The Science and Design of Sustainable Collaboration
What was the challenge?
When groups work together, getting things done, staying motivated and achieving goals can sometimes seem impossible, or at very least frustrating (think back to your last group project or meeting). This is because how we manage the stress and anxiety associated with group work can often prohibit successful collaboration. This is compounded by the fact that it is difficult to avoid these behaviors because they are simply human nature.
What did we design?
Humantics leverages these human behaviors to help groups manage their weaknesses and build on their strengths. This is achieved by designing cognitive tools, with the help of the users, that change the nature of group work all together. One example is the Collective Purpose tools made for one of our project partners. This tool reduced the anxiety of talking about financial decisions surrounding a 60 million dollar budget and allowed two opposing work groups find a set shared goals and helped them design an effective plan of action to achieve them.
What is the dynamic behind the designs?
Humantics sparks sustainable collaborations by designing tools that help work-groups, work better together. Derived from key principles of psychology and design, Humantics tools effectively reduce anxiety and confusion, favoring the development of autonomy, trust, creative initiative and productive collaboration.
Vol 1 Amuneal Manufacturing
What was the challenge?
Amuneal, a local Philadelphia manufacturer, entered into a partnership with us to help the company become more transparent, productive and cohesive. The original design challenge was to help the CEO / Owner, design business solutions to the things that kept him awake at night. Many companies have had to struggle in this harsh economic climate and Amuneal was no different, so our designs had to be simple, quick, and effective timesavers.
What did we design?
In the case of Amuneal how they conducted meetings and the lack of understanding of their process stood out as a great entry points for enacting rapid design change. We designed Role cards for everyone to use during meetings, which gave them a very specific role to play: devils advocate, white elephant, navigator, etc. The individuals were then asked to simply play the role they had in each meeting. To address the process confusion, we worked with employees to develop a low cost touch screen project management program.
What was the dynamic behind the design?
By designing meeting role cards, individual anxieties over responsibilities and purpose were managed. This allowed the group to collectively concentrate on the task at hand. Secondly, inherent to human nature, play is often used as a method for decreasing anxiety associated with authority dependence in groups. Therefore, playing roles within the meetings presented individuals with a way to decrease anxieties, which they were all to happy to use. The Tactile Dashboard program acted as a cognitive tool, simplifying understanding of the process and the touch screen pushed employees to physically interact and open a dialogue with each other. By changing the dynamic, employees began having rich conversations about the process and they began to see opportunities for innovation.
Designing A Better Way To Talk About Finances
What was the challenge?
AHow can designers help the CFO of a 60 million dollar non-profit university communicate institutional health to a faculty of artists, dancers, musicians, and designers? That was the question Bill Mea, CFO of The University of The Arts challenged us with in our first meeting. He wanted us to help him design a better language with which to communicate tough important financial news. However, through our research and interviews with the Faculty Council, we found that it was not simply an issue of visuals, as Bill had originally thought, but also an issue of verbal psychology.
What did we design?
InHonoring our original design challenge, we developed several iterations of a new financial presentation, each time editing and adjusting to incorporate the interests of both groups. Simultaneously, we designed a game aimed at bringing both groups together to find a collective purpose. We were confidant that if they could find a collective purpose, they would be more focused on addressing the most pressing concerns of each group.
What was the dynamic behind the design?
By designing a collective purpose game, we were able to reduce the anxiety that had been preventing both groups from meeting to discuss finances. Additionally, we were able to help them visualize that they actually agreed on 93% of their individual concerns. This reduction in anxiety allowed them to focus on key issues, overcome psychological roadblocks, and begin creating an effective dialogue.
A strategic guide to post-disciplinary design
What was the challenge?
Get 60 Philadelphia grads and undergrads, across three different disciplines, to take a six-week curricular detour, focused on tackling five very complex problems. We did just that by asking students, what would happen if we took a page from a few successful design firms in the world, and explored intra-disciplinary collaboration. By its very nature, the process of developing and designing these complex solutions draws upon numerous fields of expertise and points of view. These solutions require design teams to gather and synthesize information from a wide array sources and to explore multiple strategies and outcomes.
What did we design?
For most of the students this was a completely new way of working and as such came with some new challenges to their design process. To address these challenges, we designed a complete six-week curriculum along with a Strategy Toolkit and a StudioNEXT Manual to help the students orient themselves and work as a group to navigate this new collaborative environment.
What was the dynamic behind the design?
With StudioNext we hoped to prepare students to thrive and create by introducing them collaborative a intra-disciplinary environment. StudioNext did not aim to provide students with a road map to success that could be rigorously followed time and time again. Any such effort would be doomed from the outset, as no two challenges, projects, or design teams are identical. Instead, what was offered in this design laboratory was the opportunity to develop a set of collaborative tools that can be drawn upon, altered, re-implemented and expanded over the course of a designers entire career to meet ever-changing challenges.
