Since 2005, there has been an opportunity for joint reflection about the quality of the peer review process at each conference. In the subsequent conferences, discussion became more structured and this year, a substantial effort has been made. Still there remains work to be done in order to arrive at a policy that would achieve a satisfactory balance between paper and presentation quality on one side and other goals of the conference on the other. This years meeting is the opportunity to review what has happened since last year's meeting and its recommendations, also we can assess up to which point the new policies have yielded improvements. Reviewers, chairs and organizers are especially invited to give their input.
The Latinamerican Chapter has the mission to help the SD-community grow in the Spanish speaking countries. Founded in 2003, it has Latinamerican members from Mexico to Chile, from Spain and a growing number of Spanish speakers living in other countries. Since 2003, the annual meeting allows practitioners to gather and newcomers to get in to touch; we have been in Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Argentina so far. These conferences are the base of our positive feedback loop: each year the number of works submitted and presented is increased. Since 2005, the Spanish Revista de Dinámica de Sistemas publishes two numbers per year. The sisTEMAS newsletter and a mail list allow keeping in touch. In November 2009, the 7th Latinamerican Conference took place in Santa Marta, Colombia, organized by Industrial University of Santander, National University of Colombia and University of Magdalena. This year's meeting will take place in Lima, Perú in November 2010. It is an opportunity to welcome new members. If you would like to join us please contact Gloria Pérez ( gloria.perez@itesm.mx), Isaac Dyner ( idyner@unalmed.edu.co) or Martin Schaffernicht ( martin@utalca.cl). The annual business meeting was held in Seoul and affords the opportunity to get involve with the Latin-American Chapter activities and develop the networking we need to develop the System Dynamics field in our countries.
The SDS Education SIG continues to pursue its twin interests in publicising and enhancing both the contribution of SD to Education Management and the evolution of the contribution of SD to the curriculum - in both cases the interest spans the whole span of education from K-12 to Higher Education. This years roundtable/annual business meeting is the place to come to discuss substantive education issues, whether you are part of the Education SIG or simply exploring possibilities. The Ed SIG is establishing an agenda which embraces both elementary and secondary education and high education. We also deal with both management and public policy issues. We will continue working on the intellectual and operational challenges to system dynamics of the PK-20+ concept of lifelong learning from prekindergarten to continuing adult education, reaching beyond the usual silos separating the domains. Come tell us what you are working on, or just ask questions.
There exist many examples of organizations which failed to react to environmental change. Polaroid and Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) are just two of them. While existing literature in particular focuses on organizational inertia and routines as impediments to change, attention to stakeholders has not received much consideration outside the area of business ethics. Since attention proved an influencing factor at Polaroid, DEC, and in a change process of the New York Stock Exchange, the interrelationships between inertia, attention, and change will be analyzed in the present paper. Stakeholder attention proved to be influenced by stakeholder pressures as well as an influencing factor on the perception of stakeholder pressures. Additionally, sensitivity analyzes revealed how different policies for managerial intervention work by themselves and in interaction.
The current turmoil in the financial markets forces us to question the validity and relevance of the present economic theories. Complex dynamics characterized by bounded rationality and strong impact of expectations on the markets provides an independent source of fundamental uncertainty and this one can lead to speculative bubbles in assets markets triggering growth of public debt. The neoclassical methodology based on logical empiricism and deductive reasoning has failed to show what is going on in the real world. We will employ the institutionalist's view and focus on the behavioral aspects of the system modeling decision making process. We illustrate this approach with a model drawn from the current Greek sovereign debt crisis and its bailout discussions. The main benefit expected is the increased realism of the model itself. The discrepancies between theoretical predictions and observed behavior have had a major negative impact on economic models and system dynamicists can contribute a significant amount of value to institutional economics.
We offer a theory of competitive process improvement to explain the process of how best business practices emerge through dynamic interactions between competing processes. Grounded on the history of the interaction between two distinctive competing processes, Mass Production System vs. Toyota Production System, we employ the lens of competitive dynamics to develop a formal model. Three insights emerged: for sustainable competitive advantage, (1) a firm needs to invest in explorative activities at an early and continuous fashion; (2) external competitive tension plays a vital role in managing internal tension of organizational learning; (3) a firm may commit perception biases when interpreting others learning (re)actions.