Background Information

This is the 21st century, in which the human impact on the world is moving and changing faster than our capacity to grasp it and deal with the scale and complexity of the challenges. An increasingly globalised world means that the interconnectivity and interdependence of human systems functions within other complex systems, across traditional barriers of time and space.

Social and economic systems continue to operate with modes of thinking and practice developed in simpler days for more manageable challenges. Coping with and addressing the challenges of complex systems is a new and uncharted terrain, raising tough questions about our current societal capacities in the fields of governance, economy, natural resources, climate change energy, sustainability, health and well-being.

There are no quick and easy answers to the challenges we face if we want our planet to sustain and provide for the generations of tomorrow. Our existing methods of problem solving, participation and governance are increasingly redundant. Traditional notions of identity, morality, culture, security and society are unravelling as the increasing crisis in social systems asks more and more questions of us. Where we are now can be seen as a conceptual emergency and the time is ripe for new modes of thinking and paradigms for acting.

Complexity

There are three types of complexity; Dynamic complexity: cause and effect distant in time and space, Social complexity: diverse stakeholders with different agendas and worldviews, and Generative complexity: emergent realities wherein solutions from the past no longer fit.

These three types of complexity are often at the root of organisations’ and societies’ toughest challenges. When faced with such complexity the very concept of “problem solving” can be part of the problem. Often it can lead us to think of fixing something that is broken, imposing “solutions” from the past that will only reproduce the challenge. These issues need not arise if we view problem solving as part of a larger process of creativity, innovation and participation amongst diverse and often divergent parts. A change lab will address complex problems in three ways:

  1. Dynamically: Cause and effect are far apart in space and time, resulting in the need for a systemic approach.
  2. Socially: No single entity owns the problem and the stakeholders involved have diverse perspectives and interests, often entrenched and antagonistic. This creates the need for a participative approach.
  3. Generatively: The future is unfamiliar and undetermined, and traditional solutions aren’t working which results in the need for creative approaches.

While there is much to celebrate in terms of the numbers of people involved in change initiatives, in the increasing amounts of money being invested and daily innovations in what could be called alleviation, the underlying trends continue to deteriorate. Social fabrics are increasingly strained under loads they were never intended to contain. Both scrutiny and demands for action are increasing. In the face of increasing injustice, direct-action has either become a strident call for someone else to take action or the frantic alleviation of symptoms that leave underlying causes largely intact. Meanwhile there is increasing pressure on individuals to change their behaviour, particularly around environmental issues, in what the sociologist Ulrich Beck describes as an attempt to find “individual solutions to systemic contradictions.” Project and planning-based approaches, favoured by governments, corporations and large non-governmental organisations, though familiar, are entirely inadequate in the contemporary context.

Systems Thinking

Systems thinking helps us address complex issues, particularly those that depend a great deal on the past or on the actions of others, and those stemming from ineffective coordination among those involved.

Complex challenges require us to move from reacting to different levels of response. Reacting is a common and often practical method of responding to a challenge. Systems thinkers have suggested that in a given situation there are multiple levels that can be responded to. These levels can be broadly grouped into events, patterns and structures. Often we limit our response to events: who did what to who when. But this level does not address the underlying causes that led to the event’s occurrence. Many management systems focus solely on this domain. Analysis at the level of patterns prompts a response to longer-term trends: if we respond to a pattern, we move away from reaction and towards a more measured response. Structure is the level that poses the question: ‘What is causing these behaviours, trends and events?’ If we can move towards understanding the structure of a complex problem, then there is the opportunity to change the underlying cause or causes of a given problem. Responses to complex challenges that address structural causes are creative; they begin to reproduce themselves. Unfortunately such approaches are rare, though they are desperately needed to confront the systemic challenges we face.

Systemic Change

Social challenges never have single owners. Systemic challenges never have single owners. Unsurprisingly, there is an immense amount of confusion about how we go about changing systems. We have never before needed to consciously change systems as complex and interconnected as the financial system, the global food system or the assemblage of behaviours that results in climate change. Each of these systems is characterised by traits that we have historically little experience with.

Dominant responses to complexity, particularly social complexity, often rely on strategic planning. How do we change a system? We create a strategic plan, and follow it. While there can be a place for planning, the notion that strategy comes only through planning, even in situations of great complexity, has been shown by researchers, academics, scholars and planners themselves to be questionable. How then in the face of deep rooted, high-risk situations should we set strategy? How should we decide what the best course of action is? What indeed does change itself look like within such contexts?

Prototyping

Innovation equals Initiative. The process of social prototyping involves an initial team of people coming together and growing, bringing in various stakeholders, “experts” and “problem-owners” who work together in partnership.

Prototyping as a method of problem solving requires a set of skills and attitudes that are very different to those demanded by traditional engineering and planning paradigms. These skills and attitudes require us, as individuals, teams and institutions, to both unlearn old patterns and learn new ways of engaging with the world. Successful social innovation is dependent on transformation at both a personal and institutional level.

What is social prototyping?

Social prototyping can be thought of as a process of design through trial and error conducted with transparency. The word “social” means that the process of trial and error must be conducted in partnership with the diverse stakeholders that are affected by any outcomes, so that those affected co-own processes that impact them. In order to successfully prototype, a team should ideally meet a particular set of criteria. The change lab offers a theory and set of practices that enables teams to meet the conditions necessary for successful prototyping. These include:

  1. A diverse team with an established practice of disciplined observation (called “Sensing” in the U-process) – which results in an appreciation and understanding of current reality.
  2. A diverse team with a shared intention and commitment (an outcome of the Presencing phase in the U-process.)
  3. An initial set of “seed” ideas which individuals within the team have energy for (also an outcome of the Presencing phase in the U-process).

Agile management

Drawing on lessons learnt from complex software development projects, agile management is a flexible project management methodology suited to action -learning initiatives. It provides the minimum structure required to effectively manage the social prototyping phase. Innovative prototypes are created in ‘agile cycles’ of between two weeks and one month. Within each cycle a subset of the project’s overall goals is selected and implemented, so that at the end of the cycle a workable prototype has been developed.

The U-Process

As a group process it is generates shared commitment and the collective insight needed to produce solutions to complex social problems. It is convened by one or more organisations that are committed to effecting change and are aware that they cannot solve the problem alone.

During a U-Process change initiative an individual or team undertakes three activities or movements:

Sensing the current reality of the system of which one is a part, carefully and in depth, by suspending judgement and redirecting one’s vantage point to that of the whole system.

Presencing by letting go of past expectations and agendas, and reflecting to access one’s “inner knowing” about what is going on and what one has to do.

Realising by acting swiftly to bring forth a new reality, through prototyping, piloting and institutionalising new behaviours, activities, or initiatives.

The Change Lab

The change lab is a space within which multiple and potentially divergent action-learning experiments can be launched in order to learn how best to shift increasingly inter-connected social challenges. The seeds of new relationships, cultures, ideas and new realities lie in this practice.

When is a change lab needed?

A change lab is a suggested intervention when no progress is being made on a given problem, for instance when a problem is characterised by high levels of complexity and uncertainty. For example, in the malnutrition change lab in India, the lab was proposed as a systemic response given that malnutrition rates were increasing, despite billions of dollars going into funding for projects to alleviate malnutrition. Therefore the change lab is appropriate for problems or challenges that are dynamically, generatively and socially complex.

What is the duration of a change lab?

A change lab can last months to years depending on the need and scale and scope of the problem and the design of the Lab. For complex challenges, the Labs are often designed to span over several years. The change lab may begin as a project, or series of facilitated workshops and develop into a multi-stakeholder institution. When the Lab is successful and the projects of the Lab are up and running addressing systemic challenges then the work of the Lab continues indefinitely. A mini lab is a 3-day workshop that can be used as an introduction to the change lab.

Who is involved?

The change lab is a multi-stakeholder process so all the owners of a given problem are invited to be involved. One or more organisations acts as a ‘convenor’ and invites members to attend, they are also responsible and accountable for the change lab. The convenors seek to bring together 35-60 stakeholders who come from different organisations from across a given system.

Evidence of Change

The change lab is not a project or a plan, but a space within which emergent processes can unfold and flow, where learning can take place and conflict is invited as an opportunity. As a space it is experimental and heuristic in nature, characterised by action-learning, driven by the purpose of discovering and growing the seeds of healthier, more resilient and more just social realities.

Child Malnutrition in India

Mumbai and other places in Maharashtra, India, 2004-6 Reos co-convened and co-led a three-month, full-time Change Lab that brought together Indian government officials, company managers, and non-governmental organisation leaders into the “Bhavishya (Future in Sanskrit) Alliance” to create innovations aimed at cutting in half India’s extraordinarily high level of child malnutrition.

Sustainable Food Lab

Vermont and other places in the United States, Europe and Latin America, 2004- Reos co-initiated and have provided process design, organisation and facilitation support to this large-scale Change Lab involving food system actors “from farm to fork” including business, government and civil society leaders from Europe, North America and Latin America aimed at creating living examples of mainstream sustainable food supply chains.

Leadership Network for Orphaned and Vulnerable Children in South Africa

Johannesburg, South Africa, 2007- Reos have co-initiated and are co-leading a multi-year project in South Africa to help improve quality and quantity of care for the increasing numbers of orphaned and vulnerable children. In November 2007 Reos ran the first “Innovation Lab” with 60 key national leaders working in this field from government, civil society, business, academic and medical institutions and donor organisations. This was the launch event of an ongoing leadership and innovation network working to build collaboration, leadership, systemic approaches, and innovation in this field.

HIV/AIDS Capacity-Building in South Africa

Alexandra Township, 2007 Reos led 30 members of this community outside of Johannesburg through a four-month process aiming to build their capacity for collaboration and improve their effectiveness as HIV/AIDS service providers. The process led to the creation of a new programme called “Lapa Latirisano” meaning “Home of Collaboration”, aimed at providing more holistic family care and support through collaboration across organisations.

Scenario Planning

Pierre Wack was the first leader of Shell’s scenario planning team in the early 1970s. But his work was not about predicting the future. He described his role as like leading a pack of wolves, scouting ahead and helping the pack get a better understanding of the landscape around them. He called this the gentle art of re-perceiving the present.

What is a scenario?

The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines a scenario as an “outline of the plot of a play, film, opera, etc. with details of scenes, situations, etc.” A scenario is also defined as a “postulated sequence of future events.” A scenario could be thought of as an internally-consistent hypothesis about the future, that is relevant, emergent, plausible and clear. These are all criterion for useful scenarios.

When are scenarios needed?

Scenarios are needed in several situations; when a given situation is highly complex, when there is a long term need to prepare for the future, when there is a high degree of uncertainty on what the future holds for a given system and when there are a range of diverse leaders/players that have an opportunity to act together.

What should we aim for from a scenario process?

In a scenario process we aim for a better and shared understanding of emerging reality which leads to broadened networks of trusting relationships, hence strengthened capacity and infrastructure for learning. The process also aims to regenerate energy, vision, commitment, and hope resulting in renewed action and momentum.

An example of scenarios in practice: Mont Fleur

Adam Kahane has described the experience of facilitating the Mont Fleur scenarios in his book Solving Tough Problems. In 1991 twenty two diverse and influential leaders were invited to come together to create scenarios about the future of South Africa. They discussed their different perspectives on the future of South Africa and over time produced four scenarios on the future of South Africa that they saw as most probable. These scenarios all centred around the question: How will the transition go, will the country succeed in taking off?

The scenarios have been viewed as a success. The perfect timing contributed to this, just before the transition to a democratic South Africa when there was much uncertainty about how to make the transition. Another factor was the buy-in from top levels of government and business and civil society. Also, amongst left and right groups, black and white, lasting relationships were built that was the basis of further collaboration and action. The political strategy built strongly on this work and the work informed the media, politics and civil society in the building of a new South Africa.

The Finance Lab

How will it work?

The Finance Lab will use ‘action-learning’ to help participants understand first-hand the challenges that exist in the current system, to change their views and behaviour and to support them in creating workable solutions to the problems they uncover.

We do not seek to pre-determine what those problems might be. However, by way of example our scenario planning workshops might uncover a ‘lack of understanding of financial concepts within the UK population’, a problem that would threaten a sustainable financial system in the future. To investigate this theme further we would set up meetings for participants in the main phase of the lab. One could involve, for example, sending a representative group from business, finance, government and civil society, to live with different families on a council estate for a few days to get to grips with their priorities, the issues that really face them and to see whether a lack of knowledge about finance is indeed an issue.

After going through a range of these experiences, the group would then be responsible for developing an initiative to tackle and start to resolve the issue of most concern to them. These initiatives will have to meet certain pre-determined criteria to gain access to an ‘innovation fund’, raised by the founding partners of the Finance Lab, which would finance their project. These projects would be prototypes of what a sustainable financial system could look like.