Welcome
Strategic Complexity: Adaptive Problem-Solving in Unpredictable Environments by Ace Eddleman
How do you not only survive, but get what you want?
The world moves so fast and contains so much interconnection now that just scraping by can turn into extinction without warning. In order to win, you need to use the chaos and volatility for your own benefit. You must, in short, ride the waves the world presents all the way to the top—or get wiped out.
If you're stuck on a strategic problem and aren't sure where to turn because you feel overwhelmed or completely out of ideas, you're in the right place. You'll find in the following pages a way to embrace and build upon unpredictable, complex environments.
Structure of the Book
Strategic Complexity represents a consilience designed to help you think through problem solving in a way that makes sense for the global situation we find ourselves in. It's a tapestry of concepts built out of complex adaptive systems, ecology, and evolutionary biology (among other subjects) and my own experiences out in the world.
This book is broken up into four primary sections:
Systems & Complexity: An overview of concepts from ecology, evolutionary biology and complexity science that you need to internalize before you're able to recognize the underlying nature of complex problems. These ideas will change how you see the world and make you a better problem solver.
Fundamental Problems: A group of default lenses that we all use to solve problems that, more often than not, get in the way of real solutions. They tend to be psychological biases that stand in direct opposition to how complex adaptive systems work.
Dilemmas: A selection of problem-solving dilemmas that frame how to solve difficult problems within unpredictable contexts. Since there aren't any one-size-fits-all answers to these kinds of problems, it's important to explore the inevitable trade-offs that come with every potential solution.
Synthesis: A group of solution frameworks that reflect a synthesis of everything learned from previous sections, with selected examples to highlight real-world applications.
When you're ready to begin, click the button below to start reading the first section.
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