culture

Unlocking Organizational Change: Learning from the Cultural Phenomenon of Dutch Cycling

design, education & learning, evaluation / By

The famous Dutch cycling culture didn’t always exist; it was designed. A look at how this came to pass can help us to understand what it means to transform culture and keep it healthy. There are lessons to be learned whether you’re building a bike culture or transforming your organization. If you think of life …

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Taking Ideas Into Sustainable Innovation

evaluation, innovation, toolkit / By

One bright idea is pretty but a collection of ideas put into practice over time, sustainably, is beautiful (and real innovation). Sustainable innovation — a process, practice, and culture of design-driven creativity — might be the most valuable outcome for any organization. Real, sustained innovation is not about creating a single item — product, service, policy …

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Culture and heritage: Social systems in four dimensions

systems thinking, Uncategorized / By

International sporting events like the World Cup and the Olympics provide intriguing examples of the complexity and situated-nature of culture and heritage as people from all walks of life reveal, (re) create, adopt and adapt to some form of unique and shared identity, even if temporarily. This situated-ness is what illustrates one of the most substantial …

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Benchmarking change

evaluation, innovation / By

The quest for excellence within social programs relies on knowing what excellence means and how programs compare against others. Benchmarks can enable us to compare one program to another if we have quality comparators and an evaluation culture to generate them – something we currently lack.  A benchmark is something used by surveyors to provide a …

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Social innovation, social inclusion

education & learning, innovation, systems thinking / By

Social innovation is about bringing new ideas, products and services out into society with others for social benefit and improving the lives of our communities. While not every innovation will benefit everyone, there is a need to examine more deeply the question of who benefits(?) when we consider social innovation and that means taking some …

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Integrative Thinking And Empathy in Systems

design, education & learning, systems thinking / By

Award-winning Canadian author and University of Toronto professor David Gilmour came under social/media fire for comments made about his stance of only including male, middle-aged writers in his list of readings for his undergraduate English courses because that is the experience he resonates with most. Drawing on what you know is both wise and foolish when looking at it from the perspective of systems change and by looking within and beyond our own boundaries we can see how.

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