Traffic as a Wicked Problem in Australia

Introduction

A wicked problem can be defined as a social or cultural issue that is highly difficult or crucial to solve for a good number of reasons that includes complete or contradictory knowledge, a huge economic burden, the number of people as well as opinion involved with other issues. These issues are offloaded to policy makers or are recorded as being too cumbersome to handle. However, with effective leadership, these problems can be mitigated through re process of design that is an intellect approach which emphasizes abductive reasoning, empathy as well as rapid prototyping. According to researchers, wicked problems that are faced by the society can be dealt with the help of the Competing value framework. The competing values Framework, designed by Quinn and Rohrbaugh can be defined as a theory that was developed from the research on the major indicators of an effective organization. The first dimension of the competitive value framework is associated with organizational focus, that varies from the internal emphasise on the wellbeing as well as development of individual to an external focus on the well-being and development of the organization. The Competitive Value framework has got its name since the criterion within the four models seems to be carrying conflicting massage. In the following paragraph, one of the major wicked problem of the Australian society, traffic and transportation, has been discussed as well as analysed in the light of the Competitive Value Framework.

Discussion

Description of the social issue traffic and transportation

In spite of the fact that Australia is one of the most sparsely populated countries across the world, the country possesses several issues associated with its traffic as well as transportation. Traffic jam is one of the chief issues when it comes to transportation problem in Australia. Amongst the cities in the nation, the population as well as the tourists of Sydney can be considered as one of the major sufferers of transportation issues in Australia. In Sydney, often a normal 25 minutes’ drive takes one-hour traffic. Majority of time, the issue takes place due to the Anzac Parade light rail construction. While Implementation of metro rail project paves the way to the construction activities, it can be considered as a major contributor of traffic issues especially in major countries (Kartal & Ernst, 2015). Firstly, due to constructional works, a good number of roads remain blocked, which in turns causes major and prolonged traffic jams. Along with this, several cases unpredictable blocking of roads takes place due to sudden technological failure. This issue is highly enhancing the average travelling time of the travellers, leading to high dissatisfaction.

Another major transportation issue evidenced in Sydney, is poor road management. For instance, often crucial lanes are merged together during high traffic in order to reduce the number of lanes. Drivers, in the margining lanes are expected to use both the lanes in order to advance to the lane reduction point as well as to merge at that location, alternating the turns. However, this done in peak hours while the traffic of the area is high often leads to prolonged traffic jam. According to researchers, currently, Australia is facing major transport issues leading to lack of public transport and road infrastructure. Inefficient transport system is imposing negative impact on the tourism industry of Australia, which is considered to be one of the major contributors of the yearly revenue of the nation. Some of the major issues faced in the cities include low frequency public transport, indirect, slow as well as confusing routes of buses and lack of public transport in suburban areas. Just not this, highly trafficking congestions are pushing the residents out of the cities to less dense areas of Australia like the New castle and Blue Mountains. According to the residents, the train network of the city is so interconnected that even one signal failure or delay leads to wide spread disruption of the service.

A recent example of a Public transportation disaster which occur in Sydney. Sydney commuters faced peak-hour chaos this evening as urgent track repairs shut down a train line. Sydney Trains warned that the hold-up was due to 'urgent track equipment repairs'. Delays have had a flow on effect after commuters faced 30 minute to one hour waits. Trains are not running on the Illawarra Line due to urgent trackwork. The line was delayed in both directions. People have been asked to delay 'non-essential travel'. The emergency track work could not come at a worst time, as hundreds of thousands of commuter’s head home for the weekend. Passengers are packed onto the platform at Central Station. More than 67 million trips are made on the T4 line each year. 

Wicked problem characteristics as applying to the traffic and transportation problem

The four chief factors associated with a wicked problem makes it highly complex and difficult to solve include incomplete or contradictory knowledge, the number of individuals and opinions involved, the large economic burden as well as the interconnected nature of these problems with other issues. All these factors can be easily applied to the traffic and transportation problem that is currently suffered by the citizens of Australia. The first characteristic of the wicked problem includes a wicked problem possess no definitive formulation (Mulley et al., 2016). Similarly, the issue of transportation does not contain a definitive formulation. For instance, the transportation issue of Sydney is discretely different form that of Melbourne. The second characteristic of a wicked problem include is not possible to measure the success of an wicked problem. The solutions to a wicked problem can be considered to be good or bad, instead can be considered to be either better or worse. This is true for the transportation problem since, providing solutions to the different types of transportation issue can only be measured as improvement in the condition.

There is no template that can be followed while dealing with a wicked problem. Only history of the problem can be considered as a major guide to deal with such issues. When I came to transportation or traffic issues, leaders cannot follow a specific rule or guidelines in order to deal with all the problems. Each city in Australia possesses different factors that are interlinked with the problem. However, each transportation issues need to be tackled with the help of separate strategies. This factor directs to another characteristic of wicked problem that includes every wicked problem is associated to other social or business problem (An, 2016). For now, the issue of transportation in Australia is directly associated with the tourism industry of the nation. The social planner of wicked problem possesses no right to be wrong. That is offering a solution to a one-shot problem needs to be done in one shot design since a significant intervention changes the design space enough that leads to minimizing the ability of trial and error. This is true for the traffic and transport issue, since implication of the trial and error process may lead to devastating consequences.

Another mention worthy aspect of wicked problem includes, they do not possess an innumerable set of potential solutions. Generally, a host of potential solution arises in case of a wicked problem. In case the problem is ill defined, a set of potential solution relies on the realistic judgement along with the amount of credibility as well as feasibility of the proposed action. Because of the characteristics outlined above, wicked problem can be counterposed compared to the tame ones.

Competing values framework to wicked problem

The competitive value framework is a method of assessing the culture of an organization or society so that an effective strategy to deal with the wicked problem can be assessed. The competing framework is based on four major model of management theory that includes the clan culture, hierarchical culture, market culture and Adhocracy culture. While the features of clan culture include high degree of flexibility as well as are internally focused, this mode imposes great emphasis on stresses cohesion, human resource management and morale as criterion for effectiveness. The hierarchical culture includes high degree of controlling behaviour along with internally focused (Grabowski et al., 2015). It stressed on the role of information management, productivity, communication and stability and control. The third model of the competing values framework includes the adhocracy culture. The adhocracy culture includes high degree of flexibility and is externally focused. This model emphasizes on flexibilities as well as external focus along with stresses readiness, resource acquisition, growth and external support. The fourth model of the competing values framework includes the market culture that primarily focuses on its market position that is relative to the competitors. It is important that employees are aware of the company’s position and are part of the company’s appearance to the outside world.

Considering the fact, in order to deal with transportation and trafficking issue of Australia, it is highly crucial for the transportation leader to ensure an effective control on the operations. For the hierarchical culture, the communicable approach to the work is considered to be central. The coordinating management team aims to execute the task keeping accordance with strict guidelines. The transportation management teams need to ensure that all the activities are aligned with each other’s. Managers mainly possess a guiding as well as monitoring role and must ensure that the progress is appropriately monitored. Leaders needs to take the responsibility and must hold all the employees accountable.

Implication and interplay

The competing values of the hierarchical culture should be implemented to the traffic and transportation problem. For instance, a hierarchical model of traffic management should be implemented (Zlatković, 2018). Each and every major city should have traffic police station each after 7 Km. A ground vehicle management team should be guided by a ground vehicle manager. Similarly, a railway management team needs to create where the railway construction will be managed. Strict deadline for any constructional work should be implemented. Along with this, training and education of effective transportation management should be provided to the mentioned employees.

Potential leadership implications

The first step that the leader needs to be taken is to enhance the frequency of the public transport. Majority of the suburbs in Australia faces issues of low frequency transport. Most of the suburban buses run only every 60 to 30 minutes. Thus, in order to enhance the frequency, steps like incorporating more public transport and reducing the average waiting time of the same needs to be reduced (Harris et al., 2018). Along with this a clear and less complicated road map for bus routes needs to be implemented. For this leaders need to recruit skilled and efficient transport engineers by implementing effective recruitment process. Along with these new transport policies keeping accordance to the issues of lack of transport management to enhance the work force and training sessions of the transport department needs to implemented.

Conclusion

From the above discussion, it can be clearly understood that traffic and transport issues in Australia is a major wicked problem that needs to be dealt with in an emergency basis. Along with efficient leadership of transport leaders, the participation of both local as well as federal government is also crucial and order to reduce the social issue. With the implementation of the above discussed leadership strategies, it is s expected that the issue of transport in Australia will get diminished to a great extent in near future.