Workday #3 - Reverse thinking

The morning started in Hanken in the same lecture room in Åbo Akademi that we had for workday 1. As first we were divided into new random groups and got as a task to think of how the future is going to look in year 2040. All of the six groups got a different theme to focus around. Our SuperVision group members were placed into two groups: one with the focus on future ways of moving and the other one on future ways of working.

The main ideas that came up with the topic “ways of moving from place to place” where that future transportation is going to be more automated, more sustainable, more secure and faster than today. And that there is probably going to be some kind of common fee for all the public transport taking place in one city.

Both of the groups had some difficulties, as most of the people were new to us. The other group had a slow start whereas the other started of very quickly, without a common ground to stand on. Most of us didn't feel that comfortable in the new working environment, which caused that the contribution wasn't at the same level as in a task with our own group.

After finishing the first task we went around in groups and discussed about the other topics with the aspect of what needs to be done in 2020 to reach what was presented for 2040. One person out of every group stayed at their place and explained the ideas they’ve had with their group. The so called ”collaboration” didn’t work well all the time as we sometimes couldn’t give any additional ideas for a new group or couldn’t develop the idea flows further due to ineffective time management or disagreement among us. It was also pretty overwhelming to hear all the previous ideas in the beginning because it felt like we didn’t have anything to add. Nevertheless, we still kept the atmosphere positive and fun.

Finally we got back with our own team, SuperVision. It was really nice and comfortable to be back with people you know and share common dynamics with. Our group was tasked to destroy the industry of spatial design, which is the focus for us in this course and suggest 40 things that would destroy it. As we already knew each other it was easy to decide which tool to use and how to proceed with the task. We used our own modified version of the affinity diagram with post-its. We came up with a lot of ideas and the best was that everyone contributed. The next task was to “build up the industry” in other words taking the destruction threats into consideration and counter them with actions that would boost the industry. We did.

We found the ideas provided by the destroy-rebuild-tool really useful. The ideas could be used both to protect the industry and also promote it. We think that this tool also is useful in order to take into consideration the risks of the surrounding. In overall, the workday reminded us that we don’t always need to follow the traditional flow of ideas when trying to find the solutions. Instead of thinking about the consequences of the issue from this moment to the future, from near future to the further time, we can also play a trick with our brain and release our imagination by making a reversed flow from the far future back to this day or the near future. And though most of us didn’t get into an innovation mood with the first task it was nice to meet and talk with new people.