public conference Design in progress 2009. La ricerca di design per condividere azioni e favorire dialoghi designinprogress.org paper available at http://urijoe.org/designblog/archives/34

1. How networks effect the practitioners daily life.
Sharing attitudine and ICT tools within creative organizations.
francesca valsecchi

3. cooperative knowledge production
a) production of knowledge
as plural process
b) tools for knowledge
management &
cognitive activities

4. networking
as creative skill
information and technology
as relevant tools
within creative spaces
cooperative knowledge production

5. ICT
global level:
public access to
complex knowledge systems
local level:
multiple knowledge spaces

6. organizations:
digital systems within physical contexts
go beyond the distinction between digital and physical spaces.
mutual influence between creative actions and the contexts.
(Creativity Support Research)
top down initiatives
& knowledge strategies
digital-based practices
networking

7. Physical space is correlated with cognitive space.
This is a metaphorical relation,
where the physical space gives form to cognition. [… ]
Any cognitive process goes on within
a mediating cultural and physical context.
Cognitive processes are embodied,
environmentally embedded.
towards dialogue

8. creative organizations
proxemic and dense contexts
in which knowledge flows;
they include people, tools, processes, methods, objects,
contents, artifacts, etc.
the main role of knowledge tools

9. knowledge management approach
knowledge sharing
knowledge acquisition, reuse and creation
technology-based solutions that activate
best practices implementation
but lack in considering
that human behaviors play decisive roles in cooperation processes

10. Because of its fluid nature, tacit, loose
and emergent character, managing knowledge sharing
by managing communities requires a different approach
to management than what we are used to.
This implies that the role of managers will be pushed
to the periphery in which their main contribution lies
in the acknowledgement and facilitation of emergent
grass-root community behaviour .

11. ethnography & observation:
* from richness of relationships
towards relevant design intiatives and hypothesis
* based on thick dialogue activity:
first the field research about behaviors and then come to technology
design solutions flow there where users work.
* change methodological approach:
cases studies & best practices versus content analysis & interpretation

12. ethnography:
essential premise for
further design activities

13. “la nostra società è oggi è una società in cui
la comunicazione avviene quasi sempre
in situazioni complesse,
perché coloro che comunicano hanno presupposti,
danno per scontate cose diverse
e quindi danno un senso diverso a quello che dicono […]
e quindi dobbiamo stare in un atteggiamento
di esplorazione, di indagine”

14. dialogue:
just inner point of view from the system
make the system knowledgeable
just approaches based on dialogues
make it understandable.
mutual diversity
is a cognitive tool:
the n ethnographer will be able
to build awareness and insights
based on the adoption of diversity

16. Le cornici sono gli spazi attraverso i quali esercitare
delle abilità interpretative più ricche,
i punti di partenza della nostra interpretazione
ma anche i suoi punti limite,
il confine con il quale misurarsi di continuo
nella definizione del contesto di dialogo
con l’oggetto della propria comprensione.

18. conclusion
* “epistemologia della comunicazione”
* approach to dialogue
necessary to understand relationships and knowlede flows
within a given context
between actors, activities, resources.
design initiatives can improve quality and performance of contexts.
* from the design point of view,
ethnography is a method to build dialogue strategies
useful to design of tools and knowledge artifacts.

19. francesca.valsecchi@polimi.it
thanks!