JOHN D. STERMAN, Standish Professor of Management at the MIT Sloan School, author of Business Dynamics: Systems Thinking and Modeling for a Complex World (2000), specializes in systems thinking for corporate and public policy, behavioral decision theory, nonlinear dynamics, and economic dynamics. Sterman uses system dynamics - a framework for understanding complex situations - to examine how people approach complex decisions and discover why dysfunctional dynamics persist in organizations. Using management "flight simulators" that Sterman and his students have developed, managers can design effective policies to improve the long-term performance of their organizations. Recent applications include the semiconductor, automotive, and computer industries; and issues from growth strategy to process improvement and product development.