Smart model-based governance: Taking decision making to the next level by integrating data analytics with systems thinking and system dynamics

Abstract

Although Big Data initiatives are currently presenting promising results, there is still some skepticism about their real capabilities as they are contextual dependent, and their objective and accuracy are somehow misleading. Approaches underlying the extraction of knowledge from a large amount of data are surely important to understand how a system has behaved until a certain point in time. However, they, unfortunately, lack a real and effective capability to infer future system's behaviour and its relationship with other systems (some of which might even have counter-intuitive behaviours). As a direct consequence of this, the Systems Thinking approach may help fill the gap, as it advocates the ability to see the world as a complex system where everything is connected. Joining Analytics techniques and Systems Thinking models brings us to the definition of a new governance approach, based on "smart" models (Armenia et al., 2017). The aim of this work is to propose a new conceptual governance framework based on a systemic approach and translated into a system dynamics model for knowledge management within organizations: Smart Model-based governance