Barefoot Facilitation | Kate Sutherland

Written by . Posted on March 29, 2013. Filed under Learn, Masters Workshop. Tagged , , . No comments.

Author and facilitation expert Kate Sutherland presented Barefoot Facilitation at April’s DwD. Guided by appreciative interviews and dialogue questions, participants explored the landscape of facilitating where needs emerge, unbidden, for the benefit of groups and organizations we might serve.

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Humans are going through a massive transitional period. This “Great Turning” is calling for collective intelligence, collective wisdom and collective capacity as never before. We are being asked to revolutionize how we work together.

Barefoot facilitators are to professional facilitators what paramedics are to doctors: a person with a basic and versatile toolkit and enough savvy to skillfully support what is needed 80% of the time, and for a fraction of the cost.

Kate is inspired by the “barefoot doctors” of revolutionary China. In the mid-60s, there was little access to medical care in rural areas, and not enough resources to supply fully trained doctors. Instead, 30,000 villagers were trained in basic Western and Chinese medicine — enough to treat common ailments, and to share information about hygiene, family planning, and prevention of epidemics.

They were called “barefoot doctors” because when they weren’t tending to basic medical needs, these people continued to farm barefoot in the rice paddies along side their neighbours. This important innovation rapidly revolutionized health outcomes in rural China.

By analogy, we do not have resources or capacity to supply professional facilitators to all the meetings and group endeavours supporting the great shifts underway. There are, however, thousands of people in all walks of life already up-skilling their ability to facilitate deep and lasting change in the human systems of which they are a part.

Questions we explored included the following:

  • What shifts in perspective will greatly enhance your effectiveness in groups?

  • What ways of being are like secret sauce for what you are doing?
  • What organizational theories are most helpful for a “barefoot facilitator” toolkit?
  • How can we grow a movement of barefoot facilitators who help each other  with supporting the groups of which they are a part?

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Visual recording by Charlotte Young. Thanks also to Natalie Zend for facilitation support, and Patricia for the sketchnotes.

About Kate:

Kate Sutherland is an author and social entrepreneur who helps change agents and social benefit initiatives be more innovative and effective. As a consultant, trainer and coach, she has helped hundreds of leaders and organizations be more nimble, resilient and aligned with their core purpose.

Kate is the author of Make Light Work in Groups: 10 Tools to Transform Meetings, Companies and Communities, and Make Light Work: 10 Tools for Inner Knowing. She lives in Vancouver with her husband and teenaged daughter. For more about Kate, see www.katersutherland.com.

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“We already have proven solutions to our toughest social challenges. Our bigger challenge is working together to scale them for wider benefit. Kate’s latest book is a precious resource for those looking to improve how they work not only with allies but also with opponents and strangers.”

– Al Etmanski, Co-chair of BC Partners for Social Impact

What is the True Nature of Partnership?

Written by . Posted on March 8, 2013. Filed under Think. Tagged , , , . 1 Comment.

March’s DwD session was hosted by Mary Pickering of the Toronto Atmospheric Fund.

What is the true nature of “partnership”?

 Funders want it, social innovation demands it and professionals now “broker” it. With the rising clamor to establish partnerships within and across organizations to get people working together more effectively, the time has come to reflect on what a partnership really means in the social change context.
 
At this dialogue session we explored these questions:
  • What defines a true partnership?
  • Is there partnership potential in every working relationship?
  • When should – and shouldn’t – we create partnerships to advance our causes?
  • How might a partnership impact an initiative?
  • What are the key principles for making, managing – and breaking up – working partnerships?
Mary Pickering Mary Pickering has been with Toronto Atmospheric Fund since 2004, serving as VP Programs and Partnerships. Previously she worked for six years for World Wildlife Fund Canada as a major gift fundraiser. Her work with TAF focuses on incubating collaborations focused on local greenhouse gas reduction strategies. Mary has led TAF’s work on Solar Neighbourhoods, ClimateSpark, MOVE the GTHA, and the Collaboration on Home Energy Efficiency in Ontario (CHEERIO). She is currently undertaking Level 2 accreditation with the Partnership Brokers Association and is very interested in your experiences and views on creating effective partnerships.

Healing Wicked Problems in Health

Written by . Posted on February 15, 2013. Filed under Act, Learn. Tagged , , , . 2 Comments.

Can rethinking challenges together break through our most compelling health design problems?

February’s DwD held an open session for health and design professionals from across sectors in the community. Paolo Korre, Design Consultant at Mount Sinai Hospital, and Peter Jones hosted about 30 people from a diverse range of roles and sectors attended (starting off with a visual mapping of name tags by place and health intention).  Most of us reported as being external to healthcare (bottom of the grid), but we were lucky enough to get 4 or so closer to the front lines of care and practice.

mapofhealth

The engagement was typical DwD :

1) Open circle share and introduction
2) Nominal group technique: Generating one well-framed question (or wicked problem) in health of personal interest
3) Selection for first round Open Space (5 groups)
4) Further selection for larger Cafe sessions (4 groups)
5) Post and share Cafe sketches

+ Hanging around to talk with those who wanted to stay longer

What is the possibility for creating better practices and healthier communities through health and care design? What experience and wisdom might emerge if we had the time and place to share it with a community of committed listeners?

The  following three intentions (at least 1 and 2) were upheld by the end of the evening:

  1. Bringing local participants together with opportunities for connection / collaboration
  2. Presenting authentic issues of concern to our work and communities
  3. Inventing possible avenues for action or engagement to follow

Of 30 or so initial wicked problems (or questions), one each proposed by each person, a first set of 5 were selected and engaged for a round:

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  1. How can healthcare tech innovation be reconciled with costs?
  2. Why is healthcare so full of “problems?”
  3. What is health and who cares?
  4. How can we take ownership of our own health records?

A second round of Cafe sessions selected the most compelling themes from the first round of ideas. The final set of problems were taken on by four groups, with these responses sketched, posted (see the picture), and discussed in plenary.

James Caldwell (shown here engaged in the “Participaction” group) reviewed the workshop and discovered deeper insights and connections than we had time to develop at the close to the evening.

“Ideally each group was trying to create better practices that improved communication which would allow for better health. We presented real issues that hamper individuals and communities and tried to devise credible actions for health care engagement.”

The three that I will focus on are:
1. How do we redefine how to be radically inclusive?
2. If physical inactivity is the root of all health evil, why not ban it?
3. How do we create and maintain and own our own comprehensive health records?

“The result of any of these would mean that individuals become the drivers or agents of their own health. Ironically, the impact to the government’s financial system would be positive.”

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All three issues have a few things in common:
1. They empower the individual
2. They lesson costs for the government
3. They improve the future health of the individual
4. They make for a more engaged society

“Of course any sane person would be asking why are we undertaking these initiatives today? Common sense would dictate that we would all be happier, healthier and more informed if we did. But I guess that’s why we call them “wicked problems”. Unfortunately too many groups that make too much money from individuals with health problems would lose, and I don’t think they will give up their control anytime soon.”

“I guess this is where designers can speak up and more effectively communicate to everyone why initiatives such as the three mentioned could help better our society. Designers could simplify the problem, the parameters, the solution and the message to a wider audience than the health industry or government could which would be seen as self-serving anyway.”

I agree with James that the 3 (actually all four) final problem areas are interconnected in the solutions. James is considering the outcomes, which show a virtuous cycle of healthy behavior (active lifestyles), inclusive public communication, and monitoring through electronic media. The fourth problem-solution (bottom of the board) was “creating community healing spaces.” I”m not sure this one was as well understood by the other groups, but it seems to me that James’ individual solution space is complemented by a public (or co-citizen-led) system of:

  1. Reframing inclusive healthcare to focus on those that need it most (who are unlikely to take individual initiative)
  2. Creating community centres as temporary (but connected) healing spaces,
  3. Thereby providing many opportunities to get off one’s butt
  4. Supported by personal health tracking in ever-decreasing cost and management, providing incentives to maintain a common health record.

 

 

 

On Building Culture through Participatory Design

Written by . Posted on February 8, 2013. Filed under Learn, Masters Workshop. Tagged , , . No comments.

Guest post by Leah Snyder of Mixed Bag Mag

When Gelareh Saadatpajouh, Programs Coordinator at Toronto Design Offsite set out to facilitate Design with Dialogue’s TO DO session she decided to have our group explore, as she puts it:

“Design processes, where plurality of indeterminate factors is approached together and in an ongoing manner, and where designers become adept in handling the growing complexity in both materials of their craft and their position in the world.”

Increasingly designers are being called upon to search their souls in order to create with meaning. In a world exhausted by consumer culture and in desperate need of cultural revision we as designers can play a key role. As Gelareh got us up and activated with an exercise where we mimed our way of working it was clear why design thinking is so adaptable across platforms, disciplines and cultures. For as many people as were in the room there was a different design process. As we later shared our revelations from watching each other I realized that my own design process is also adaptable to where I am in my life’s journey and can shift when I have a renewed way of interacting with my world.

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For over a decade my creation happened in isolation. Working with clients to design promotional tools and branding strategy there would be a two-way dialogue with the client after which I would go inside to then create something that would ultimately reach out. After another exercise where we were directed to find a design process action then go out into the group with that action to mingle I realized that my process has radically shifted. Now my first step is to reach out. I start by engaging in multi-directional dialogue, sometimes with other designers, but more often than not those dialogues are with people from many different walks of life. Sometimes those dialogues occur at street corners, even with strangers. I design as I walk, I process as I talk.

More and more I see others who design programs or products, ad campaigns or architecture instinctively, like me, reach out first as the point from which to start. As Design Week in Toronto demonstrated there is a community expanding around the questions “What is design?” and “Can we as designers contribute to modeling a new type of world?”. The idea of the collective is now being understood as the base from which we need to grow ideas. At a time when we require it the most the spirit of collaboration has motivated designers into taking more radical positions. The result -  fertile ground in which we see new materials and new models rapidly sprout.

For the last part of the workshop Gelareh had us break out into small groups “guided by a designer who shared something of their design, resulting in new “artifacts” that were then constructed through brainstorming, creative discussions, and active participation throughout the design process.”

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On the street, a few days later, I randomly bumped into someone whose group I was in. I was able to ask her if the exercise we did on her project was helpful to her. Did it result in a new “artifact” for her work? The answer -  an enthusiastic yes! And as we walked up to the street corner together, before going our separate ways, we continued to design as we walked and process as we talked.

 

Building Culture through Participatory Design | DwD for TODO 1.22.13

Written by . Posted on January 9, 2013. Filed under Learn, Masters Workshop. No comments.

What design practices facilitate the creation of culture?

  • How do we build culture in a durable, intentional way?
  • How do we learn and teach from design process itself?
  • How have we learned to improvise or hack design practices so that we personalize design thinking with our own experience?
  • How might we build on each other’s practices to make something new happen?

For the Toronto Design Offsite we created an experience for culture building through sharing and learning design processes. We will have an open space exchange of learning and generative framing through design participation. If you are a designer or participatory culture artist, we invite you to attend and share in this workshop a method or practice for small group envisioning, scenario or model making, or group sketching type practice.

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Culture building is the re-creation of artistic and social evolutionary practices that enable continuous learning across generations. The workshop invited people to share their own design processes in small groups to co-create cultural artifacts, such as a learning experience, an interior, a song, a plan, or a website or publication. The goal was the participatory process itself, and learning from one another ways of revealing collective wisdom and aliveness in co-creation.

Design with Dialogue (DwD) is a Toronto-based open community of practice. This special workshop was a collaboration between Gelareh Saadatpajouh and Markus Doerr with Peter Jones from DwD, with Miranda Corcoran and Leah Snyder , photographers and Patricia Kambitsch, live sketching.

Cultural identification started with the introductions, which were simply adding a nametag to the Toronto map o’ culture waiting participants at the entrance:

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Small groups met in spaces all around Lambert Lounge to co-create dialogues and pictures of practice:

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Dating by Design

Written by . Posted on December 28, 2012. Filed under Learn. Tagged , . No comments.

Dating by Design

Navigating the complexities of modern relationships

We spend a lot of time perfecting our craft at work – striving for that 10,000 hours. But when was the last time you spent dedicated time on getting better at relationships? Perhaps because designers are often tasked with solving “wicked”, complex problems, the language of design provides many useful metaphors for exploring the complexities of modern relationships. By using design as a language to talk about dating and relationships, the conversation becomes more objective, and less subjective (aka less awkward).

DwD hosted Ayla Newhouse to present a design charette (a short, intensive and collaborative design exercise) for relationships, to apply the creativity and processes of design to dating and relationships. Participants were matched up into small groups to design their way out of (or into) fictional relational and dating situations.

dating sketchThanks to Aimee @ISEEAIMEE for the live sketching.

Hosting the session:

Ayla Newhouse is a Communication, Interaction and “Attraction” Designer with 16 years of relationship experience ranging from misalignment to creative brilliance. She is the creator of Dating by Design, and the author of “the ABC’s of Dating by Design” (datingbydesign.ca). Ayla also offers one-on-one and couples Dating by Design consulting.  Follow her at @aisforayla

Previously, Ayla co-founded 1thingapp.com: a social gratitude journal that helps people recognize the good things in their lives. A graduate of the Communication Design program at the Emily Carr Institute and the Interdisciplinary Design program at the Institute without Boundaries, Ayla worked with Normative Design and Bruce Mau Design before starting her own design/coaching practice in 2011.

2012 Retreat: Envisioning 2013

Written by . Posted on December 16, 2012. Filed under Act, Retreat. 2 Comments.

A dedicated group of DwD members engaged in a year-end retreat and participatory planning session Saturday, December 15. Facilitated as an Appreciative Inquiry by Greg, Peter and Patricia, we explored the inspirations from over a dozen incredible workshops in 2012, our dreams for the new year, and the opportunities for designing actions for our near future.

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Using the Group Pattern language card deck, pairs shared about the applicable meaning of selected cards for relevance to DwD practice. The sharing dialogue was sketched to reflect the meaning of its relationship to DwD:

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Actions to Continue, Stop, or Start new filled the whiteboard after group reflection on actions and new directions for 2013.

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We haven’t synthesized the design plan and next steps from the recommendations yet. The intention with sharing the artifacts here is to share with the whole community the ideas, interests and new directions supported by core DwD members.

Look for the following changes in 2013:

  • Revamp the DwD brand and synch with its support network and communities (OCADU, KMDI, Overlap)
  • Publish the pipeline of upcoming DwD sessions and collaborations – invite the entire DwD community to participate in creating and facilitating sessions
  • Revise the website to enable bidirectional communication and posting
  • Share on the website the individual work we do as a result of learning: Inspirations and facilitated engagements that draw from DwD practice
  • DwD for Designers to create dialogue processes
  • Invite non-designers to DwD, increase variety and diversity of participation
  • Promote visual storytelling, metaphorical design, and embodied practices
  • Spinoff DwDx (as TEDx) by supporting non-Toronto affiliates
  • “What’s inspiring you lately?” section on website
  • Create movement and dance-inspired DwD sessions