Workshops

I create and facilitate bespoke and ‘hand-made’ workshops.

First, I listen to your goal and context. Where do you or your team stand at the moment? Where do you come from? What have you achieved so far? What are your goals and challenges for this workshop? What is your content?

Workshop topics can vary, I have created workshops on the topics of

. brand strategy
. product invention
. creative idea generation
. future scenarios
. web strategy development
. product development
. change processes
. idea generation / brainstorming
. the simple goal to connect and be inspired
. many other topics are possible!

… and in the fields of technology, services, science, education, art & design.

Then I systematically translate your goal and context into a unique workshop experience: I design materials, activities, the flow of the workshop day(s), propose unusual but appropriate and inspiring places. Each workshop element links to the topic and goal but also opens up new perspectives and aims to trigger unexpected insights and ideas. The underlying reasoning for each workshop design is logical and goal-oriented, – the actual experience is playful, inspiring and fun.

Often my workshops are about ‘thinking with all senses’, which means experiencing a topic or goal on different levels, ideally involving the entire body. Be prepared to play and move!

You might be a member of a team and have a specific workshop topic in mind or you are yourself consulting a team or company in its process and would like to intensify a topic…

… do contact me if you want to have a conversation about possible workshops for your context.

Btw, I have occasionally also created workshops for individuals who for instance wanted to clarify their professional direction in a creative and playful way. This is something I’d also be excited about exploring further.

Examples for workshops I have created and facilitated or co-facilitated:

. Idea generation workshop ‘Building Talks’ for the Oslo School of Architecture and Design
. Workshop materials ‘Lab Books’ for lottolab at the Science Museum London
. Workshop series on future topics ‘The Futures Of…’ for Appleyards Ltd.
. User requirements workshops ‘At Your Service’ for Cornelsen Schulbuchverlag
. Product strategy and product development workshops within the ‘LernCoachies’ project for Cornelsen Schulbuchverlag

Contact me about workshops.

Process Illustration

I illustrate your thoughts into notebooks.

First, I listen. – To your conversation, your description of your project, your idea or ‘vision’ for a project, your meeting, your talk or conference. I take notes, visible to everyone or initially only for myself.

Then I translate and distill what I hear into hand-drawn images, shapes, patterns, words and stories. These notebook pages make your thoughts visible to you. Maybe they are not yet exactly right… but in any case they catalyse your thinking and work process.

These images and notebook pages can be used for conversation and as input for the next steps in the process, such as meetings and workshops. They can be used to communicate in a quick and engaging way to a wider audience. Because they change and evolve over time but still are recognizable, they can become the visual red thread that runs through your project.

The tangible output you receive are digital and physical versions of the notebook and individual illustrations for communication.

Contact me if you want to have a conversation about how to use process illustrations for your purposes.

Examples for projects and individuals who used my process illustrations to clarify, distill and communicate their ideas:

. ‘My School’ conversation drawings for lottolab.
. Concept drawings for an online learning platform ‘LernCoachies’ for Cornelsen Schulbuchverlag
. Presentation and conference notes at ‘TEDx Berlin’ and ‘Creative Mornings’
. From my notebooks
. Currently I am creating process illustrations for the German party SPD, for individuals and company start-ups for clarifying and making visible their thoughts, concepts and approaches.

Contact me about process illustrations.

• 2011
• Self-initiated
• Note taking at TEDx conference in Berlin

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

I enjoyed ‘High Energy’.

I learned from Wolfgang Kessling that only 20sqm of solar panels are necessary to provide the energy for a family of 4 for a year and that these cost only 5000 Euros to install.

If we THINK and LIVE climate-smart, like Nils Lindell and his family did and does, we probably need less than these 20sqm.

Katherine Lucey made the point of energy poverty AND prosperity being are a gender issue: women are most harmed by energy poverty and women are also the biggest leverage for a change towards energy prosperity.

Mischer’Traxler bring the poetry and immediacy of nature into their design.

Markus Fischer (video talk) demonstrated how to fly, Lewis Pugh (video talk) explained how to swim (and live) with humility… ‘there’s nothing more powerful than a made-up mind’.

Studnitzky were enchanting, Axel Peterman gave us shivers and Thimon von Berlepsch spoke magic about breaking patterns and fresh perception.

Many more but I had to leave early… here is a selection of pages from my notebook.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Selection of Notebook Pages

Whale I, Illustration ink pen on paper, 2011

Available as a limited edition T-Shirt print at Sequoia Tees. Remko Span is doing this nice project where he invites one designer per day to provide a unique, never seen before design to be printed in a limited edition onto T-Shirts.

• 2011
• Self-initiated
• Note taking at 4th Creative Morning in Berlin.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

New Potential Through User Generated Content, Crowd Sourcing and Open Innovation.

A morning highlighting the opportunities and threats that lie in crowd sourcing, crowd funding, collective intelligence and such wonderful things. Read and watch the whole story at Fontblog.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Context:

• 2011
• At Qubique Design and Furniture Show in Berlin
• With Rivka Halbershtadt and Marina Ostrowski
• Workshop and talk on the ups and downs and ups of the creative process.

Methods & Deliverables:

• Concept and delivery of workshop with Marina Ostrowski and Rivka Halbershtadt
• Talk on designing in Process

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Marina initiated this worskhop on ‘Creative Processes’ with the wise sense that a fresh and much needed take on creative processes should…

a, involve an open view onto the wider context of a person, venture or industry (Marina Os, Concept Development, Brand Consultation & Cross-Cultural Communication for the creative industries)

b, be experienced through the body (Rivka Halbershtadt, Licensed Trainer of the Grinberg Method)

c, and incorporate careful and playful process design (Michele Gauler, Designer Psychologist)

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

The Day of the Workshop

Here are some impressions of the workshop day.
(Big thanks to Emanuel Hägglund for these lovely photographs. And thanks very much to Unn Gustafsson, amazing writer at balticworlds.com and politiken.se for providing them!)

Our workshop and talk was a three-part journey:

. Marina spoke of her experience as a brand and strategy consultant for the creative industries.

. Rivka addressed the body in the creative process through exercises which we performed all together (thanks everyone for the courage to wave your arms and legs in public) and which aim to silence our heads in order for new things to arrive and to stop habits and patterns of behaviour which stand in the way of reaching our goals.

. In my part, I showed examples of my ‘design in process’: how I design workshops and processes which are tailored to the people and topics at hand. I also showed examples for design output which evolves out of creative processes. My slides and notes are below… have a look in case you are interested and weren’t able to come.

All in all, I very much enjoyed this workshop and was thrilled with the enthousiasm of all the people who where there (and who nearly all returned for the 2nd part after the ‘creative break’).

A big thanks! to everyone who was there!

For more information on this workshop, on ways of applying this ‘Context-Body-DesignInProcess’ approach to your work, do contact us (Marina, Rivka or me).

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

My Talk on Designing in Process

Hello. My name is Michele and as Marina said, I am a designer psychologist.

I first to have these two degrees and then I happened to notice that these labels are not just on paper but that I am both and do both: I like to design things and I like to consider the human side of things.

What I want to talk about today is ‘design in process’. - How to design for and in the creative process by using the content, context and people as sources and material for play and thought.

Let me paint the picture of this creative process situation. It’s what we are talking about here and that part that Marina described as having moving start and end points.

There is us and there is some unknown solution or output that we want to reach... over there somewhere.

And I think what lies in between looks a bit like this.

And I think often we feel it more like this.

Now... I would like to say that obviously, we don't want that black blob, the 'unknown' to disappear. We want it. It's where the new comes from. 'From nothing comes something.' as Amy Tan says.

We want the unknown...

... but ideally, sometimes, we want to see it as our friend...

... who has invited us to a party.

We all know that there are ways of celebrating this space.

And some of the ways of making it a celebration and pleasurable experience are
. to work with the body, like Rivka teaches,
. to consider wide contexts in the way that Marina described.
. And what I additionally suggest is to 'design in process' which means to engage with the content, context and people in a playful and meaningful way.

So let's enter this space.

And let's for the moment do this again in monster-mode.

What do we do when we don’t know what to do and are in monster-mode?

. we might give up right away and go back to the 'safe' area
. or we try to get to the exit as fast as possible
. by applying what we know and what has worked in the past or what others say is right
. we loose our sense of joy
. we narrow our view
. we might detach from the topic, as if we don't really care about it
. ...

These are I guess only a few of the things we do in monster-mode...

... and it seems these reactions intensify if you are not alone...

A team, much more than an individual maybe, will race as fast as they can to conclusions. Because you don't just have to handle your own fear but the fear and confusion of the entire group.

Especially 'detaching' is common in a group because it is easier to step back from responsibility and action with others around where responsibility might be diffused.

So, let’s enter the space again... as a group. And let’s see how it works to design in process by playing with content.

I am going to show you 4 examples of workshops I have done with people.

The first one is a workshop called ‘Buidling Talks’ that I did for design students from Oslo.

They approached us as Beta Tank, when I was running Beta Tank with Eyal, hello Eyal.

From their tutor I heard that they were – as their final degree work – going to design interactive communication solutions for their new university building.

So I designed a workshop for them around a building.

Using a building and barrier tape, I asked them to create communication links between the people in the buildings. Ask questions and give answers from one window to the other.

The point of this workshop was to have them experience a building with their bodies, walk up and down, become out of puff, open and close doors. To interact with the real people in the building and represent communication in a physical and tangible way.

Another project I want to show is this ‘interior decoration’ workshop. I did this together with a colleague of mine, David Marx for a small technology start-up in digital and print publishing. This was about their identity, the product’s identity and their clients.

In order to inject a sense of beauty and care into the way they were approaching their brand, product and clients, we decided to start from the inside and decorate their offices. So, unexpected to them, we turned up with all the equipment and got them all to paint the walls.

These were 'user-profile' newspapers. For them to describe their clients.

Again, this was supposed to create a high engagement level, working with the bodies, touching and painting surfaces, bringing your business away from the abstract to the concrete and tangible and understanding that if you want to create a beautiful, high-value product for your client you might want to start with your own interior.

The next example for creating playful and meaningful engagement with content is work I did for a schoolbook publisher who wanted to develop an educational software.

The software was supposed to help kids do their homework so to make the topic more personal, part of the concept workshop was for all team members to tell their own stories of doing homework.

In a later, different phase, I used plates as whiteboard-post-it hybrids for a workshop in which we distilled their digital product content as 'menu offerings'.

The last example is from a project I did last year at the Science Museum in London.

Lottolab was conducting a programme called 'i,scientist', where kids experienced being scientists and thinking as scientists.

I decided to create very simple DIY lab books for them. Out of A4 card and paper and metal binding rings. The idea was to keep it so simple that they could change them themselves.

After showing them examples of lab books of famous scientist and then asking them to surprise me with their notebooks throughout the 5-week program, this is exactly what they did: they surprised me :)

They carried their lab books along everywhere.

They used wool to 'draw'.

They invented egg frying machines.

These 'things' that are designed for the process: the plates, the barrier tape, the homework stories, the lab books...

...these things are the play balls in the process.

My sense is that these process play balls best support creative processes (the walk through the unknown) if they are bespoke, specific and open.

By being bespoke, they are like gifts that the people in the process are happy to give and receive which raises the level of emotional relevance and connection.

By being specific, they have anchors to the topic and context.

By being open, they give room for ideas and participation.

Throwing these process play balls into the process...

... allows us to play in an open and meaningful way, with anchors to the people, topic and context...

... which lets us travel through this unknown space, at least part of the time, in a balance between what we know and what we don't know, which opens us up for discovery.

Although the path might not look that straight but more like this.

Before we go for a break I would like to mention why in the first place I find it important to 'design in process' in this way... and not just use Flipcharts in meeting rooms to discuss an idea.

I think this kind of work addresses 3 aspects:

* durability and meaningfulness (sustainability): creating things which we don't throw away

* finding new ways of production and new ways of using and reusing resources in the space of 'not knowing'

* emotional health: attachment to our work/doing and things rather than detachment + happiness and well-being through full engagement.

The play balls are thrown INTO the process.

And of course there are ideas and results that come OUT of the process.

This OUTPUT can be part of the process, also a wider process, so the output itself might be unfinished, in process, has room for development.

I want to give two examples.

One is some work I did for Lottolab in London.

They wanted to create a new kind of school curriculum and design and asked me to join into the 'visionary phase' where they started with having conversations with inspiring and inspired people.

I took note and distilled the conversations with them.

This is one of the conversations, with Steven Gage at the Bartlett.

These are my notes and drawings of that conversation.

This is the conversation with Wayne McGregor at the Royal Opera House.

I started making process cards and a web page from the conversations.

These are the process cards which we used for summarising results but also as process tools for working with thoughts and material that was generated.

The other example for process output is my final year project at the Royal College of Art, called Digital Remains.

This could be called a 'digital urn' which contains the data of a deceased person.

It belongs to a loved one who is remembering the person through their data.

Although this looks quite refined, it is a concept. It is a physical sketch of a product that might exist in the future. The project is a piece of 'design for debate' as it's intention is for us to discuss the role of data when we die and how we make data precious and tangible.

These two examples were examples for output that can come out of the creative process.

The output can be quite unexpected and a bit ambiguous too... is it art or design? A product or prototype? A sketch or a finished illustration?

They have different levels of refinement. With the cards it was clearer that this was work about a process. Digital Remains is also 'in process' but for a wider audience, in a debate.

The level of refinement becomes a design decision, depending on the purpose of the output.

This is one of my favourite books: Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud. It is a book about how comics work but really it is about how our brains and perception work. So regarding this 'degree of refinement'...

Scott McCloud speaks about how the degree of abstraction in comic figures can be used to influence how much the reader will identify with a figure. If the abstraction is high, the identification is high, the own participation and involvement is high.

In terms of the 'design process play balls': The barrier tape and the plates have a very high abstraction, they allow for a high degree of participation, they become 'part of us'.

On the other hand, a low abstraction (high detail) makes us look at a thing as an 'object', with its own identity and character. - The Digital Remains urn has high detail and refinement, which makes us react to it as consumers and users. We don't think that we can add to it or change it but we think about whether we want it or not, whether we like it or not. This makes this design output ideal for triggering a debate rather than generating ideas.

I think that the 'design process play balls'...

... and the 'output' (especially if it becomes a new play ball) pose their own interesting design questions.

And they have the potential of transforming ideas and intensifying thought and work processes in a playful and meaningful way.

Thank you.

Honour the Process, Illustration, 2011

• 2008
• At the ‘Design and the Elastic Mind’ exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York
• Exhibition of three access key prototypes from the Digital Remains project.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

What happens to your data when you die?
Three Digital Remains access keys were displayed at the ‘Design and the Elastic Mind’ exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2008.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Paula Antonelli speaking about Digital Remains

These are the words that Paula Antonelli, the curator of the exhibition, used to describe Digital Remains:

“You are looking at three beautiful round artefacts. They are very nicely crafted, possibly by hand, and you’ll notice that they carry a name and two dates. One is the date of birth and the other is the date of death.

This is a beautiful and very poetic work by Michele Gauler, called Digital Remains. It’s based on the idea that, as more and more of our lives become digital, our loved-ones will want to keep not only our physical but also our digital effects after we’re gone.

Each disc contains someone’s digital remains: images, music and documents, compiled from the various hard drives, networks and web pages creating during the life time. When you move a disk close to a computer, it can connect to that computer via bluetooth and share the deceased’s digital remains. A programme inside the disc can even search for the media that are most appropriate for each viewer. For a friend it might show pictures of a party that that friend attended to with the deceased. But for relatives it might show a video of a family vacation.

It’s a response to the digitisation of our world. To the increasingly central role of electronic media not only in storing the minutia of our lives but also our ideas, inspirations, aspirations and memories.”

– Curator Paula Antonelli on the project ‘Digital Remains’

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Digtial Remains at the MoMA

Context:

• 2011
• For Naming Elephants
• Web site design and brand communication for a non-f0r-profit social enterprise.

Methods & Deliverables:

• Conversation- and drawing-based development of direction and strategy
• Idea and concept for web site and communication
• Design specification web site
• Creative direction web site
• Concept, design and production of process tools

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 
Naming Elephants is a non-for-profit social enterprise which aims to create positive change in individuals, teams, schools and companies. They are a team of highly experienced therapists, teachers and coaches.

Mike Beard, director of Naming Elephants, approached me in 2010 with the wish for me to translate and distill what they do into visuals and words. In a process of conversation and iteration with him and his team at Naming Elephants, I developed together with them different output:
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Naming Elephants Tag Lines

Instead of only one tagline, we developed 15 tag lines which express the variety and flavour of what Naming Elephants does. They appear in turns on the web page and are printed on their business/post cards.
Some of them are:

Naming Elephants
…asks great questions
…is creativity
…embraces the unfamiliar
…is playfully pragmatic
…is inherently optimistic
…has humanity and attitude
…creates possibility
…catalyses positive change
…is about what you can be
…leads with credibility and passion
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Naming Elephants Business Postcards

Post cards using the logo and tag line, for people to pick their favourite.

Naming Elephants Web Page

A web page to express the attitude of empathy, postitivity and expertise at Naming Elephants.

Naming Elephants Process Resource

These compound cards are a workshop tool for Mike and his team. Participants receive their puzzle piece and have to complete the elephant in an exercise which called ‘Can you name your elephant?’. Because there are things in us and our lives which are of utmost importance (the elephant) but may not be immediately obvious to us or others. Knowing about these elephants, good and challenging ones, helps :)

Context:

• 2010
• For Lottolab Studio
• Event at the Science Museum, London.

Methods & Deliverables:

• Lead for creating the user experience
• Communication visuals
• Process materials for public engagement
• Coordination of staff

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

As the final event for the i,scientist programme, the young participants conducted a public experiment on perception at the Science Museum’s Lates on ‘Gaming’.

For Lottolab’s contribution to the Lates, ‘Sound Seer, Light Hearer – Science as a Game’, I created the communication visuals, designed materials for public engagement and designed and organised the experience of entering the space as a guest.

You can watch the kids conduct their experiment and see me talk about the Lates in the last part of the i,scientist film by Antonio Rui Ribeiro.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

The Lates Event in Images

Stills from Antonio Ribeiro’s film

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Some of the Materials for Public Engagement

These are questions which we stamped onto cards in order to engage the public in thinking about perception and ‘Seeing Myself See’.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Flyer Design