TdLab Winter School 2019

• Learning through adaptation: Participants learn to face and handle uncertainty in real-world situations by being responsible for designing, organizing and facilitating a stakeholder interaction. The participants test and adjust their interactions with the coaches before it is launched. They have to match their interactions with available resources and time constraints, much like what they would have to do in the context of their own projects. This year the theme was “community development” in the context of the ongoing process of regional amalgamation. The goal was to help the community of Wislikofen from the present and future challenges in this process of transformation and change and to help the community members themselves envision a future that all could stand behind. This theme was decided upon based on a mutual agreement through discussions with the mayor of Wislikofen, Heiri Rohner and the community secretary Andi Meier.

First hand observation, informal interviews (attendance of community meetings “Echogruppen”, “Kaffee und Kuchen”) and conversations with community members formed the basis of the participants’ understanding of the theme. This was supplemented by scientific reports on spatial planning in the region by a seminar course conducted by the department of spatial planning at ETH Zurich. The participants used these varied sources of information to formulate and integrate their understanding of the system. The integration of this knowledge was encouraged through the creation of a “rich picture”, identification of insights and the creation of “problem statements” – which are methods adapted from design thinking and soft systems thinking. They identified existing “tensions” within this system and were asked to frame these tensions as possible problems that may be present in the system, which they would like to focus on in the stakeholder interactions. Participants had a chance to “test” their impressions by doing further observations and informal interviews during a community event. New information brought back further refined their understanding of what might be matters of crucial importance to the impacted communities. Community members were asked to comment on the identification of these problem statements and these statements were refined in response to this feedback. Groups coalesced around different topics which emerged after this information gathering phase. Within the groups, after clarifying the exact “problem” the groups wanted to address, they went on to brainstorm and design the type of interaction that would help to clarify or further discuss this tension for the community. These interactions took place during the evening prior to the last day of the programme, where about 12 community members from Wislikofen and surrounding communities that are also a part of the community amalgamation process joined. The details and outcomes of this community event are documented in a German language and English language report “Ein Abend mit Wislikofen”.

This report was presented to the “Gemeindrat” and served as the foundation for discussing the topic for 2020 TdLab Winter School. The feedback from the community was overall positive. In particular, the community appreciated that the Winter School did not deliver a finished product of what “should be done” in the community, but rather, helped the community to reflect on what are important perspectives and a comparison and integration of these diverse perspectives. By making these perspectives explicit, important tensions in the development processes were pinpointed. These tensions then served to be important starting point for new ideas of how address existing challenges in the village.