Archives
The healing power of curiosity
Posted on July 9, 2016
It has been a heavy few weeks in the world. In times like this we often raise our voice to speak when perhaps we ought to listen more, for it is in listening and asking questions that we may be better positioned not only to understand what’s happening around us, but resist having these events […]
Decoding the change genome
Posted on April 12, 2016 3 Comments
Would we invest in something if we had little hard data to suggest what we could expect to gain from that investment? This is often the case with social programs, yet its a domain that has resisted the kind of data-driven approaches to investment that we’ve seen in other sectors and one theory is that we […]
Systems thinking and the simple plan
Posted on January 12, 2016
Planning is something that is done all the time, but the shape in which these plans unfold is often complex in hidden ways. Without the same resources to evaluate those plans (and make different ones should they change) many organizations are left with great expectations that don’t match the reality of what they do (and can […]
Isolation: The New Innovator’s Dilemma
Posted on March 27, 2014
Innovators transform the world around them in big and small ways and while a successful effort can be lauded by pundits, politicians and the public there is a long road to making change happen. That road is also a lonely one and doing things different means more than just innovating and experiencing what it means to be […]
Sane truths in Crazy Town: What Rob Ford’s story offers politics, science and journalism
Posted on February 17, 2014
A new book about Toronto’s (in)famous mayor reveals a great deal more than just a story of man known more for what he smokes and says than his governance, to what kind of world we want to live in. Robyn Doolittle’s ‘Crazy Town’ goes well beyond documenting one man’s troubling behaviour and its place in […]
Public Health and Social Media: Catching Fire From Small Sparks
Posted on July 24, 2013 4 Comments
Public health is regrettably not a field that I often think of when I consider powerful examples of using social media for change and impact, but every so often something changes that. Monday something changed. Toronto Public Health, one of the largest health units of its kind in North America, took to Twitter to voice […]
Design / Time
Posted on July 11, 2013 2 Comments
Design’s relationship with space is complex and well documented in the literature on architecture, interior design, and product innovation. The relationship with time is much more complicated particularly with the rise in popularity of the concept of design thinking. The discourse on design thinking largely focuses on applying the cognitive patterns and creative techniques more […]
A Flood of Complexity
Posted on July 9, 2013 2 Comments
Yesterday Toronto was hit with a massive rainstorm that dumped more than 120mm of rain on parts of the city within the span of five hours knocking out power to more than 300,000 people, stranding thousands more, and even prompting a rescue of hundreds trapped on a commuter train out of the city by the […]
How Serious Are We About Learning?
Posted on July 26, 2012 6 Comments
When journalist and book author Daniel Pink tweeted the above image the other day it provoked thinking about what real learning means and what it takes to achieve it. We produce enormous amounts of knowledge, yet struggle to put it into use, but we also teach much and learn little because the systems we’ve designed […]
The Lies Told By Innovation
Posted on May 11, 2011
If the forest and trees are part of the natural environment, then we need to consider them both at the same time — literally and metaphorically — in the systems we work in and do so with intent (design) otherwise we will continue to perpetuate the lies that innovation allows us to tell ourselves so well.
