Teaching Innovation in Government

ShiftFlow’s Principal Consultant Nick Scott reflects on his time working in the Government of New Brunswick and the attempts to provide experiential learning to fellow public servants.

Each month in the Government of New Brunswick (GNB), public servants convened in a colourful, street-level, open work environment with plenty of wall space and whiteboard surfaces. They met for the regular Public Innovation 101 workshop.

The space and workshop didn't have the look or feel of a typical government meeting. Participants sat in a circle, and each shared something about themselves (What is their superpower? Why did they become public servants? What motivates them to excel in their work?). This was part of the first lesson: innovation can be uncomfortable and unfamiliar by nature, requiring that we bring our whole selves on the journey. Public Innovation 101 aimed to nurture innovative mindsets.

After six Public Innovation 101 workshops, the GNB’s Innovation and Design Services unit hosted the first Public Innovation 201 workshop: exploring innovation tools and techniques. In 201, we developed innovation literacy by understanding the concept, sharing examples, and engaging with theories of strategic innovation in a public sector context.

In our initial experiment testing out the delivery model, we used an existing policy challenge and ran it through a one day workshop - a condensed design sprint.

This is how we did it - from pre-work to journey mapping to closing circles and everything in between (with templates by Alex Matson).

Pre-Work

Collaborating with our colleagues in social development, we created five fictional personas, corresponding empathy maps, and a problem statement based on their experiences.

*We used this template to capture fictional profiles of end-users and stakeholders in order to ground their work in a human experience.*

*We used this template to get participants started in empathizing with end-users and stakeholders.*

*We used this template to help get participants started thinking through the problem they are trying to solve.*

Welcome, Framing, Flow

As with all our workshops we started in-circle with a land acknowledgement, emphasizing the importance of our work as public servants and the dangers of only taking an institutional point of view. We then used Theory U, Breath Pattern, and Design Thinking to illustrate the framing and flow of the day.

Team Formation

Next, we invited participants to pull an animal name out of a hat and asked that they make the sound of that animal to identify their team members (gotta stretch that comfort zone!). This light-hearted activity transitioned to team/table work, where we reflected on the need for psychological safety and team agreements.

Challenge Brief

We then invited our social development colleague to present the challenge and user personas that had been developed beforehand. Participants asked framing questions to deepen their understanding of the problem.

*This template was adapted from an Open North report*

Journey Mapping

After being briefed by our social development colleague, participants were led through a journey mapping exercise.

Re-framing the problem

With journeys mapped out and opportunities identified, participants were invited to reframe the problem from different points of view: Institutional, User/Citizen, and System. We discussed the common mistakes in problem framing and the importance of getting the right question before brainstorming ideas.

We ran a quick exercise to illustrate this.

We asked participants first to draw a vase. After some sharing, we then asked them to draw the best way to experience flowers. This UX exercise helps to illustrate the value of experience focused inquiry versus task/product focused inquiry, and the importance of asking the right questions.

We then invited participants to reflect on the morning’s insights and re-frame the problem from the point of view of their chosen persona.

Brainstorming

Three brainstorming activities followed: structured, semi-structured, and unstructured.

*A semi-structured exercise whereby team members build off the ideas of their colleagues*

This map guides teams through a discussion about the ideas they have generated before inviting them to do some traditional popcorn-style brainstorming. Is the idea familiar (status quo) or is it something we have not seen before (novel)? Will the idea address a symptom or address a root cause?

Prototyping & Testing

Teams were then asked to select an idea or combination of ideas for development and testing. After a brief lesson on prototyping using Back to the Future’s self-lacing shoe to illustrate Desirability, Feasibility, Viability, and Impact, participants were invited to build a table-top prototype.

*Teams first captured their selected idea in this template.*

*Then we taught DFV-I before they built their prototype*

*Then in turn each team presented their prototype for one minute and our colleagues provided feedback in the form of a question.*

Closing Circle

At the end of each session, participants completed a Menti survey, providing feedback. Menti’s interactive nature helped facilitate a closing circle/debrief.

In one day, we were able to provide an experience to our colleagues that showed how the tools and techniques could be applied to their work. It revealed how little time, space, or practice is devoted to thinking about the people most impacted by public policies, programs, and services. Not only that, but how difficult it is to do. It can be an emotionally heavy lift thinking about and empathizing with end-users.

It was deeply fulfilling to make space for public servants to think about and empathize with the people most impacted by their work.

You can access the beta of our workbook here.

What reflections, experience or feedback do you have on the tools and techniques we used? Have you gone through a similar experience? We’d love to hear from you.