# Wardley Maps - swardleymaps.com
# The official home of Wardley Maps by Simon Wardley

> Wardley Mapping is a strategic planning technique created by Simon Wardley that helps organisations visualise their business landscape, understand component evolution, identify dependencies, and make better strategic decisions. This site is the authoritative source for Simon Wardley's writings on mapping, strategy, AI, sovereignty, and software engineering.

## About Simon Wardley
Simon Wardley is a researcher, strategist, and the creator of Wardley Mapping. He works on retainer for a few clients, speaks at events, and researches topics including strategic mapping, AI, digital sovereignty, and software engineering.

## Key Pages
- [Home](https://swardleymaps.com/): Overview of Wardley Maps with key benefits and testimonials
- [Writings](https://swardleymaps.com/writings-books): 1,096 articles (2006-2026) organised by category:
  - [Books](https://swardleymaps.com/writings-books): Two books — Wardley Maps (19 chapters) and Rewilding Software Engineering (6 chapters)
  - [Proto](https://swardleymaps.com/writings-proto): Proto-book on mapping values, culture, and sovereignty (22 posts)
  - [Posts](https://swardleymaps.com/writings-posts): Standalone articles from Medium
  - [Opinions](https://swardleymaps.com/writings-opinions): Opinion pieces from LinkedIn
  - [Me & X](https://swardleymaps.com/writings-mex): Dialogue-format discussions from LinkedIn
  - [Archive](https://swardleymaps.com/writings-archive): Archive from blog.gardeviance.org (2006-2019)
  - [All](https://swardleymaps.com/writings): Complete chronological listing
- [Resources](https://swardleymaps.com/resources): Courses, books, tools, and learning materials for Wardley Mapping
- [Events](https://swardleymaps.com/events): Map Camp conference and community Discord
- [The Lab](https://swardleymaps.com/lab): Experimental demos and ongoing research
- [Explore](https://swardleymaps.com/explore): Search 1,096 articles with fuzzy matching and interactive connection graph
- [Contact](https://swardleymaps.com/contact): Email and LinkedIn for Simon Wardley

## Book: Wardley Maps — Topographical Intelligence in Business (Free)
Available at https://swardleymaps.com/writings-books#wardley-maps
- Chapter 1: On being lost
- Chapter 2: Finding a path
- Chapter 3: Exploring the map
- Chapter 4: Doctrine
- Chapter 5: The play and a decision to act
- Chapter 6: Getting started
- Chapter 7: Finding a new purpose
- Chapter 8: Keeping the wolves at bay
- Chapter 9: Charting the future
- Chapter 10: I wasn't expecting that
- Chapter 11: A smorgasbord of the slightly useful
- Chapter 12: The scenario
- Chapter 13: Something wicked this way comes
- Chapter 14: To thine own self be true
- Chapter 15: On the practice of scenario planning
- Chapter 16: Super Looper
- Chapter 17: To infinity and beyond
- Chapter 18: Better for Less
- Chapter 19: On playing chess

## Book: Rewilding Software Engineering (In Progress)
By Tudor Girba and Simon Wardley. Available at https://swardleymaps.com/writings-books#rewilding
- Chapter 1: Introduction
- Chapter 2: How we make decisions
- Chapter 3: Questions and answers
- Chapter 4: Flexing those thinking muscles
- Chapter 5: Different folks for different strokes
- Chapter 6: Myths we tell ourselves

## Proto-Book: Mapping Values, Culture and Sovereignty
An early-stage exploration available at https://swardleymaps.com/writings-proto — covering how to map culture, how values evolve, and how AI systems embed and capture societal values. Three sections: Foundations (mapping culture), Values and Society (geopolitics, economics), and Digital Sovereignty and AI.

## Recent Key Writings
- [Rewilding Software Engineering Ch6](https://swardleymaps.com/posts/2026-01-16-rewilding-software-engineering): Dismantling eight myths in software engineering (with Tudor Girba)
- [LLMs are coherence engines, not truth engines](https://swardleymaps.com/posts/2026-01-08-llms-coherence-engines): On why LLMs generate coherence rather than truth
- [On the question of debt](https://swardleymaps.com/posts/2026-02-15-on-the-question-of-debt): Four types of debt — technical, evolutionary, cognitive, and epistemic
- [Brave New World](https://swardleymaps.com/posts/2026-03-12-brave-new-world): On government, markets, values, and how AI changes societal norms
- [2026, Brexit, Sovereignty and all that](https://swardleymaps.com/posts/2026-01-05-brexit-sovereignty): Sovereignty, EEA/EFTA, and identity vs governance

## Topics Covered
- Wardley Mapping methodology and practice
- Business strategy and situational awareness
- Component evolution and value chains
- AI, LLMs, vibe coding, and their societal implications
- Digital sovereignty, training data, and non-kinetic warfare
- Software engineering practices and rewilding
- Organisational design (Pioneers, Settlers, Town Planners)
- Open source strategy and gameplay
- Culture, values, inclusion, and exclusion
- Brexit, governance, and political economy
- Healthcare vs sickcare

## Licensing
Wardley Maps are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0).

## Company
SWARDLEYMAPS LTD, Company number 15425177, registered in England & Wales.
Contact: simon@swardleymaps.com