Het Nieuwe Werken (HNW) is bezig aan een snelle opmars. Door invoering van HNW streven organisaties naar meer resultaatgerichtheid, ondernemerschap en eigen verantwoordelijkheid bij hun werknemers. In combinatie met tijd- en plaatsonafhankelijk werken wil men niet alleen kostenbesparingen realiseren (door het terugbrengen van ruimtegebruik met flexkantoren en telewerken) maar ook de flexibiliteit en effectiviteit van medewerkers en organisatie vergroten. Dat laatste is vaak nodig om de dienstverlening te verbeteren, om beter te kunnen inspelen op ontwikkelingen in de markt, of om een aantrekkelijker werkgever te zijn voor talent.
Bij HNW horen andere werkrelaties en nieuwe vormen van zelfsturing, samenwerking, en kennismanagement. Ook de eisen aan de werkomgeving (kantoor en ICT) veranderen. De organisatie én de medewerker worden continu uitgedaagd om na te denken over de vraag welke werkvormen en werkomgevingen het best passen bij een bepaalde doelstelling. HNW heeft dus een grote invloed op de manier waarop kenniswerk wordt uitgevoerd: er is sprake van een “groeipad” waarlangs HNW steeds verregaander wordt toegepast. Daarnaast doet HNW een zwaar beroep op de vaardigheden van de medewerker om zijn of haar werk zelfstandig en effectief te organiseren. Om daadwerkelijk de vruchten van HNW te kunnen plukken is het van belang om hem of haar hierop goed toe te rusten.
In het ProWork rapport “Het Nieuwe Werken: van teamdoelen naar persoonlijke vaardigheden” beschrijven we de aanleiding en opzet van een workshop en een masterclass die bijdragen aan de ontwikkeling van een HNW teamontwikkelingsagenda c.q. aan de ontwikkeling van persoonlijke HNW vaardigheden. We beschrijven waarom er op team- of afdelingsniveau aandacht moet worden geschonken aan een ontwikkelingsagenda: waar ligt onze ambitie met tijd- en plaatsonafhankelijk werken, hoe maken we het uitvoerbaar, wat moet er dan anders. Vervolgens beschrijven we de rationale en de opzet van een workshop die als doel heeft om bewustwording te creëren over de omvang en impact van HNW voor een afdeling en om een aanzet te geven voor de agenda.
Daarnaast beschrijven we waarom er op individueel niveau bewuster aandacht moet worden geschonken aan persoonlijke HNW vaardigheden: een integrale ontwikkeling van digitale vaardigheden en persoonlijke effectiviteit. We beschrijven de opzet van een masterclass die beoogt om medewerkers meer bewust te maken van vier kernuitdagingen van HNW en de kennis en vaardigheden die nodig zijn om deze succesvol het hoofd te kunnen bieden. De masterclass reikt voorts enkele concrete hulpmiddelen en methoden aan die deelnemers in hun eigen, dagelijkse werk kunnen toepassen.
Op 11 maart hebben we op het congres Bedrijf in Beweging in Amersfoort opnieuw onze workshop De Zeven Vaardigheden van de Moderne Kenniswerker gegeven. Na een korte inleiding konden de deelnemers in een eerste ronde brainstormen over uitdagingen waarmee de moderne kenniswerker wordt geconfronteerd. De uitdagingen die werden genoemd, zijn:
de baas zien te blijven over een overvolle agenda
geen tijd hebben voor reflectie of zelfontwikkeling
eigen doelen moeten stellen, zelf de verantwoordelijkheid moeten nemen
een gezonde balans zien te houden tussen werk en privé
moeten samenwerken op afstand
niet goed weten wat er speelt in je team
je collega’s weten te vinden, verbonden blijven met je collega’s
geen eigen werkplek meer hebben, moeten werken op meerdere locaties
moeten werken met steeds meer applicaties en devices
je weg zien te vinden in een versnipperd aanbod aan informatie
In een tweede ronde konden de deelnemers brainstormen over de vaardigheden die nodig zijn om deze uitdagingen goed het hoofd te kunnen bieden. Na een inventarisatie en een stemmingsronde kwamen we tot de volgende lijst:
Duidelijke prioriteiten kunnen stellen
Grenzen kunnen stellen
Goed verbindingen kunnen leggen
Zelfstandig kunnen werken
Gericht zijn op relaties
Goed kunnen netwerken
“Mindful” kunnen werken, jezelf goed kennen, bewuste keuzes maken
Opvallend was de grote afstand tussen Duidelijk prioriteiten kunnen stellen (de nummer 1 in deze lijst) en alle overige vaardigheden die werden genoemd. Dus wat deze groep deelnemers betreft, met veel vertegenwoordigers uit de HRM wereld, is dit dé vaardigheid van de moderne kenniswerker.
The bias storm is a method we apply at the start of collaboration, when the people who have to collaborate come from different backgrounds, cultures or organizations. The method aims to get prejudices they might have about the other in the open. Talking about these prejudices helps to understand the other and clears the road for fruitful future collaboration.
How it works
This method should be used during the initial session of people who have to collaborate. Immediately after the initial round of who is who and why are we here together today, form pairs of people from different backgrounds, cultures, organizations or whatever barrier you wish to level. Ask these pairs to write down on sticky notes what prejudices their colleagues might have against people from the other “side”. It is important not to ask what prejudices they have; as that might result in only the politically correct responses. While they are writing these down, walk around and stimulate them with questions such as: “What did your colleages say when they heard you had this session?”.
After a few minutes, when you notice that “the popcorn stops popping” ask the people from one “side” to read out what they have written down. Write key terms on a big piece of paper. Try to defer any defence (“I would like to react on that…”, “Let me put that straight…”) to the next phase. Then ask the people from the other side to read out what they have written down and collect their key terms on a different piece of paper. Then start the next phase by just asking “Who would like to react?”
Our experience is that this method is a powerful starter for cross-organizational collaboration projects.
In a previous post about the Future Workspaces Concept Game we have described how individials can be inspired by the concepts in the game and how it can help them think about how they want to live and work in the future.
When the Concept Game is played by more people in an organization, it can help that organization determine what aspects of future ways of working are important for the people in that organization. The Concept Game can be played in a workshop of 8 to 10 people. In the workshop, people first select their own favourite and not favourite concepts. Secondly, the choices are explained and discussed by the group. Finally, a coherent view is created on what issues and opportunities of future ways of working are most important for the organization. You can download a flyer about the Future Workspaces Concept Game Workshop here.
Based on our experiences with doing workshops to discuss the social media landscape and facilitating experiments to gain hands-on experience with these tools inside organizations, we are now developing three concrete FWS products around social media: (more…)
During the Future Workspaces project day we also introduced a social networking concept called ‘Borrelpraat’. Borrelpraat is a prototype of a social networking tool that can be used at networking events. Participants have a tag on their badge with which they can indicate their position (using RFID technology). Furthermore, they indicated their interests at registration. On a swipe of their badge their location and interests are visualized on a big screen. These interests are matched with other participants at that location to stimulate conversations. Due to the use of standard Web 2.0 and RFID technology, Borrelpraat is easy to extend. Below is a short movie (in dutch) that shows the working of this prototype
We tested this prototype at the future workspaces project day. The participants of this day reacted enthusiastically, which resulted in approximately 100 swipes of badges within the hour. We are going to explore this way of social interaction more and extend this concept. If you are interested please feel free to contact us.
Within Future Workspaces, many concept ideas have been developed. The Concept Pool page on this website shows some of them. To inspire knowledge workers and to gain more insight into what concepts or concept areas appeal to them, we have created the Concept Game.
The physical version of the Concept Game can be played individually or in a workshop. It is also possible to play the Concept Game online.
Click here to start playing the Concept Game online. You will be asked to select your favourite and least favourite concept ideas. Please also tell us why you have selected these concepts and submit your choices. It will help us to focus our future plans and concept development.
The online version of the Concept Game was developed by Steven Haveman.
For the FWS Projectday 2009, we transported our multi-touch wall to Driebergen. There, participants of the Co-create workshop had a chance to hear about and have a look at recent developments in hardware and software (they could even look inside of the big black box!) After that, one half of the group could play around with our sticky notes application while the other set out to discuss how this technology could be of use in their own working practice.
Earlier, we had developed and evaluated scenarios aimed at using multi-touch technology for working and creating together. The results of the workshops also point at other directions for future developments that we hope to explore further.
Some interesting points of discussion:
The fact that multi-touch surfaces allow input from multiple persons at the same time implicates that everyone who is at the surface has control over what is viewed, changed or added. Some people see this as an advantage, others think that one person should always be in control.
Multi-touch surfaces are useful if different kinds of information (for example, tekst, numbers and photos) have to be reviewed with a team. In those cases, the large screen provides an overview and each of the team members has control over the data that is shown.
Multi-touch surfaces could also be used for co-creation and inspiration by letting people work at such surfaces at different moments in time. People could have their own space and shared spaces where they can add to the work of others or find ideas to use in their own work.
It is fun to use the multi-touch surfaces because it involves a natural kind of interaction. This alone could be a reason to use them.
A multi-touch wall could also be used for communication with people at other locations. Reviewing a document and seeing a video of a person on the same large screen could be an efficient way to work together at a distance.
Wouter from Jam visualized outcomes of the discussion. More of the results (also from the other workshops) can be found here.
The Professional Playground of the Future Over 60 people working in industry, knowledge institutes and government organisations, 3 speakers, 3 visualisors, 5 working prototypes, a stimulating environment and lots of sun proofed to be the perfect ingredients for an inspiring projectday.
Through diverse activities such as learning about playfulness at work during Sarah Harveys talk, experiencing new technology (and creating ideas on how to use them) in the workshops and connecting with others through ztamps during ‘Borrelpraat’ we brought our motto for this day ’see, share, do, create’ to life.
For an impression of the day see twitter and Flickr. More details about the outcomes of the workshop will follow soon. Please feel free to share your experiences or links to photos of the event in the comments.
Yesterday we organized a social media workshop for our expertise group – a group of 16 colleagues with similar research interests. Although we frequently co-operate with one another in various ongoing research projects, and although we meet once a month as a group, we felt that knowledge sharing between group members could be improved. The first aim of the workshop was therefore to introduce and discuss various social media and their potential to facilitate knowledge sharing within the group. (more…)
To inspire knowledge workers and to gain more insight into what concepts or concept areas appeal to them, we have created The Concept Game. This game can be played individually or in a workshop with a group of people.
At the Innovatieproeftuin, 50 students in Innovation Management and Industrial Design Engineering worked all day on a future workspaces case. The day was organized by the Innovation Platform, the NCSI, student association STAR of the RSM Erasmus University and student association i.d of Delft University of Technology. To start the day, Luis Suarez from IBM gave an inspirational talk about working without e-mail. He encouraged the students to stay in control of their own productivity and to think about the best tools to use for their communication.
The 7 teams were then challenged to come up with their vision of working and living in 2028. Session leaders of each team were briefed about the case a week earlier and came up with solid and creative plans to tackle this case and try to win the challenge. (more…)
Yesterday we did a workshop on the 7 skills of modern knowledge workers at the Innovatieproeftuin. After an introduction by Ruud about the challenges faced by modern knowledge workers, the audience (of about 80 people) was put to work: first they had to select what they considered the top issues modern knowledge workers are faced with. Based on the results, they then had to describe the key skills modern knowledge workers have to posses to deal with this. While many of these 80 people probably expected a session where they would sit back and hear about the 7 essential skills, it was great to see them actually working together in small groups. (more…)
Op woensdag 3 december vindt in de Van Nelle Ontwerpfabriek in Rotterdam het event “de Innovatieproeftuin” plaats. Het Future Workspaces team zal daar acte de présence geven met twee workshops (“No Hub, No Glory!” en “De Zeven Vaardigheden van de Moderne Kenniswerker”) en een studentenatelier (“Schrijven naar 2028″). Meer informatie vindt u in deze uitnodiging en op de website van de Innovatieproeftuin. Wij hopen u op 3 december in Rotterdam te zien!
Wednesday Septemer 17, we held a Future Workspaces workshop on Enterprise Social Software. Around 25 people from a broad range of organizations joined the workshop. We started of with an impressive showcase by our host, Erik Krischan (IBM), on the social tools they are using. My “yes, can we have that too, please“-moment was when he demonstrated their Intranet search: while searching for a specific topic, the system also shows the experts on the topic within the company, your social path (friend-of-a-friend) to that expert, relevant communities and of course the relevant information assets. After that presentation, Mireille Jansma (ING) gave us a brief impression of the issues people face in a less technology-minded setting when trying to introduce enterprise social software: a very good way to get us back on our feet to the reality of typical enterprise environments. (more…)
RSS
Het Nieuwe Werken (HNW) is bezig aan een snelle opmars. Door invoering van HNW streven organisaties naar meer resultaatgerichtheid, ondernemerschap en eigen verantwoordelijkheid bij hun werknemers. In combinatie met tijd- en plaatsonafhankelijk werken wil men niet alleen kostenbesparingen realiseren (door het terugbrengen van ruimtegebruik met flexkantoren en telewerken) maar ook de flexibiliteit en effectiviteit van medewerkers en organisatie vergroten. Dat laatste is vaak nodig om de dienstverlening te verbeteren, om beter te kunnen inspelen op ontwikkelingen in de markt, of om een aantrekkelijker werkgever te zijn voor talent.
In a 
Based on our experiences with doing workshops to discuss the social media landscape and facilitating experiments to gain hands-on experience with these tools inside organizations, we are now developing three concrete FWS products around social media:
Over 60 people working in industry, knowledge institutes and government organisations, 3 speakers, 3 visualisors, 5 working prototypes, a stimulating environment and lots of sun proofed to be the perfect ingredients for an inspiring projectday.
The coming weeks our agenda is full of interesting events. I’m sharing my list, although I won’t be able to make it to all of them:
