-to-sale and a culture of disposability. Although this business model is seductive and profitable, it isn’t sustainable.
Read the article by Tima Bansal and Gareth Gransaull on MIT Sloan Management Review.
In this lecture, Dr. Tima Bansal outlines some key assumptions made in conventional business strategy, which is grounded in neoclassical economics.
Watch the full lecture here.
With climate change in mind, businesses and consumers are increasingly seeking to shift to a circular economy. On January 25, 2022, The Globe hosted a webcast that provided advice to business leaders on shifting their operations, product design and supply chains to a circular approach.
Watch Tima’s conversation with The Globe and Mail’s senior editor of climate, environment and resources, Ryan MacDonald.
Companies are embedded in their social, economic, and political context — not separate from it. That means they are directly connected to the major crises that engulf society, from climate change to income inequality and beyond. Eight perspectives on how societal challenges are evolving, and what that means for companies.
Read the full article on the Harvard Business Review.
The way Bansal and others see it, the world would be a better place if more businesses played an active role in tackling social and environmental challenges, from climate change to global poverty.
Read Tima’s contributions to the article on Time Magazine.
Tima Bansal sat down with three experts to discuss the path forward for purpose-oriented companies.
Watch their discussion here.
Why aren’t people doing more about climate change? One issue is our brains are wired to respond to short-term problems, not long-term risks.
Read Tima’s contributions to the article on The Guardian.
What is the psychology behind climate change denial? Can it be overcome? And what communication tips can scientists take from political campaigns?
Listen to Tima’s perspective on how corporations weigh into the climate change debate on The Guardian.
Embracing sustainable finance will help Canada build a green economy — and ensure all Canadians will flourish.
Read Tima and Diane-Laure’s article on the Conversation.
We live in a time defined by large-scale environmental and societal challenges. The climate emergency, rising levels of inequality, agriculture and food security, and growing unemployment rates are among many trends affecting all societies and sectors. In light of these, what role can organizations play to help tackle these challenges?
Listen to the conversation with Tima, Barb Steele, Executive Director, Ashoka Canada; and Bradley Wamboldt, General Manager, Enterprise Technology, Suncor Energy