Welcome to the Censemaking Methods Series where today we look at how to apply principles to guiding evaluation and strategy. This builds on our previous lessons on Principles-Focused Evaluation and the building blocks that underpin the approach. What are principles and why do they matter? Principles are anchors between values and strategy that allow for decision-making […]
Using Principles To Frame Strategy and Evaluation Read More »
Persistent, dramatic changes are taking place that influence our work, communities, and personal lives and understanding what it means to learn, respond, and succeed will take changes in how we evaluate it all. A key feature of change in a complex system is that once its shifted, it never goes back; there’s no ‘undoing’ what’s
Whole System Learning and Evaluation Read More »
Seth Godin’s recently published book, The Song of Significance, looks at how we organize our work and the message is profound if we’re ready to hear the song. I’ve written about Seth Godin many times in this space. Seth has written about the issues of work and education and making a difference in thousands of
Significance and Making a Difference Read More »
More data does not always bring deeper insights, and the confusion between having good information, making a good decision, and taking the best action creates more folly than foresight. A strategy is a narrative about what you do, how you (intend to) do it, and what you expect to accomplish. Analytics are a way to
The Folly of Analytics in Strategy Read More »
What if we learned lessons from how people live a long and healthy life and applied it to social innovation? Could we create blue zones of social innovation and learn from them to create more sustainable, adaptive communities of learning and innovation?
Blue Zones of Social Innovation Read More »
We can think of organizations as part of systems or ecologies, but what does it mean to make them fit for humans? Today, we look at the psychology and design of organizations for humans. An organization is much more than a group of people working together; it’s a system. The whole — the organization —
Humans and their Organizations: A Psychological Design Perspective Read More »
A new term has been circulating in policy circles that reflects a changing way of viewing conflict, crisis, and complexity: polycrisis. Let’s look at what it might mean for people looking to plan, evaluate, and act in a world filled with turmoil. Polycrisis is not a term that inspires much hope. I’m not one for
What’s in a Polycrisis? Read More »
In my previous post, I wrote about using metrics that are as much about reflecting width (joy, quality) as length (longevity, quantitative performance). In this post, I look at how that applies to organizations. I’ve encountered relatively few organizations that are driven — if they are being honest — by quality, depth, and richness as
Becoming A Strategically Wide Organization Read More »
Two simple words can make the difference between seeing something that just “is” to something that could be almost anything we want. Noema Magazine recently published an article from Yakov Feygin and Nils Gilman entitled The Designer Economy. Feygin and Gilman are not traditional designers looking at products and services, they are business writers and
Putting Designer In Front of Words Read More »
Strategic Design is about applying design principles, methods, tools, and approaches to shaping an enterprise. How might we use this to connect our purpose with our actions? Strategic Design is a newer area of practice within the field of design. It’s basically taking what we know about Design and applying it to ourselves: our organizations,
Using Strategic Design for Change Read More »
