Transcript Slide 1

Sensemaker Software Suite
History never repeats
•We are living in a time of fundamental change - where sustainability requires
new ways of thinking about systems and communities in near real time
•The building blocks of the past will not necessarily provide a firm foundation for
the future. To survive and thrive in these complex timed requires us to
understand the landscape in which we live today - to make sense of the world
so we can act
•Complex times require a toolkit that allows us to:
•- manage high levels of uncertainty
•- understand intent in a rapidly changing environment
•- do more with less
- make decisions in inherently complex environments
- manage knowledge critical to the organisation
- evaluate impact of initiatives
•- make invisible issues visible
Some facts - Humans...
•
can
only
see
0.01%
of their
visual
range
inare
sharp
focus
at
one
time
will
only
ever
seen
approximately
5%
of previous
what
is available
see
the
world
asany
amemory
series
of
dots
based
experience
make
by
scanning
thousands
of
fragmented
patterns
stored
indecisions
long
term
applying
the
first
pattern
that
matches
pattern
recognition
intelligences
NOT
information
processing
devices
Source:
Theories
of
Visual
Perception
-and
Ian
E.
Gordon
Everything is Fragmented
• IF the world as a series of dots joined up on the basis of past
experience
• IF Humans are Pattern Recognition beings NOT Information
Processing machines......
How do we make sense of the world so we can act?
• Narrative and visual images are ways to convey complex
knowledge and ideas - a supplement to traditional ways of learning
and interpretation of our world
• Decision making occurs through the blending of fragmented
experiences gained through narrative and personal understanding
• Multiple fragments provide the basis for interpretation
Sensemaker Suite
A natural and intuitive approach to gaining multiple perspectives and new
insights into complex problems that have until now proved to be intractable for
both strategic management methods and software
Asymmetry
“There is no difference between a terrorist, a
citizen, an employee and a consumer - all
represent the problem of asymmetry in which an
organisation has to understand multiple
interactions and decision from large populations
which cannot be predicted or controlled by that
organisation.”
- Cognitive Edge
Sensemaker can provide a decision maker with the ability to “see the world”
through the eyes of their customer, their staff, their citizens or even their
enemies.
Survey & Interview limitations
Traditional surveys & interviews have limitations:
• the questions utilised for these techniques assume the validity of a
pre-existing hypothesis (it is virtually impossible to develop the survey
questions without a hypothesis)
• interviewees tend to provide neat (rationalised) answers when
asked for their opinions which normally doesn’t resemble their realworld experiences at all
• survey and interview questions provide minimal context—how many
times have you answered a survey and found yourself thinking: ‘It
depends…’?
• traditional survey techniques are too open to gaming or
manipulation to provide any value at all. If interesting patterns are
discovered, they often cannot be explained unless further research is
commissioned.
Sensemaker reduces the influence of “Experts”
Narrative fragments
Whose "increased selfishness"?? Litigators?? That will hinder many
volunteers, regardless of time, attitudes, and generations. Who can seriously
afford to be sued for any perceived wrong doing while do gooding?? Like
everything in our highly dynamic society today, volunteering attitudes and
experiences are shifting. Some more positive, some negative, and many
traditional volunteer beliefs and services need to mirror these changes to
move with the times to survive the times.
Who killed the Volunteer?
Sensemaker uses fragments to uncover patterns not readily visible
Narrative fragment collection
Photo
Paper survey
Anecdote Circles
You Tube
Voice recording
Websites
Physical object
Blog
Sensemaker enables narrative capture from many different sources
The “crux of the issue”- managing more with less
How often have you had to depend on others for
information from the “coal-face”?
Have you ever wondered about the validity of what
you hear?
How many people have filtered and interpreted issues
and actions before they reach you?
How do you know in a rapidly changing environment
that the data you are making decisions with is not
“yesterday’s news”?
Sensemaker can overcome issues of multiple entities divided into component
parts - by being your management dashboard - to make sense of what is
actually happening at the “coal face”
Management Dashboard - doing more with less
Sensemaker as a management dashboard - a decision support platform with
near real time data from the front lines - understanding the business in order
to act
Quantitative & Qualitative Data
Summary Statistics for graph: In this story people feel
they are -- Lacking choice X The people in this story
could be described as -- Old ways
But everything else is great..
Number of items: 36
~~~~~ X axis (In this story people feel they are -- Lacking
choice)
Mean: 68.6667
Median: 79.5
25th percentile: 36.25
75th percentile: 97.75
Standard deviation: 31.9616
Skewness: -0.6409 (skewed to the left)
Skewness standard error (SSE, sqrt(6/n)): 0.4082
Skewness Z score (skewness / SSE): -1.5699
Skewness indicates normal distribution (abs Z score < 2):
yes
If your lucky you'll get a competent
supervisor. If not you can end up with
someone who doesn't do their job but will
always appear to others that they are helpful
and hard working. They will take credit for
your hard work and even put their name to
it. They will quietly and without witnesses
bully you all the while justifying why they
need you to do as they say. If your not good
at dealing with this type of conflict you often
feel angry and frustrated.
Kurtosis: -1.1866 (platykurtic or heavier in the tails)
Standard error for kurtosis (KSE, sqrt(24/n)): 0.8165
Kurtosis Z score (Kurtosis / KSE): -1.4533
Kurtosis indicates normal distribution (abs Z score < 2):
yes
~~~~~ Y axis (The people in this story could be
described as -- Old ways)
Mean: 65.8056
Median: 79.0
25th percentile: 24.0
75th percentile: 99.0
Standard deviation: 33.0427
Skewness: -0.4929 (skewed to the left)
Skewness standard error (SSE, sqrt(6/n)): 0.4082
Skewness Z score (skewness / SSE): -1.2074
Skewness indicates normal distribution (abs Z score < 2):
yes
Kurtosis: -1.4432 (platykurtic or heavier in the tails)
Standard error for kurtosis (KSE, sqrt(24/n)): 0.8165
Kurtosis Z score (kurtosis / KSE): -1.7676
Kurtosis indicates normal distribution (abs Z score < 2):
yes
Restrictions
We're under staffed, under resourced, aging
demographic.
Correlation
Use parametric correlation test? yes
Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient: 0.4346
Pearson correlation significance: 0.0081
Significance threshold: 0.05
Correlation is significant? yes
Sensemaker provides hard and soft data for actionable results
Sensemaker project overview
Index and Instrument Design
•Workshop 1 - setting project boundaries - what do
you need to know (representative sample of target
group. Developing areas of focus
•Workshop 2 - refining Sensemaker instrument,
developing prompting questions & language
(Project team)
• Emerging Options facilitates workshops,
provides support for briefings and assistance
with scoping
• Technical advice re database if required
• Conducted by the project team, supported by
Testing the questions and indexing framework
• Testing Sensemaker instrument with sample
Finalise the database and complete data
collection
Emerging Options consultants
• Database configuration completed by
Cognitive Edge
Data Analysis & Report presentation
• Conducted by Emerging Options consultants
•Data analysis & preparation of presentation to
management
•Capture and share learning about the process
•Exploration of options for further activities and
applications
Sensemaker Distributed Research project overview
Preparation and Planning
•Briefing sessions with management team (s)
•Scoping projects
•Selection of Sponsor and Project team
• Consulting support for briefings and assistance
with scoping
• Technical advice re database if required
Training Workshop (2 Days)
•Cognitive Edge principles and framework
•Sensemaking database
•Developing prompting questions and indexing
Testing the questions and indexing framework
•Initial sample of people tested
• Training workshop with project teams from all
participating organisations
• Conducted by the project team, supported by
Emerging Options consultants
Finalise the database and complete data
collection
• Database configuration completed by Cognitive
Generate reports from the database
• Technical and consultant assistance for each
participating organisation
Edge
Final workshop (2 Days)
•Preparation of presentation to management
•Capture and share learning about the process
•Exploration of options for further acitivities and application
• Conducted by Emerging Options consultants
Skins can be constructed to reflect
organisation brand & image
Web capture instrument can be configured
with workflow to cater for targeting multiple
audiences
Participants are asked to relate their
anecdotes or experiences in response to a
“prompt”. This could be visual or written
Instrument can be configured to cater for
written word, audio files, video files, url’s
and pictures
Each experience is a fragment that can be
interrogated to understand patterns
existing in the respondent group
Drop down questions are used as lenses
through which patterns can be viewed
Responses are attached to each
anecdote - context is captured with each
entry
Expert interpretation of respondent
experiences is removed at point of
capture
Double negative questions are used to prevent respondents providing responses that they think are wanted.
Negative extremes range from “total lack of” to “excess of” in each question
Each question focuses on an area of interest about which you want to know more
Demographic & other research questions can be
included as ways of interpreting patterns that
exist
Sensemaker
An alternative to traditional ways of understanding
the world by:
- implementation at 50% of the cost of traditional
research tools
- being an alternative to focus groups
- providing immediate insight from real time data
- data capture: owned by the organisation, context
embedded at point of collection, reducing expert
interpretation required
- easily scaleable to 000’s of fragements
- keeping it “Real”
Sensemaker – Example Projects
Project: My Visit (United Kingdom)
Project: Future of Volunteering (Australia)
The project was driven by a need at National Museums
Liverpool (NML) to carry out large scale qualitative
evaluation in order to adapt and develop its schools'
program.
Meals on Wheels is a home-based community service facing
major challenges regarding the traditional service model
patterns of volunteering.
As a result of the My Visit project, figures for learning
visits to NML rose by over 400% from Knowsley.
Feedback from the site has helped refine or develop
over twenty NML learning activities.
Sustainable relationships with teachers in the area
have been created. The project has enabled the
learning team to concentrate on leading sessions,
development work and other evaluation techniques
rather than the analysis of data.
The success of the project has also led to the
development of an on-gallery web-based questionnaire
for visitors to the slavery museum.
A critical issue was to retain and build its volunteer base
into the future across all sectors.
The key objectives of the project were to develop an
understanding of policy issues and implications given the
changes in demographics and patterns of volunteering, as
well as guidance for those organizations funding and
managing volunteers.
Sensemaker - Example Projects
Project: Making Sense of Life in a
Philippine Public Hospital (Phillipines)
Project: Risk Assessment & Horizon
Screening (Singapore)
The project sought to understand the challenges facing
a small, under-resourced hospital. It focused on issues
such as the lack or resources and other constraints.
The project also focused on the relationship between
consultants, residents and the administration. It
attempted to gauge their various perspectives and
pinpoint levers that could be used to improve the
overall dynamics of the operations.
The RAHS system is a strategic risk assessment and
analysis tool, which aims to provide early alerts on
potential threats to national security by building a
network that links various independent government
agencies throughout the Singapore government.
Through the RAHS project, the government aims to
identify early indicators of change, detect signals and
analyze potential threat patterns which otherwise
would have gone unnoticed.
Sensemaker - Example Projects
Project: Career Development Project
(Ireland)
The Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE) is a
public sector organisation which is facing
modernization and transformation. It also has a male
dominated aging workforce profile in senior
management positions.
There is one female director in HR and of the 29
people at the next management level, there are only
four women. At least one-third of the 29 people are
over 55 and two-thirds over 50.
The project aim was to answer the question of how
NIHE could facilitate career development and
maximise the performance contribution of all
employees in the NIHE, regardless of age, gender or
religion.
It was important that internal processes for
succession planning and staff development ensured
that the NIHE had the skills supply it requires for
future performance
Project: A Strategic Conversation (Canada)
The aim of this project was to link the Forest service at all
levels in a collective understanding of the opportunities,
challenges and uncertainties in the internal and external
operating environment that are expected to affect the
Forest Service over the next 3-10 years.
It provided an innovative opportunity for staff to engage in
conversation with Executive and each other about some of
the key internal and external forces influencing the
ministry.
A outcome has been to create a culture in the Forest
Service where staff are able to sense change and act
quickly and confidently when change is required.
The project established strategies that will assist the
Forest Service to better plan for future business
challenges.
A ‘culture of networking’ inside and outside of the
ministry has been created that allows for continued
scanning and dialogue across the Forest Service, and with
partners, as issues emerge.
About us:
Emerging Options are a consulting network specialising in complexity and ways of helping
organisations and groups understand the world in which they participate in order to act.
Vivien Read is a founder of Emerging Options. Viv
has over 30 years experience as a consultant and
manager in organisational strategy, change
management, industrial relations, leadership
development, and action learning. She has co
facilitated 4 Cognitive Edge accreditation programs,
in Australia and South East Asia. She is currently
involved in projects using the Cognitive Edge tools
and processes in Australia and Singapore.
Viv is a frequent presenter at conferences, seminars
and professional groups including knowledge
management societies, facilitator networks, and
training and development groups.
Vivienne Read
Chris Fletcher is a co-founder of Emerging Options.
Prior to starting Emerging Options, Chris was the Asia
Pacific Director for Knowledgement Management at
Deloitte. He has over 20 years experience working
in Marketing, Business Development, Strategy and
Knowledge Management - predominantly in the
professional services sector. His current focus is on
using Cognitive Edge tools and processes to help
organisations and groups understand complex
issues, connect people and develop networks.
Chris is a regular speaker at conferences and
seminars in the Asia Pacific region.
Chris Fletcher