The PSI network model for studying diverse complex design scenarios

Abstract

Design pervades our world in variety and complexity that is difficult to grasp. Different disciplines and researchers take one or few perspectives to study, model, and try to understand design, why it fails and when it succeeds. However, without a comprehensive model, the value of such approaches is limited. We created a framework - the PSI (Problem, Social and Institutional Spaces) framework - that includes several models, ranging from simple to complex, networked, and hierarchical or recursive that can be used to model all design scenarios. In what follows, we demonstrate the network version of this framework, how it is used, and what insight it can present. The diversity of situations we present, mergers and acquisitions of companies, collaborations between industry and university, large multiorganizational projects, and a very complex project, as well as other cases we do not present here, confers the validity of utility and potential of the PSI framework.