Abstract for: The Shifting the Burden Archetype: A Workforce and Task Backlog Management Game

We first develop a workforce and task backlog management model based on the shifting the burden archetype. The model involves the corresponding solution archetype in addition to the problem archetype. Secondly, we develop a game based on the model. Finally, we present an experimental design in this paper. We plan to randomly assign the participants into three separate test groups. The first group will be guided towards the problem archetype. The second group will be guided towards the solution archetype. The third group will be guided towards a balanced approach that consists of both the problem and solution archetypes. We expect that the participants who will be guided towards using the solution archetype will improve their performances while the participants who will be guided towards using the problem archetype will have a deterioration in their performances. In a follow-up paper, we plan to summarize the results that will be obtained from the experiment. The motivation for this study is to demonstrate the long term benefits of systems thinking and system dynamics in decision making. We hope that such a demonstration will promote systems thinking and system dynamics and increase the willingness of the decision makers in applying high leverage policies.