Recipes for Systemic Change - Helsinki Design Lab

The Final Review119Sitra team members time to celebrate an incredible week ofeffort, but it also functioned as a real working dinner whereinthe review conversations were revisited and continued.Perhaps most importantly, moving from the review to dinnerallowed us to spend more time together, stewing on theideas without resorting to an awkwardly long meeting. Usingexactly the same space for both formal and informal discussionusefully ensures that the Studio’s ideas remain in focus,as if they were hanging in the air while the context is shiftedaround them.Combining the final review with a meal allows you todedicate a total of four to five hours of intense conversationaround the work of the Studio team. Especially when dealingwith strategic questions that are often complicated and messy,having a solid bit of time to properly talk through thingsis important. The danger of a short conversation withoutenough opportunity for back and forth is that the participantsuse the same words without ever sharing a commonunderstanding. It is a fact that understanding takes time, andthat is what the review/meal pairing is designed to deliver aspainlessly as possible.Sharing a meal in the studio space, surroundedby the work of the studio team, is a useful wayto extend the conversation while avoidingfatigue.Sample Schedule—Months before review: identify and confirm guests—Weeks before review: set up dinner and other logistics—Friday 10:00: presentation ‘dry run’ with Studio teamand HDL to test the story and work out the bugs—15:00 move studio table and arrange chairs for review—15:45 guests arrive—16:00 presentation starts—16:30 presentation concludes and conversation begins—17:45 conversation slows down as people get hungry—17:50 a short toast before sitting down to dinner—18:00 dinner begins and the conversation continues,lasting as long as the table likes—Afterwards: follow up with thank you emails and beginexploring next steps