About Carl Davies
Mission
I'm keen to push the boundaries on how we manage performance in complex social systems. My mission is to provide a useable resource for theoretical based, practitioner focused discussion to the complex and wicked challenges we face. Be that at policy , organisational or indeed at a personal level, I strive to bring the complexity based conversations into mainstream discourse.
My Background
Having always been fascinated by holism, systems theory, and opposed to the traditional reductionist appraoches to complex probelms in my teen years, I sought teachings that put people at the heart of societies complex challenges. During my first degree, I focused on psychology and sociology, completing my academic placements with clinical psychologists in order to pursue a deeper learning of the complex mechanisms that give rise to the observable events we see. Here I worked with people suffering with complex presentations of chronic pain conditions and chronic fatigue syndrome.
I then trained to be a Physiotherapist, moving quickly to specialise in complex pain and fatigue related disorder. With complementary training in Chinese Medical practices, I recognised the importance of Complex Adaptive Systems theory in trying to understand how socio-economic factors mix with biological and psychological factors that make us all individuals. Having recongised that health systems still look to treat the condition in the human, rather than treat the human in the condition, I embarked on a journey to understand how we might radically change healthcare systems to be far more person centred.
Leadership & Organisational Development
After a long career working in various senior operational and strategic roles in provider and commissioning organisations through the NHS, I saw first hand the deeply rooted and bureaucratic structures that limit leaders ability to bring about the change they seek or that the end user deserve. When an opportunity presented itself, I embarked on a PhD focused on Complex Adaptive Systems theory and the study of how we might facilitate radical improvement in complex social systems (e.g. organisations). This explores some of the reasons why systems get stuck despite overwhelming need to adapt and repeated attempts to invest in change. I am interested in the deeper interactions between agents and their environment, which I believe are at the heart of the challenges.
This website is the next phase in that journey, looking to share views that I hope others may find useful.