BEI1501 · Engaging complexity

Overview

Engaging complexity is an immersive introduction to the world of complex challenges - social, environmental, institutional, and technological - where clear-cut solutions are rare, and understanding takes time. In this unit, you’ll learn to observe, listen, describe, and reflect before jumping to conclusions. You’ll work with tools like stakeholder mapping, systems diagrams, and controversy analysis to explore how problems are shaped by context, power, and perspective. Rather than rushing to solve, Engaging complexity invites you to slow down and sit with complexity: What’s going on here? Who is involved? What’s being said, and what’s not? You’ll begin to understand how complex environments work, and why that understanding must come before any attempt to navigate or intervene. Understanding complexity isn’t a distraction from action, it’s what makes meaningful leadership and innovation possible. This unit develops your ability to approach challenges with curiosity, care, and the skills to ask better questions - grounded in ethical awareness, humility, and the patience to trace complexity carefully, thread by thread, knot by knot.

Offerings

Assessment

The Handbook does not list a final examination among the assessment items. That is not a guarantee there is none.

Assessment details may change. Please refer to the assessment information in Moodle closer to the start of the teaching period.

Requisites

The Handbook lists no prerequisite, corequisite or prohibition for this unit.

Learning outcomes

1. demonstrate understanding of complex systems and the value of situated, relational approaches to problem exploration
2. use mapping and observational tools (e.g. stakeholder mapping, systems diagrams, controversy analysis) to describe complex social and institutional environments
3. identify and reflect on how context, power, and perspective shape the way problems are defined and understood
4. practice careful, ethical observation and inquiry as a foundation for future innovation and leadership work
5. reflect critically on your own assumptions and positionality in relation to the challenges you encounter.

Workload

Minimum total expected workload to achieve the learning outcomes for this unit is 144 hours per semester typically comprising a mixture of scheduled learning activities and independent study. Independent study may include associated readings, assessment and preparation for scheduled activities. You are expected to complete all pre-class activities prior to your scheduled class, and post-class activities should be completed after your scheduled class. Learning activities may include a combination of teacher directed, peer directed and online engagement activities.

Student experience, not official rules. Nothing here changes what the Handbook says.