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When building up knowledge, when facillitation digital group processes you need tools. Wiki’s is the answer to many problems - I think
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If you need something to read, here’s some cheap stuff - $9
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Don’t panic about competition from China. Just look at how the U.S. design industry evolved - and flourished - despite outsourcing
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About d.school: Ideo is the top design shop in Silicon Valley. Now a co-founder is on a mission to change the way students - and businesses - think
Archive for July, 2005
John Thackara has done a book with some very important insights about design and innovation – “In the bubble”. I’ve only read the extracts but by doing that it gave me thoughts about lot of things….
… If we can design our way into difficulty, we can design our way out…it seems that we should substract the technology for a while, focusing on social innovations instead?
… where do we want to be?…
… how do we get there?…
I think I’ll buy the book for my self and a few very good friends
A little snip from the book:
You hang around on ice flows, in extreme cold, for weeks on end.
Standing there, in bare feet, you are able to sustain a temperature
differential between your own body and the outside environment of
eighty degrees Celsius. Every now and again, when you’re feeling
hungry, you jump into the icy water, catch a fish, and then clamber
back onto a sunny beach. You do this without ever over- or
underheating.
Ever thought of how city-areas are made, produced, constructed?
By cityplanners, architects and big construction conglomerates, right?
It seems that New York has decided to do it in a different way. Looks promising and I wish that the best will win the competition.
RED has done a tremendous work in finding answers to the very difficult question - How to create demand for sustainable design? and How to take advantage of the business opportunities from sustainable development?
They made a “open source” document which is very interesting and definitely worth a read.
I haven’t yet reflected that much on the 151 pages – but I will over the weekend.
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When searching the web for fuzzy frontend I found this very interesting site - some great articles is available here.
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Interesting thought about incomplete information and decision making - by Nobelprize winning scientist
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Jonathan Huebner, a physicist working at the Pentagon’s Naval Air
Victor has a project going on collecting quotes and references about design and business thinking.
Please help Victor Lombardi collecting even more quotes – or maybe you should join the discussion over at Ralf’s?
I like them all – personally I find it very interesting to imagine which setting each of the contributors is coming from. Why do they say what they say? – there is always a reason.
It there a “right” or a “wrong”? I don’t think so – it always depends on context, doesn’t it?
Few weeks ago I participated in a conference about innovation and diversity. It was a very interesting conference about how to creation the best conditions for radical innovation.
The conference covered - had a presentation - about the easiness, or the opposite, when leading multidisciplinary teams.
The conference concluded that it sometimes – at the most – is very difficult leading multidisciplined teams because of lack of communication and common understanding of goals and vision.
I’ve experienced that my self and as I see it its more about a radical shift in leadership attitude going from that a leader interprets himself as the overall leader/manager to facilitating/framing the process/conversation. The future leadership of innovation is more about HR and understanding where people is coming from, why they say what the say – the reason behind – and how the interact with other people with other skills and backgrounds.
Or what? Is innovation more about strict deadlines, focused teams, and projectplan revisions. What tools do you use when facilitation group processes?
Sasha Verhage has some very interesting leaningpoints when dealing with digital interaction design.
The processes used caused - “…The benefits of this tool include increased participation, increased understanding of the value of each discipline, and consequently increased buy-in from the team.”
Any experience from anyone using these specifik tools?
I’m becoming curious about how the motivation behind the desire for innovation affects the outcome.
To this end I’ve begun to contemplate how different organisations have approached the task of innovation, and how the organisational context and agenda have been reflected in the kind of observable results.
Here are three real examples [no names] of divergent organisational scenarios, each with equally divergent products I have had experience with:
1. Innovation for the Community
An information technology training centre partly funded by government bodies.
-Management/Operational Style:
flat hierarchy, staff encouraged to develop own projects and to “own their own process”, open-plan configuration of work space, rapid embrace of new technologies.
-Product / outcomes:
Training for participants in hardware/software, office technologies, basic design, DTP and multimedia
-Innovations:
Free/subsidised open-learning for disadvantaged in the community, Think tank style support for entrepeneurial but unemployed/under-employed people.
* This environment is very conducive to innovation that directly assists people. the management style fosters and encourages workers to take risk and to experiment/fail in order to push the envelope.
2. Innovation for Profit
An international design and business college focussing on the Asia region.
-Management/Operational Style:
Hierarchical/Autocratic, staff are viewed as cost centres, fiercely entrepeneurial, aggressive, highly visible marketing approach, educational as business approach.
-Product / outcomes:
Accelerated learning, diploma & degree level qualifications, links to industry through internship programs, validation through western universities [UK, Australia]
-Innovations:
Design and business education in developing countries [e.g. China, India], supply of “qualified” design graduates to emerging local industries, prestigious, glamorous image in local market.
*The innovation here is “the vision”. A unique product that has little/no competition in the marketplace.
Innovation from staff is possible within the strict confines of the management processes and sometimes occurs despite management, in secret.
3. Innovation in reponse to government/state agenda:
Vocational education provider primarily funded by government sources.
-Management/Operational Style:
Hierarchical, highly beauracratic, systems orientated, governed by awards, government policy, unionised labour, structured along lines of command, agenda driven by government policy and economic needs, increased pressure to deregulate and develop commercial products.
-Product / outcomes:
nation-wide accredited training and qualification framework, targeted programs [e.g. disadvantaged, disabled, indigenous, community]
-Innovations
Programs funded via alternative funding sources, more commercial [user-pays] products
*Innovation in this environment is very difficult and often frustrating to those with ideas that don’t fit within the governemt guidelines. Staff often innovate by finding ways around “the system”.
In all three scenarios the motivation behind any innovation is related fundamentally to the nature of the organisation. The kind of innovation possible is dictated by the structure and culture of the organisation. The motivations of staff may not be/are often not aligned with management…
What motivates your organisation’s innovation?
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I came by this blog through technorati
…they say!
Building you self up as a gury is tough - but standing there on top of the mountain gives you unlimited posibilities, doesn’t it?
Tom’s angle to the above - "I say "Radical change" takes a minute……."
Mr. Peters has just done a new manifesto - amazing read - easy cooked though, It reminds me on one of his presentation I saw this spring.