While I could quote some excellent points from across the whole piece, I’ll start with this introduction:

Involvement of ‘users’ early in the research and ideation phases of the design process is often equated to “asking users what they want”. (A certain quote oft attributed to Ford comes to mind). Codesign however, goes well beyond this. The premise is that ‘users’ become partners. Rather than being viewed as a source of information to be input into the design process, those impacted by the design are invited to work actively with designers to shape the definition and direction of the project. Participation can include sharing personal experiences and perspectives, contributing to the generation of new design concepts, the evolution of those concepts, analysis, interpretation, decision making, evaluation and more.

When taking a codesign approach it is our role as designers to facilitate that participation. At the beginning of the design process we work with users to understand the design project in relation to their everyday lives including their habits, rituals, dreams, attitudes and experiences. These then become resources for inspiring design concepts and direction. In order for people to actively and effectively participate in the design process they must be able to imagine, access, and express their experiences and expectations. Simply asking people questions is not enough to facilitate this process. This is because people are not explicit sources of information. As humans we are limited in what we can express by our existing frames of reference, we can only talk in the language that we know.

This (perhaps unsurprisingly) reflects Zumio’s approach, and our process is strongly geared towards enabling this type of participation. Penny’s and Natalie’s article does a great job at providing some insight into the thinking behind some of the methods we employ to achieve this goal. Congrats (and thanks) to Penny and Natalie for producing yet another great resource for the UX/service design community…

The focus of the papers I read were on the concept of “enabling solutions” – that is designs that, rather than taking away problems, build people’s efficacy to solve the challenges they face, increasing their “resourcefulness” (to borrow a term from Emily Campbell’s RSA paper You know more than you think you do: Design as resourcefulness & self-reliance [PDF 356KB]).

While at the time I didn’t fully appreciate the relevance of these papers to my intended report, by the time I’d finished writing it I realised Manzini’s ideas had been very influential. Which is why I’m so excited to see that Ezio is speaking in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney next month in a tour co-organised by ASIX, TACSI, and the Centre for Social Impact.

In each state Ezio will be doing both a public forum: “Small, local, open, connected” and masterclass: “Next economy – enabling sustainable ways of living”. From the masterclass blurb:

Perhaps the world’s leading expert on sustainable design, Ezio Manzini sits at the interface between design, community and social innovation with a focus on scenario building toward solutions encompassing both environmental and social quality.

This masterclass will explore how the interplay between social and technical innovation is opening up brand new opportunities. How can we conceive and deliver “enabling solutions”? How can individuals, businesses, institutions, associations and communities collaborate in the framework of viable business models to support sustainable ways of living?

This masterclass is for policy-makers and practitioners who are interested in sustainability, social innovation and cross-disciplinary collaboration.

I’d thoroughly recommend this tour/series to anyone interested in sustainability and/or social innovation – I’m sure it will be an engaging and inspiring set of sessions…

It is quite an interesting programme modeled around a group board game supporting organisations in providing educational material about sustainability, promoting key points for discussion and incorporating anonymous polling (or auditing) tools.

During Thursday’s session we participated in some demonstration rounds of the game within groups. Even though we weren’t able to get the effect of a full workshop (due to time constraints), I was impressed with the promise of the tool.

It is designed to be run in a workshop mode, and it was a well designed tool that incorporated competitive spirit in a constructive way to enhance learning. And while the focus of the session on Thursday was environmental sustainability, the programme itself covers a much broader set of areas, including diversity and other social factors.

The customisation options alluded to by MOSS and Sustainability Challenge International (co-designers of the game, along with input from Swinburne University and Baker & McKenzie) seem quite strong too. There also seems to be a vision of “crowdsourcing” questions and answers for the game as well.

The programme seems ideally suited to larger organisations and CSR departments, though if the costs are reasonable (I’m not yet sure what the programme’s price point is) would also be appropriate for smaller group settings.

Thanks again to everyone who participated in the Melbourne and Sydney workshops. As promised, here are the presentation slides, along with my notes (PDF 14.78 MB) from the presentation component of the day.

Of course, I can’t include all of the great discussion that took place, but hopefully it will help jog the memory as well as provide some further details on some of the topics we covered.

Workshop materials

The material generated by workshop participants is also available for download:

• Melbourne: Risk & opportunities – transcribed (PDF 65 KB)
• Melbourne: Other workshop materials (PDF 21.2 MB)
• Sydney: Workshop materials (PDF 1.1 MB)

The remainder should be up by Monday.

Other follow-ups

Two follow-ups from the workshops:

1. There was a question about RSS in Outlook: one that I’m aware of is NewGator Inbox [Update 21 June 2011: as far as I can tell this product is no longer available, so I've removed the link], although it seems that Outlook 2007 has an RSS reader built in.
2. I mentioned the “Government 2.0″ Google group in (I think) the Melbourne workshop also. I’ve also come across a Government 2.0 Australia Ning community (they are different groups, but exploring similar themes. Neither are specifically focused on social networking, but may be of interest all the same.

If any readers have other related resources to suggest, it would be great if you could do so in the comments.

Thanks

I wanted to say thanks to a number of folks who participated in the workshop by being so generous with their time and insights (in alphabetical order):

• Fi Bendall (Bendalls Group), Peter Buckmaster (Care Network), and Katie Hart (Amnesty International Australia)
• Priscilla Brice-Weller (ANTaR)
• Marc Lehmann (Saasu)
• Helen Mitchel (CPA Australia)
• Mathew Patterson (Campaign Monitor)
• Deb Shaw (Amnesty International Australia)
• Georgina Swan (Choice Australia)

Your input and generosity was greatly appreciated by the participants (and especially by me!) Some of the video and other materials from the case studies should find their way into blog posts in the not too distant future…

Thanks also to Penny Hagen who assisted in preparation for the workshop. And last, but not least, Maxine, John and the WDS team for organising such a wonderful event and presenters’ dinner. It was a wonderful opportunity that I deeply appreciate…

Just wanted to make a quick post to thank all the participants of the Web Directions South (WDS) Roadshow Engaging social media workshops that we did in Melbourne and Sydney this week.

I personally enjoyed them a lot – the energy of the folks involved was fantastic. From the feedback I’ve received it sounds like y’all enjoyed and valued the experience too. Thanks also to those of you who pointed out things that could be improved – your points and insights help tremendously.

I’ll be collating the materials generated through the workshops and tweaking the presentation materials for distribution early- to mid-next week. The WDS folks will be in touch via email with details as soon as they’re ready.

P.S. my preparation for this workshop, along with preparations for a major delivery for Inspire, have meant it’s been awfully quiet around here of late. I suspect May will see a bit more posting in these parts…

Not that that would have been the case anyway – my friend and colleague Penny Hagen has been lending a hand working out the flow of the day – the aim is to keep things “hands on” and practical.

I hope to have a bit more to post as we get closer to the date – but in the meantime a reminder that you can get a discount if you use the code “WD-GY” when you register, reducing the price to $499 for the day.

It’s a great program – I feel privileged to be amongst the well known names that are on that list. Most of all I’m looking forward to the opportunity to learn more about what people are doing in the social media space and helping them overcome some of the roadblocks and challenges they face. Should be a lot of fun :)

Update: If you use the discount code “WD-GY”, the price for the workshop drops to $499 :)

From the official blurb:

Social media – blogs, wikis, social networking services, online communities, folksonomies/tagging, social search – are reshaping what citizens expect from government services. Areas of government, from health and policy development to tourism and the cultural sector, are all being asked to deliver better, more interactive, more citizen-centric, more engaging, and personalised online services.

If you have any thoughts on e-government, sites that you think would be worth showcasing, or interesting workshop techniques, feel free to leave a comment :)

It’s a full day workshop, which will hopefully be a lot of fun as well as informative for participants. If you’re interested in attending, pricing and registration details are on the site.

(Astute observers will notice that the workshop takes place two days before I present at the CPA Centering on Excellence conference – so it’s shaping up to be a big week!)

• Learn of various types of social media online communities
• See what consumers are doing to (your) Brand
• Investigate the ROI of social networks and the many revenue streams
• Understand how consumer communities are creating peer to peer financial services
• How to work with social networks now and in the future

The conference will be located at the Swissotel, Sydney (entrance on Market Street just opposite the State Theatre – map).

It seems that the financial services industry is keen to learn about social media – this session occurring shortly before the CPA Australia conference I’m also presenting at in May.

(Big thanks to Laurel for introducing me to the conference organisers – v. much appreciated!)