TOCICO

Peter Cronin and Billy Soulis introduce the Druid as a practical tool for capturing and mapping recurring problems before attempting to solve them. The workshop focuses on situations where people alternate between two seemingly reasonable approaches, yet neither approach resolves the underlying problem because each side eventually creates consequences that push the system back toward the other. A Druid loop is built from the bottom up. Each side begins with a behavior or approach, followed by what goes wrong as a result, how the problem gets worse, and the goal violation that becomes serious enough to force a switch to the opposite behavior. The key test is whether each goal violation logically drives the opposite behavior, creating a self-reinforcing loop. Cause-and-effect statements are checked using simple “if…then…” logic. The presenters advise participants to start with what they know, avoid trying to perfect the wording on the first pass, and revise the map as the logic becomes clearer. The deck demonstrates the method with several examples. A work-notification loop contrasts notifications only during work hours with notifications left on 24/7, exposing the trade-off between delayed urgent communication and poor work-life balance. A Sales-versus-Operations example shows how promising fast, tailored delivery can overload operations and damage delivery trust, while enforcing standard lead times can reduce overload but cause lost sales and declining revenue. Participants then practice building Druids around quality versus speed and developing staff versus maintaining immediate output, before mapping a recurring conflict from their own context. The objective is not to solve the problem during this first workshop, but to leave with a clear, logic-tested picture of the recurring cycle, the consequences of each behavior, and a strong foundation for the next step: surfacing assumptions and designing an intervention that breaks the loop.