UNLEASH - https://unleash.org/
It was... intense!!
The ‘Lab’ gathers approximately 1000 ‘Talents’ from around the world (this year 108 countries) to work together to co-create solutions that address the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). During the 5 days, teams are formed around common thematic interests, then go through a facilitated innovation process of problem framing, ideation, prototyping and testing. On-site hours are 8AM to 9PM but of course teams stay and go on way after midnight, and facilitators also try to be there to support. On Day 6 all teams pitched to juries and peers, and winning teams will be selected, but the competition part is not that important in this case- the experiencing of the entire process in a very condensed time schedule, with teams of wide variety, is the most important part.
Problem framing cont at #UnleashLab2018 urban cooling, rural energy, valorizing ecology... how will they evolve? #ClimateAction #SDGs pic.twitter.com/jOvI3RxsO4— Reina Otsuka (@reinaotsuka) 2018年6月2日
I was privileged to be one of the 160+ facilitators consisted of innovation staff of partnering organizations and professional facilitators. This was great experience, facilitating the first few steps of team formulation and setting the direction, then supporting the energetic and engaged teams to move through the unusual processes. It is truly rewarding to witness really innovative Aha moments and see new ideas taking shape. Also, even the facilitators work in a team of around 10, diverse in terms of background, profession and nationality. I think I was very lucky to be in the SDG #13 Climate Action team, which was a very good mixture of professional facilitators and subject matter experts, all with rich experience and wonderful personalities. I even got to hold a SDGs Quiz session with UN colleagues in the facilitator team :-)
I wanted to share a few thoughts and learning from this experience.
Problem framing is key, even when we aim for innovation
Some people may have the impression that ‘innovation’ is something that is merely based on a ‘good idea’, or do things drastically differently by trashing the business-as-usual, or simply starting from a new invention. But that is not always the case. In fact, understanding the problem, its root cause, and framing the problem in a unique and user-centered way, is key to coming up with any kind of solution. During UNLEASH, common innovation methodologies such as design thinking, human centered design and lean start-up concepts are combined with more traditional problem framing or the Theory of Change. The importance and difficulty of problem framing was visibly shown, as the teams struggled through the problem framing phase for over 3 days of the given time, and whizzed through the remaining steps in 1-2 days. And when the problem framing was obviously not that great, the solution that came out was never that great.
‘If I had an hour to solve a problem, I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes thinking about solutions.’ – Albert Einstein
The power of diversity
As numerous studies have shown already (eg. 'How Diversity can Drive Innovation'), diversity of the team members are key to creativity. Diversity can be nationality, social or occupational difference, personalities, gender etc. Facilitators tried to combine talents with similar interests but with different background and / or self-declared personal traits (eg. Strategic vs entrepreneur). This created much tension and struggles within teams, as not everybody is used to working in diverse teams. However, the more different views you can throw on the table, and with a good amount of struggle, the higher the level of ideas seemed to be. This comes of course with the caveat that some teams had to compromise to reach an agreement, or a person with a big voice (or fluency in language) won. This is one thing a facilitator needs to be very aware and careful. We did see some incidents of conflict or discomfort within teams; which we tried our best to notice and resolve, but there are always blind spots.
The hidden but huge importance of facilitation
While the ideas were generated in the minds of the talents and attributed to the teams, it was a big learning that facilitators actually play a crucial role in moving the innovation process. There are different facilitation styles, but personally, even when facilitating on my subject matter area, I prefer to hold back my own opinion or advice, and rather provide examples or try to take a coaching approach. Giving feed back on logical caveat, pressing the teams to meet deadlines or standards, creating an inclusive atmosphere for brainstorming, and conflict resolution were some areas that I felt especially difficult to do when you are one of the team members, although of course not impossible (= facilitators are useful). Facilitation of the innovation process can be applied not only in workshops but in daily work. Having an innovation officer, or a team that can guide the process can bring results in a more systematic manner. It was again rewarding to interact with the teams, some of them who were very skeptic of the innovation methodology in the beginning, but in the end came up to me and said that he/she will use this for their own organizations!
So, all in all, it was great fun and a huge learning experience, and I cannot wait to try out some of the tools and frameworks I learned in my day job. I really hope that all the talents are also feeling that way, and can spread the innovation methodologies in their respective home organizations.
We need so much innovation to happen in order to achieve the SDGs!!!
