Our Toolkit
These are the main practices and methods we work with. Depending on the context and need, we adapt and blend the following patterns and methods (in alphabetical order):
Action Research: Action research is a term which refers to a practical way of looking at your own work to check that it is as you would like it to be. Because action research is done by you, the practitioner, it is often referred to as practitioner based research; and because it involves you thinking about and reflecting on your work, it can also be called a form of self-reflective practice. See also action research booklet
Appreciative Inquiry: Appreciative Inquiry is about the co-evolutionary search for the best in people, their organisations, and the relevant world around them. In its broadest focus, it involves systematic discovery of what gives “life” to a living system when it is most alive, most effective, and most constructively capable in economic, ecological, and human terms.
Chaordic Design: chaordic is a term that blends characteristics of chaos and order. The term was coined by Dee Hock the founder and former CEO of the VISA credit card association. The mix of chaos and order is often described as a harmonious coexistence displaying characteristics of both, with neither chaotic nor ordered behavior dominating. Some hold that nature is largely organized in such a manner; in particular, living organisms and the evolutionary process by which they arose are often described as chaordic in nature. The chaordic principles have also been used as guidelines for creating human organizations — business, nonprofit, government and hybrids — that would be neither centralized nor anarchical networks.
Circle Practice: Circle Practice is a highly adaptable modern form of generative dialogue which has existed throughout time as a form of gathering. Because circle is universal, it is familiar and easily learned; challenges current status quo and brings a natural sense of coherence to groups.
Dialogue Interviews: Dialogue interviews are intended to engage the interviewee in a reflective and generative conversation. This form of interview builds deep relationships, builds your emphatic skills and can give you a deeper understanding of the system you are investigating. It can be used to prepare for projects, workshops, or capacity building programs.
Experiential Learning: Is the process of making meaning from direct experience. Experiential learning plays an important role in helping particpants shift perspectives and access different intelligences.
Learning Journeys: Learning or Sensing Journeys are a way of experiencing the system through the lens of different stakeholders. Together with other members/users of the system, participants will undertake small journeys to different places in that system, to gain new perspectives and insights.
Lego Serious Play: LEGO SERIOUS PLAY™ is an innovative, experiential process designed to enhance innovation and business performance. Based on research that shows that this kind of hands-on, minds-on learning produces a deeper, more meaningful understanding of the world and its possibilities, Lego serious play deepens the reflection process and supports an effective dialogue – for everyone in the organization.
Open Space: Open Space Technology is a simple way to run productive meetings, for five to 2000+ people, and a powerful way to lead any kind of organisation, in everyday practice and extraordinary change.
Rapid Prototyping: Prototyping means to create a landing strip for the future you want to create, and to build something that allows you to explore an emerging idea or concept by doing something. Prototypes are an early draft of what the final result might look like. Prototyping often goes through several iterations based on the feedback that you generate from other stakeholders.
The 8 breaths of design: Over the years many facilitators / hosts saw their work with different (larger scale) initiatives as a follow-up of different ‘breaths’, different phases of divergence and convergence. The 8 breaths model is a tool to navigate the complex landscape of multi-stakeholder engagement and collaborative innovation.
U-process: The U-Process is a methodology for addressing highly complex challenges— for solving complex problems or realizing complex opportunities. It is a “social technology” and a process design pattern for effecting the transformation of reality, within and across the worlds of business, government, and civil society.
World Café: As a conversational approach, the World Café is an innovative yet simple methodology for hosting conversations about questions that matter. These conversations link and build on each other as people move between groups, cross-pollinate ideas, and discover new insights into the questions or issues that are most important in their life, work, or community. As a process, the World Café can evoke and make visible the collective intelligence of any group, thus increasing people’s capacity for effective action in pursuit of common aims.