Learn.Implement.Innovate
Client:
Treasury Board of Canada
Role:
Design Strategist
This project was done as a participation entry in a design sprint organized by the Government of Canada (GC) Experimentation Team housed in the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat (TBS).
The GC team wanted to emphasize developing strategies that would foster a culture of experimentation and innovation amongst the executives across the hierarchy of TBS.
Along with my three team members, we developed a program for these executives to train them and enable them to use experimental methods in their day-to-day operations.
​
Duration: 3 weeks
The challenge
How can we engage and support executives on experimentation in a way that resonates and is useful for them?
Our process
We carefully observed the information shared with us and perceived that innovation practices and experimentation were regarded as the subordinate approaches to solving issues.
Based on our three key insights, and with a circular, ever-evolving method, we designed a program that works as an intervention for the executives from day one into the service until retirement.
Confidence
to try
Acceptance
of failure
Need
for agility
Our take on challenge statement
How might we bring in 'experimentation' as an approach to work in the day-to-day lives of executives?
Ideation
Based on the age groups, we perceive three categories of executives and analyzed their mindsets and daily challenges.
25-34 yrs
Campaigner
Challenge: Has a lot of ideas but does not know how to implement
Mindset: Wants to make impactful change and is open to embracing failure
35-49 yrs
Logician
Challenge: Confused on their risk taking capabilities
​Mindset: Open to learning new things with some training
50+ yrs
Leader
Challenge: Needs time to resonate with new ideas
Mindset: Stringent in terms of change and follows conventional methods
Proposed solution
We designed the activities in the program in a way that can be implemented across all the age groups of the executives. A four-week program was detailed out for the youngest category of the executives, later parts of which can also be implemented across the higher categories.
By the end of this program we aimed to inculcate an understanding of the process and its challenges, methods of identifying and implementing solutions and the value of experimentation.
Our inferences
We believe it is vital for people to come together and work towards experimentation. Fusing the three, the role of the leader is more observatory in nature, and the logicians come in to observe and reflect. The campaigners, on the other hand, focus on all three steps, observe, reflect, and implement. This process of experimentation, circular in nature, is, therefore, constantly evolving the people and the process itself.
Ideally, the program can also be crafted in a way that this fusion enables cross-learning for all.