About this Presentation
Explaining a TOC concept clearly does not always change how people think or behave. This session explores how a well-designed game or simulation can create an experience that participants can examine for themselves, making cause-and-effect connections visible instead of asking them to accept an explanation. Aleksandra Bryzgalova shows how simulations can act as a mirror: participants make reasonable decisions, see the consequences, and then reflect on what their own behavior produced. She emphasizes that the experience must feel safe rather than judgmental and simple enough that participants see themselves and the system, not just the rules of the game. Using a local optimization game and an inventory game as examples, the session demonstrates how apparently sensible local decisions can create downstream waiting, excess work, instability, and unnecessary complexity. The design approach is concise: choose one discovery, create the conditions in which it can emerge, make the effect visible through fast feedback and clear consequences, and ask participants what happened and why instead of giving them the lesson. The result is a practical method for designing experiential learning that helps people discover TOC ideas through their own decisions.
What Will You Learn
To help you get the most value from this session, we’ve highlighted a few key points. These takeaways capture the main ideas and practical insights from the presentation, making it easier for you to review, reflect, and apply what you’ve learned.
Why a clear explanation may still fail to change thinking when people lack the experience needed to internalize cause-and-effect connections.
How to design a simulation as a mirror so participants can see the consequences of their own reasonable decisions.
Why psychological safety and simplicity matter: judgment stops exploration, while excessive complexity makes people focus on rules rather than behavior.
A four-step design method: choose one discovery, design the environment, make the effect visible, and ask what happened and why instead of explaining the lesson.
Instructor(s)
Aleksandra Bryzgalova
Aleksandra Bryzgalova is an independent Theory of Constraints consultant and trainer, certified in the TOC Thinking Processes, Production, and Distribution.
She has worked with TOC since 2009, helping leaders and teams explore complex management situations, uncover the underlying conflicts and cause-and-effect relationships, and develop systemic solutions.
What Aleksandra loves most is the TOC Thinking Processes and everything connected with changing the way people think. To support this, she uses and designs learning games and simulations that allow participants not only to understand TOC ideas, but to experience them and see familiar management situations from a new perspective.