Abstract
This paper identifies a key mechanism and its constituent qualities, for facilitating mutual understandings of risk. The focus of participatory workshops has expanded towards addressing broader questions of strategy, business models and other organizational and inter-organisational issues. To develop effective partnerships across the boundaries separating companies, it is necessary for those involved to gain mutual understandings despite the challenging paradoxical, abstract and sensitive aspects of discussing risks. A richer understanding of design facilitation practice is offered through drawing together the following experimentation with industrialists in innovation workshops and interactive interventions in artistic cultural venues: 1) a large revolving door sculpture – Blender. 2) a series of interventions utilising audiovisual transmissions to enable one person to act as a proxy for absent others, 4) a table top tool kits for discussing business relationship issues and 5) a number of bespoke interactive sculpture-like artifacts for provoking insights concerning business dilemmas. Analysis of the cases reveals an underlying theme of breakdowns or ruptures as central to facilitating mutual understandings of risk. Such breakdowns are shown to be made of, and valuable due to two main qualities: co-created facilitation and perspective plurality.
Keywords
Risk; Facilitation; Participatory Design; Participatory Innovation
Citation
Mitchell, R. (2014) Co-created Facilitation and Perspective Plurality to Foster Mutual Understandings of Risk, in Lim, Y., Niedderer, K., Redström, J., Stolterman, E. and Valtonen, A. (eds.), Design's Big Debates - DRS International Conference 2014, 16-19 June, Umeå, Sweden. https://dl.designresearchsociety.org/drs-conference-papers/drs2014/researchpapers/64
Co-created Facilitation and Perspective Plurality to Foster Mutual Understandings of Risk
This paper identifies a key mechanism and its constituent qualities, for facilitating mutual understandings of risk. The focus of participatory workshops has expanded towards addressing broader questions of strategy, business models and other organizational and inter-organisational issues. To develop effective partnerships across the boundaries separating companies, it is necessary for those involved to gain mutual understandings despite the challenging paradoxical, abstract and sensitive aspects of discussing risks. A richer understanding of design facilitation practice is offered through drawing together the following experimentation with industrialists in innovation workshops and interactive interventions in artistic cultural venues: 1) a large revolving door sculpture – Blender. 2) a series of interventions utilising audiovisual transmissions to enable one person to act as a proxy for absent others, 4) a table top tool kits for discussing business relationship issues and 5) a number of bespoke interactive sculpture-like artifacts for provoking insights concerning business dilemmas. Analysis of the cases reveals an underlying theme of breakdowns or ruptures as central to facilitating mutual understandings of risk. Such breakdowns are shown to be made of, and valuable due to two main qualities: co-created facilitation and perspective plurality.