Systems Thinking in Product Management
Start with the core idea behind the site: product problems are often system problems.
Why Smart Product Managers Keep Solving the Wrong Problem
9 min read →New here?
Start here
Three useful entry points into the ideas, methods, and examples on this site.
Haulage and Logistics Optimisation in a TMS: The Only Way Is Earl
The opening guide to transport optimisation, framed as a product problem before an algorithm problem.
The series opener: why transport optimisation is a product problem before it is an algorithm problem, and why Earl Hickey's list is the right way to frame it.
9 min read →Probabilistic Delivery Forecasting for Product Managers
A practical introduction to making better decisions when delivery and outcomes are uncertain.
Why a fixed deadline hides uncertainty, and how probabilistic forecasts support better product decisions.
7 min read → Filter by category
Forecasting
AI Football Forecasting and Open Systems: Chris Kamara Explains
Why more data cannot make an open system predictable, and what goes wrong when a 57% probability gets reported as a promise.
Published 5 July 2026
AIForecasting
9 min read
Compound Probability in Business Plans: Peep Show and Football Accumulators
Mark Corrigan explains why a ten-leg football accumulator and a ten-assumption business plan fail for exactly the same mathematical reason.
Published 27 June 2026
ForecastingProduct Management
6 min read
Probabilistic Delivery Forecasting for Product Managers
Why a fixed deadline hides uncertainty, and how probabilistic forecasts support better product decisions.
Published 15 January 2026
ForecastingProduct Management
7 min read
Optimising My Name is Earl
Choosing Route Optimisation Algorithms for Logistics: Earl Finishes the List
From Clarke-Wright and 2-Opt to Simulated Annealing, Tabu Search, Ant Colony and Large Neighbourhood Search, what Earl taught us about solving real optimisation problems.
Published 15 August 2026
Optimisation
4 min read
Large Neighbourhood Search for Logistics Routes: Earl Breaks the Plan
How destroying and repairing part of a route helps an optimiser escape the traps that small improvements cannot reach.
Published 7 August 2026
Optimisation
6 min read
Ant Colony Optimisation for Logistics Routes: Earl Lets the Ants Take Over
How pheromone trails, exploration, and evaporation help a routing system learn from successful routes.
Published 1 August 2026
Optimisation
13 min read
Clarke-Wright Savings for Haulage Routes: Earl Meets Clarke
The Clarke-Wright savings algorithm from 1964, still running inside commercial transport optimisers, and why chaining stops beats visiting them one at a time.
Published 26 July 2026
Optimisation
6 min read
Two-Opt and Three-Opt for Haulage Routes: Earl Rewrites the List
Two-Opt and Three-Opt formalise the planner's instinct that a route crossing its own path “looks wrong”, and then run straight into the local optimum.
Published 26 July 2026
Optimisation
6 min read
Genetic Algorithms for Vehicle Routing: Earl's Genetics
Genetic algorithms stop improving one plan and instead run a whole population of competing plans that can breed.
Published 25 July 2026
Optimisation
13 min read
Tabu Search for Vehicle Route Optimisation: Earl Learns to Remember
Tabu Search escapes a local optimum using memory rather than chance: the optimiser keeps a list of what it has just tried and refuses to repeat it.
Published 22 July 2026
Optimisation
6 min read
Simulated Annealing for Vehicle Routing: Earl Learns to Cool Down
Simulated Annealing: why a routing engine sometimes has to accept a worse route in order to reach a much better one.
Published 19 July 2026
Optimisation
15 min read
Order Clustering for Haulage Planning: Earl Learns About Belonging
Before a route can exist, something has to decide which orders belong together, and that clustering decision constrains everything downstream.
Published 12 June 2026
Optimisation
11 min read
Haulage and Logistics Optimisation in a TMS: The Only Way Is Earl
The series opener: why transport optimisation is a product problem before it is an algorithm problem, and why Earl Hickey's list is the right way to frame it.
Published 9 June 2026
OptimisationProduct Management
9 min read
Objective Functions in Transport Optimisation: Earl's List
Why transport optimisation has to start by defining what better actually means.
Published 9 June 2026
OptimisationProduct Management
12 min read
Product Management
Product Discovery and Systems Thinking: Buffy and the Wrong Problem
Why discovery frameworks need systems thinking, and why another dashboard might not save Sunnydale
Published 30 September 2026
Product ManagementSystems Thinking
6 min read
Product Discovery Frameworks: The Framework Is Not the Product
Why product-management frameworks are useful models, not reality
Published 16 August 2026
Product Management
4 min read
Systems Thinking
How to Explain Statistical Distributions Without Starting With the Maths
What Monty Python, Douglas Adams and Groundhog Day can teach us about uncertainty, probability and Monte Carlo analysis
Published 19 September 2026
Systems ThinkingProduct Management
5 min read
Tacit Knowledge and New Starter Onboarding: The Smallest Member Knows the Least
What my daughter's first days at senior school reveal about tacit knowledge, onboarding and the systems experienced people stop seeing
Published 4 September 2026
Systems ThinkingProduct Management
3 min read
Scaling Organisations: Specialisation, Handoffs and the Senior School System
What a child's move to senior school reveals about specialisation, hand-offs, process and organisational complexity
Published 31 August 2026
Systems ThinkingProduct Management
6 min read
Departmental Silos and Mental Models: Alf Garnett and Organisational Tribalism
Social Identity Theory and Senge's mental models, via Alf Garnett: why each department's partial view of the business feels like the whole system.
Published 21 July 2026
Systems ThinkingProduct Management
6 min read
Work as Imagined vs Work as Done: What Porridge Reveals About Processes
Hollnagel's Work as Imagined and Work as Done, explained through Slade Prison, and why transformation programmes that automate the process map make things worse.
Published 11 July 2026
Systems ThinkingProduct Management
8 min read
Analysis Paralysis in Product Decisions: Monty Python Plays Football
How the Monty Python philosophers' football match explains analysis paralysis, and why “gather more data” only works in systems that hold still while you study them.
Published 21 June 2026
Product ManagementSystems Thinking
6 min read
Stakeholder Objectives and Misaligned Incentives: Lessons from the Likely Lads
Two failure modes that stakeholder management usually treats as one: people who do not share your objective, and people who share it but are quietly optimising for something else.
Published 21 June 2026
Product ManagementSystems Thinking
4 min read
Technology, systems and society
Automation Without a Beneficiary: Ray Bradbury and August 4, 2026
Ulrich’s boundary critique, via Bradbury’s automated house: why a system can meet every target it was set and still be making breakfast for nobody.
Published 4 August 2026
12 min read
Evaluating AI Output: Fluency, Accuracy and Yes, Minister
Sir Humphrey never lied outright either. Why fluent, confident AI output moves the cost from drafting to judgement.
Published 29 June 2026
AIProduct Management
5 min read
What other disciplines can teach you about product
Long-Term Product Strategy: What Fernand Braudel Reveals
What product managers can learn from Fernand Braudel about events, trends, structures, AI, and long-term product strategy.
Published 30 May 2026
History & PhilosophyProduct Management
8 min read
Data-Driven Product Management: E.H. Carr and the Interpretation Problem
E.H. Carr and the Myth of Data-Driven Product Management.
Published 20 May 2026
History & PhilosophyProduct Management
6 min read
Business Process Reengineering Before Automation: The Hammer Lesson
What product managers can learn from Michael Hammer, business process reengineering, and the danger of automating bad processes.
Published 10 May 2026
Product ManagementSystems Thinking
8 min read
Product Narratives and Customer Value: What Harari Reveals
Why customers buy stories, not features, and what product managers can learn from Yuval Harari.
Published 1 May 2026
History & PhilosophyProduct Management
6 min read
AI and Business Model Disruption: Schumpeter and Creative Destruction
Why artificial intelligence is not just coming for jobs, but for business models, value chains, and product assumptions.
Published 20 March 2026
AIHistory & Philosophy
7 min read
Theory of Constraints in Software Operations
Finding and defeating the final boss
Published 19 January 2024
Systems ThinkingOptimisation
11 min read
Systems & Constraints
Soft Systems Methodology for Software Requirements: A Tarantino Heist
What an old PhD thesis can teach product managers about systems thinking, requirements discovery and building the right thing
Published 20 April 2026
Systems ThinkingProduct ManagementAI
10 min read
Systems Thinking in Product Management
Why Smart Product Managers Keep Solving the Wrong Problem
Published 30 January 2026
Systems ThinkingProduct Management
9 min read
Product Discovery and Systems Thinking: Buffy and the Wrong Problem
Why discovery frameworks need systems thinking, and why another dashboard might not save Sunnydale
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleHow to Explain Statistical Distributions Without Starting With the Maths
What Monty Python, Douglas Adams and Groundhog Day can teach us about uncertainty, probability and Monte Carlo analysis
Published
5 min read
Read ArticleTacit Knowledge and New Starter Onboarding: The Smallest Member Knows the Least
What my daughter's first days at senior school reveal about tacit knowledge, onboarding and the systems experienced people stop seeing
Published
3 min read
Read ArticleScaling Organisations: Specialisation, Handoffs and the Senior School System
What a child's move to senior school reveals about specialisation, hand-offs, process and organisational complexity
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleProduct Discovery Frameworks: The Framework Is Not the Product
Why product-management frameworks are useful models, not reality
Published
4 min read
Read ArticleChoosing Route Optimisation Algorithms for Logistics: Earl Finishes the List
From Clarke-Wright and 2-Opt to Simulated Annealing, Tabu Search, Ant Colony and Large Neighbourhood Search, what Earl taught us about solving real optimisation problems.
Published
4 min read
Read ArticleLarge Neighbourhood Search for Logistics Routes: Earl Breaks the Plan
How destroying and repairing part of a route helps an optimiser escape the traps that small improvements cannot reach.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleAutomation Without a Beneficiary: Ray Bradbury and August 4, 2026
Ulrich’s boundary critique, via Bradbury’s automated house: why a system can meet every target it was set and still be making breakfast for nobody.
Published
12 min read
Read ArticleAnt Colony Optimisation for Logistics Routes: Earl Lets the Ants Take Over
How pheromone trails, exploration, and evaporation help a routing system learn from successful routes.
Published
13 min read
Read ArticleClarke-Wright Savings for Haulage Routes: Earl Meets Clarke
The Clarke-Wright savings algorithm from 1964, still running inside commercial transport optimisers, and why chaining stops beats visiting them one at a time.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleTwo-Opt and Three-Opt for Haulage Routes: Earl Rewrites the List
Two-Opt and Three-Opt formalise the planner's instinct that a route crossing its own path “looks wrong”, and then run straight into the local optimum.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleGenetic Algorithms for Vehicle Routing: Earl's Genetics
Genetic algorithms stop improving one plan and instead run a whole population of competing plans that can breed.
Published
13 min read
Read ArticleTabu Search for Vehicle Route Optimisation: Earl Learns to Remember
Tabu Search escapes a local optimum using memory rather than chance: the optimiser keeps a list of what it has just tried and refuses to repeat it.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleDepartmental Silos and Mental Models: Alf Garnett and Organisational Tribalism
Social Identity Theory and Senge's mental models, via Alf Garnett: why each department's partial view of the business feels like the whole system.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleSimulated Annealing for Vehicle Routing: Earl Learns to Cool Down
Simulated Annealing: why a routing engine sometimes has to accept a worse route in order to reach a much better one.
Published
15 min read
Read ArticleWork as Imagined vs Work as Done: What Porridge Reveals About Processes
Hollnagel's Work as Imagined and Work as Done, explained through Slade Prison, and why transformation programmes that automate the process map make things worse.
Published
8 min read
Read ArticleAI Football Forecasting and Open Systems: Chris Kamara Explains
Why more data cannot make an open system predictable, and what goes wrong when a 57% probability gets reported as a promise.
Published
9 min read
Read ArticleEvaluating AI Output: Fluency, Accuracy and Yes, Minister
Sir Humphrey never lied outright either. Why fluent, confident AI output moves the cost from drafting to judgement.
Published
5 min read
Read ArticleCompound Probability in Business Plans: Peep Show and Football Accumulators
Mark Corrigan explains why a ten-leg football accumulator and a ten-assumption business plan fail for exactly the same mathematical reason.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleAnalysis Paralysis in Product Decisions: Monty Python Plays Football
How the Monty Python philosophers' football match explains analysis paralysis, and why “gather more data” only works in systems that hold still while you study them.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleStakeholder Objectives and Misaligned Incentives: Lessons from the Likely Lads
Two failure modes that stakeholder management usually treats as one: people who do not share your objective, and people who share it but are quietly optimising for something else.
Published
4 min read
Read ArticleOrder Clustering for Haulage Planning: Earl Learns About Belonging
Before a route can exist, something has to decide which orders belong together, and that clustering decision constrains everything downstream.
Published
11 min read
Read ArticleHaulage and Logistics Optimisation in a TMS: The Only Way Is Earl
The series opener: why transport optimisation is a product problem before it is an algorithm problem, and why Earl Hickey's list is the right way to frame it.
Published
9 min read
Read ArticleObjective Functions in Transport Optimisation: Earl's List
Why transport optimisation has to start by defining what better actually means.
Published
12 min read
Read ArticleLong-Term Product Strategy: What Fernand Braudel Reveals
What product managers can learn from Fernand Braudel about events, trends, structures, AI, and long-term product strategy.
Published
8 min read
Read ArticleData-Driven Product Management: E.H. Carr and the Interpretation Problem
E.H. Carr and the Myth of Data-Driven Product Management.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleBusiness Process Reengineering Before Automation: The Hammer Lesson
What product managers can learn from Michael Hammer, business process reengineering, and the danger of automating bad processes.
Published
8 min read
Read ArticleProduct Narratives and Customer Value: What Harari Reveals
Why customers buy stories, not features, and what product managers can learn from Yuval Harari.
Published
6 min read
Read ArticleSoft Systems Methodology for Software Requirements: A Tarantino Heist
What an old PhD thesis can teach product managers about systems thinking, requirements discovery and building the right thing
Published
10 min read
Read ArticleAI and Business Model Disruption: Schumpeter and Creative Destruction
Why artificial intelligence is not just coming for jobs, but for business models, value chains, and product assumptions.
Published
7 min read
Read ArticleSystems Thinking in Product Management
Why Smart Product Managers Keep Solving the Wrong Problem
Published
9 min read
Read ArticleProbabilistic Delivery Forecasting for Product Managers
Why a fixed deadline hides uncertainty, and how probabilistic forecasts support better product decisions.
Published
7 min read
Read ArticleTheory of Constraints in Software Operations
Finding and defeating the final boss
Published
11 min read
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