Carving New Patterns: What the Nornir Teach Us About Systems Change Over the winter break, I went to the Museum of the Cherokee People in Cherokee, North Carolina.

Carving New Patterns: What the Nornir Teach Us About Systems Change
open.substack.com/pub/stanholt...

Wall Street Journal headline and deck: "New York Shooting Puts Mamdani on the Spot Over Policing Views: The killing of four people in a Midtown office building rattled a city where mass attacks are rare and violent crime has declined."

It's really weird to demand accountability from a NYC mayoral candidate for a deadly NYC shooting rather than the current NYC mayor, an ex-cop who campaigned on a "tough on crime" platform and promptly got indicted for crimes

Partnerships implode because you're doing it wrong. Stop pretending everyone's the same. My rules for REAL teamwork: Assume good intent, listen hard, find the mission, use superpowers, demand accountability. No fluff. Just results. #TeamworkTruth #NoExcuses

We're tearing down essential human services—and handing the spoils to the elites. That’s not change. It’s chaos. Real revolution means: Emergency Bridge Funds, co-designed metrics, real-time budgets & pay tied to community well-being. #FundTheFrontLines

Reductionism is killing your people.

Splitting human lives into symptoms and stats ignores the systems that made them sick.

Systems heal. Reductionism maims.

The passage of this bill, that does so much damage–just to give tax breaks to the ultra-wealthy–is a clear call for change in Washington.

I will continue to stand up and fight for working Americans across the country.

Stop wasting cash on dead-end "outcome evaluations." Real-time feedback and constant adaptation win. Your old methods? OBSOLETE. Innovate or get left behind. #EvaluationRevolution #AdaptOrDie

Nonprofit boards: you’re crippling your mission. Teaching people to survive a broken system lets that system skate free. Charity alone perpetuates injustice. Stop patching holes. Demand policy reform, power shifts & systemic fixes. #SystemsChange #NonprofitLeadership

Your systems‐change plan is broken—master these 3 pillars: Build Capacity. Forge Networks. Ignite a Movement. Capacity builds strength. Networks fuse power. Movements shatter systems. Ignore one—and watch your “change” collapse. Real impact or empty scores? Your call.

More evidence this is about white, christian, nationalism

Through months 6–12, look for relational wins: partners explain each other’s programs; adapt to a shared agenda; back (not blame) each other; have tough resource talks; share ownership. Systems change isn’t a score, it’s a story. Educate donors & watch the needle move

Stop treating systems change like a quiz! A 95% score doesn’t mean your initiative is successful. Measuring client outcomes 6 months after a redesign? You’re fooling yourself. True change happens in relationships—providers collaborating toward a shared goal, not chasing quick numbers.

Real collaboration transforms you & the system. Take time to align, integrate programs & agree on shared metrics. Or keep pretending you’re ‘collaborating’—and watch your impact (and funding) slip away.

Don’t collaborate if you won’t change. As a former funder, I saw fake collabs that were just money grabs. Red flags: One org leads & subs out the rest; 3 conflicting goals; no client journey map; no shared metrics/data.

What if we replaced knowledge, skills and abilities, with joys, passions and gifts?

Directors , face the truth : No evaluation = no improvement . Worried about cost or reflection on you ? Evaluate & uncover quick wins. No data = no credibility . Don't guess, know . # EvaluationMatters # DataDriven

I've heard "People like you should die." But I refused to listen. Hate can't win when we tell our stories. Let's share ours & shatter the system designed to silence, separate & erase us. #TellYourStory #Resilience #Authenticity

Stop hiding behind “too expensive” or “no budget.” Evaluation isn’t costly. It’s just:

• Stop
• Think about what you want
• Measure what you are doing to get what you want
• Ask: “Is it working?”

If you can’t handle the truth, skip evaluation—and watch your project fail.

Wicked problems don’t play by the rules. 4 red flags:

1. No one agrees on the cause
2. Endless “solutions,” no single fix
3. Zero quick wins—results take ages
4. They only get ‘better’ or ‘worse’

All 4 true? You’ve got a wicked problem. Which # haunts your project?

Burning out?

- Learn to say "no"
- Prioritize self-care
- Ask friends for help

You can't help anyone else, if you haven't helped yourself.

That fish proverb is a lie. Teaching self-sufficiency is BS if you assume a pole, clean water & fish exist. 46% of US streams are toxic. No water = no fish = no lifeline. Stop handing out poles for poisoned ponds. Roll up your sleeves—clean the river.

I’m a jerk. I don’t give $ to “Homeless vet, need help.” Here’s the deal: the system built a wall. They sobered up, trained, got vouchers—yet no affordable apartments. It’s not their fault. My spare change props the lie that charity fixes it. Tear out the next brick.

YOU’RE NOT SISYPHUS. YOU’RE MORTAL. Every day you push a boulder uphill—feeding, housing, protecting—only to watch it roll back. Nearly a third of caseworkers quit within two years. Compassion without change is self-harm. Demand a system overhaul. Crush the roots.

We were trained to slice problems into parts and stare at them under a microscope. That’s reductionism. But wicked problems—poverty, climate, inequality—don’t live in labs. If you’re not thinking in systems, you’re not solving. You’re just playing whack-a-mole.

Systems thinking helps us understand how different parts of a community are interconnected. When we address a problem, we need to consider the ripple effects. How can we use this approach to create more effective solutions? #systemsthinking #nonprofitsolutions #communitydevelopment

One of the biggest mistakes I seen in program evaluation is focusing solely on outputs instead of outcomes. Are we really making a difference in people's lives? Let's shift the focus to measuring the change we desire. What are your thoughts? #programevaluation

partnersforimpact.com/what-is-an-o...

Hey kids. I'm in my 60s. You've never lived in an America where wealthy paid their fair share. I have. We accomplished great things. We:
- eliminated polio
- built new schools
- built new highways
- cut the poverty rate
- led the world in technology
- WENT TO THE MOON SIX TIMES!

Have you noticed that undocumented immigrants commit less crime than Trump?

There’s A Deeper Meaning Behind The Story Of The “Nickel Boys” Whether you've read Colson Whitehead's Pulitzer-winning novel or watched

"Nickel Boys" didn’t win Best Picture at the Oscars, but it put the victims of Florida’s Dozier School for Boys on the international stage. You need to know the true story behind this acclaimed film -- and Kaniqua Robinson is telling it. ➡️ pushblack.news/bcca77

The FAA approved another launch before the last crash investigation was completed — and it ended in another disaster.

Why is SpaceX getting a free pass from DOGE cuts? 🤔