Operationalizing wicked problem solving to create desirable futures: the design agenda

1. Operationalizing wicked problem solving to create desirable futures: the design agenda Gavin Melles, Faculty of Design, Swinburne University, AustraliaStefan Holmlid, Computer Science Department, Linköping University, Sweden MattiasArvola, Computer Science Department Linköping University, Sweden

2. Multiple reasons to envision This year marks the 40th anniversary of the publication of “Dilemmas in a general theory of planning” (1973), a seminal paper in which Rittel and fellow planning professor Melvin Webber formally presented the thesis that numerous problems in planning, management, and policy-making are by nature wicked, and stand in sharp contrast to the problems of engineering and sciences. They identified 10 properties typical of wicked problems Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

3. 40 years ago today … • Indeterminacy in problem formulation • Non-definitiveness in problem solution • Non-solubility • Irreversible consequentiality • Individual uniqueness Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

4. Simon vs.Rittel & weber? Popular confusions and misunderstandings Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

5. Contingency, artefacts, and some other (economic) thoughts • Engineering, medicine, business, architecture, and painting are concerned not with the necessary but with the contingent not with how things are but with how they might be in short, with design • Artificial systems and adaptive systems have properties that make them particularly susceptible to simulation via simplified models. • We have usually thought of city planning as a means whereby the planner's creative activity could build a system that would satisfy the needs of a populace. Perhaps we should think of city planning as a valuable creative activity in which many members of a community can have the opportunity of participating if we have wits to organize the process that way. • Design for distant futures would be wholly impossible if remote events had to be envisioned in detail. What makes such design even conceivable is that we need to know or guess about the future only enough to guide the commitments we must make today. • We can view the matter quite symmetrically. An artifact can be thought of as a meeting point an "interface" in today's terms between an "inner" environment, the substance and organization of the artifact itself, and an ''outer" environment, the surroundings in which it operates. If the inner environment is appropriate to the outer environment, or vice versa, the artifact will serve its intended purpose. Thus, if the clock is immune to buffeting, it will serve as a ship's chronometer. • Feedback mechanisms, on the other hand, by continually responding to discrepancies between a system's actual and desired states, adapt it to long-range fluctuations in the environment without forecasting. In whatever directions the environment changes, the feedback adjustment tracks it, with of course some delay. • Thus the traditional definition of the professional's role is highly compatible with bounded rationality, which is most comfortable with problems having clear-cut and limited goals. But as knowledge grows, the role of the professional comes under questioning. Developments in technology give professionals the power to produce larger and broader effects at the same time that they become more clearly aware of the remote consequences of their prescriptions. Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

6. Problem In spite of its many achievements, however, working with wicked problems is still an evolving and, to a large extent, emerging enterprise in a stage of enlightenment. Much of its research and scholarship, as substantive as it may seem, remains largely a repetitive description of the social reality of wickedness, rather than well-grounded theoretical explorations or empirical investigations. The focus has been placed upon raising awareness, preaching for acceptance, and advocating creative adaptation strategies and innovative approaches. But little has been reported on exactly how these ideas and proposed approaches can be operationalized Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

7. Operationalising: Collaboration, visualisation, dialogue • How to get from principles to practice • Dialogue, collaboration and technology • Participation hinted at in Rittel & Weber • Central to social planning and the resolution of the human-centred problems of the artificial sciences Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

8. Case studies in urban spaces in Linkoping Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

9. Case 1: Project Background • New tools for health is an cluster based in East Sweden, the aim of which is to create new products and services that result in more efficient healthcare and increased independence – with the home as a base. In partnership with other stakeholders that support innovation, we support mobile solutions based on information and communication technology within four focus areas: patients with diabetes and heart failure, as well as fall prevention and to ensure that the elderly feel safe and socially included. The ideas may come from companies, innovators, researchers or employees in working in the care/healthcare sector. http://www.newtoolsforhealth.com/ Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

10. Focus on personas • A persona is an archetypical users based primarily on ethnographic studies of real users. A persona consists usually of a couple of pages of description of demographics, behavioural patterns, goals, abilities, attitudes and environments, as well as personal details that are included to make the persona come to life. It is also given a name to make it easy to refer to and envision as a real person. (Blomquist & Arvola, 2002; Cooper, 1999; Pruitt & Adlin, 2006) Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

11. (participatory) Design Process • Postcards • Dialogues around maps • Group interviews • Informal observations and interviews • Walking quiz • Personas and scenarios Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

12. Mapping what is • There is nothing wrong with the memory so far. Then it's worse with night vision. Torsten works out regularly together with some friends. He has seen some old people who were alone and stopped eating properly. Anna, his wife, is feeling much better now than before when she was in great pain. She relies less on the walker now. There is luckily an elevator in the house. • Torsten want contact with government officials, pharmacy or doctor in person. Phone is all right, but it's better to meet them. He says: ”As long as I can go to a pharmacy and I will do you so.” Since Anna became ill, the apartment is full of assistive equipment, and it occasionally goes wrong when using it. • They live in a rental apartment of 72 square meters, two rooms and a kitchen. The area is good but it feels a little less safe than it did before. • Torsten has a cell phone. The first one he got from one of the sons who would buy a new one. He is not so interested in trying out services supported by mobile phone or computer. Actually, he doesn’t have a computer. Torsten understands well how mechanical engineering works, but the new technology is more difficult. He uses a manual when he will learn something, or he wants to be told face-to-face how new things work. Sometimes he gets help from the children. It is worrying if the technology makes direct human contact decrease. Figure 1. Torsten, senior gentleman, born 1926 and married to Anna [Illustrator: Stefan Nygard] Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

13. Problematic day scenarios • Figure 2. Tough job. Åke comes to hel Anna up and says, ”God morining!” ”Oh, who are you?, she replays. Åke thinks, ”these things always work differently”. ”Ouch, my arm!”, Anna says as Åke helps her up. ”oops,” he thinks, ”I didn’t know she had a sore arm”. ”My name is Anna”, Anna says. ”Too bad I don’t have time to get to know them better, but... what now?”, Åke thinks as Annas husband Toersten comes into the room and shouts, ”Hey you! Who are you?” Åke helps Anna into her wheelchair and Torsten asks: ”You are not a thief are you?” Åke thinks to himself: ”Oh, this is tough. I’m just doing my job.” As he walks out he says to himself, Fifteen minutes late and getting shouted at. This doesn’t feel good...” [Illustrator: Stefan Nygard] Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

14. Insecurity in the local park • Depicting fear and anxiety of local environments • Generating considerations for technology interventions Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

15. tOwards what should be • Figure 3. Who gives care? Translation: Åke goes to work and places the mobile device in the ”who gives care” holder. He is careful with Anna’s injured arm, since the mobile device has informed him of a note from an earlier care giver: ”OBSERVE: - The arm is sprained. - The husband’s name is Torsten. Talk to him!” Meanwhile, Åke is introduced to Torsten, who thinks that he seems rather nice. The work is completed on time and Torsten says: ”See you!” Yeah, have a nice day!, Åke replays. [Illustrator: Stefan Nygard.] Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

16. summary • Desireable futures and wicked problem solving a common agenda • Positions are falseley dichotomized and misunderstood especially in terms of the economic discourse and Deweyan pragmatism inherent in Simons work • Operationalising principles into practice involves range of techniques and methods, including familiar design tools, , which also build on bounded rationality, scenarios … • Collaboration, visualization, dialogue already familiar characteristics to design and integrate the broader stakeholders (local society, health practitioners) in problems • Personas generated through a range of methods inform scenarios of current and future use Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT

17. references • Ackoff, Russell, "Systems, Messes, and Interactive Planning" Portions of Chapters I and 2 of Redesigning the Future. New York/London: Wiley, 1974. • Camillus, J.C.; "Strategy as a Wicked Problem," Harvard Business Review, Vol. 86, 98-101 (2008). http://hbr.org/2008/05/strategy-as-a-wicked-problem/ar/1 • Conklin, Jeffrey (2006). Dialogue mapping : building shared understanding of wicked problems. Chichester, England: Wiley. ISBN0470017686. • Rittel, Horst W. J.; Melvin M. Webber (1973). "Dilemmas in a General Theory of Planning". Policy Sciences4: 155–169 • Levin, Kelly; Cashore, Benjamin; Bernstein, Steven; Auld, Graeme (23 May 2012). "Overcoming the tragedy of super wicked problems: constraining our future selves to ameliorate global climate change". Policy Sciences45 (2): 123–152 • "Tackling Wicked Problems: A Public Policy Perspective". Australian Public Service Commission. 25 October 2007. Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies, AUT