Systems

Wicked problems are those that are “difficult or impossible to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements that are often difficult to recognize.” Over the last month I have attended a number of great presentations and the underlying theme in most of them was ‘wicked’.

Take the youth employment situation in Ontario. Ontario sports a higher percentage of unemployed youth than the Canadian average. The fix? If you are the Ontario government it is a $190 million over 2-years. But that only gets us back to the country average. Is it a real fix?

After working in the non-profit sector for the better part of a decade, I am distinctly aware of the many challenges it is facing. Funding, governance, human resources, politics – these issues, and many more – have daily and long-term implications for how organizations can continue to operate.