Introductory description

Digital change agents are people with a supercharged capability for applying technology to solving problems and improving the world. You might assume that they are geeky Comp Sci graduates hiding away in dimly-lit basement offices somewhere on the Internet. This is simply not true. Arts and Humanities graduates are the real heroes of this story.

Around the world, every year, billions of pounds are wasted on projects that seek to transform people's lives and capabilities using IT. At the same time, most people fail to take advantage of digital technology's potential for helping them achieve more, working more efficiently, creatively, sustainably, and (most importantly) in alignment with their values and goals. Why? It's not that there are significant technical challenges. For example, software engineering has evolved techniques and frameworks that allow small teams to rapidly create sophisticated cloud based mobile solutions that draw upon super-complex infrastructure systems around the world, providing instantaneous and 100% reliable solutions to any problem. But did you know that a key conceptual underpinning for this technological revolution was derived from Christopher Alexander's utopian work on "design patterns" in architecture, urban planning and design? Alexander sought to understand, describe, and make more usable, the blend of systematic formalism and creative improvisation observed in artistic practice. There's far more to the successful application of technology than efficient algorithms and high speed fibre. Simply adding more, faster, increasingly ingenious tech does not solve our problems. Indeed as Fred Brooks demonstrated, technology adds complexity exponentially. We end up with an increasing mess of "wicked problems".

How do we avoid this? Or rather, who can help us to find a better way?

Digital change agents have an acute awareness of creative techniques, such as those described by Alexander. They are able to understand a situation, empathise with people and their challenges, and help them to envision sustainable, durable, ethical, change through the application of digital technologies. They use key Arts and Humanities skills, especially storytelling, visual thinking, and critically-creatively working with language. And at the same time, approaching innovation from the opposite direction, they can look at gadgets and systems and imagine how they might be applied to real-world situations.

We need more of these people! Where do we find them? As many successful innovation companies have discovered, look to the Arts and Humanities - disciplines that include a deep understanding of people, culture and creativity. See for example Ten Faces of Innovation by Tom Kelley and Jonathan Littman, based on the practices employed by the world's most famous design innovation consultancy, IDEO. However, successful design-led innovation needs to be "values-led", and that's not an easy approach to follow. So we need people who are comfortable with ethical complexities, people who are able to understand contrasting perspectives and bring potentially opposing sides together into creative dialogue. The Arts and Humanities are thus more essential than ever.

What does it take to expand on Arts and Humanities learning to become a successful digital change agent? Based on research carried at Warwick and around the world, including work with successful Warwick graduates over ten years, we have designed a module that introduces and provides scope to practice the essential elements: Design Thinking, Systems Thinking, Visual Thinking, knowledge of and skills with important technologies, remote team working, project management and much more. We use a "problem based" approach, with a range of case studies and design challenges of interest to Arts and Humanities students. Some of these are focussed on developing capabilities within the Arts Faculty itself, others are outward looking, applying our capabilities for the benefit of the wider community. The module begins by exploring each student's home disciplines, and with an interdisciplinary mindset, the commonalities and connections between them. We will focus especially on the common challenges of public engagement, and how digital technologies are used and may be used in the future. The students will critically and creatively reimagine Arts and Humanities practices, proposing ways in which they may be transformed through technology.

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

The module will consist of a series of case studies, presented online and discussed in class (hybrid), and creative design challenges for students to complete (in small teams). We will use the design sprint method with the Miro collaborative whiteboard. The case studies and challenges will address currently significant issues and apply the techniques covered in the online material. Students will have opportunities to suggest and choose topics for the class to explore. The syllabus will be emergent so as to make it relevant. However, we will ensure a balance that includes social issues, public engagement, and topics of relevance to the Arts and Humanities.

This will be accompanied by a wiki covering key concepts and knowledge, and recorded lectures exploring techniques (including Design Thinking, systems thinking, design patterns, human-centred design, interaction design, usability testing, user-experience design, critical technology studies).

Technical skill workshops will include: Miro, web tools and platforms, video production.

Each student will also keep a reflective journal in which they develop their personal account of the relationship between digital technologies and their home disciplines, this will form the basis of their reflective essays.

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• Know, recognise, and diagnose the common reasons for failure and success in digital transformation projects.
• Understand key concepts from Design Thinking and human-centred design, and how they address the limitations of a techno-centric approach.
• Know how interdisciplinary Design Thinking combines diverse academic, artistic and professional disciplines to create teams capable of creating and implementing fresh ideas.
• Articulate ideas from their own disciplines, illustrating how they challenge and help us to overcome the limitations of techno-centricity.
• Systematically and creatively engage with new technologies, using methods from Design Thinking and Systems Thinking, so as to understand their implications, potential, and limitations.
• Initiate and shape digital change projects with appropriate teams of experts and participants, and play the role of digital change agent.
• Use, configure and advise on a core set of current and emerging technologies (including advanced Teams, VR, AR, mobile computing)(.
• Articulate their own transformative journey reflectively, and empathise with the differing needs, ambitions and values of others.
• Describe and evaluate the use of technology in their home discipline, compared to other disciplines and practices in the Arts and beyond.

Indicative reading list

Alexander, C. (1966) “A Tree Is Not a City” in Design, Number 206. Council of
Industrial Design. http://www.rudi.net/books/200

Brooks, F. (1986.)“No Silver Bullet – Essence and Accident in Software Engineering” in Proceedings of the IFIP Tenth World Computing Conference: 1069–1076 http://worrydream.com/refs/Brooks-NoSilverBullet.pdf

Brown, T. (2008) “Design Thinking.” Harvard Business Review, June 2008. Brown, T. (2009)

Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation. HarperCollins. Kindle edition.

Catmull, E. (2008) “How Pixar Fosters Collective Creativity” in Harvard Business Review, September 2008. https://hbr.org/2008/09/how-pixar-fosters-collective- creativity

Chapman, J. (2005) Emotionally Durable Design. Taylor & Francis.

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2009) Flow. Harper Collins.

Kahneman, D. (2011) Thinking, Fast and Slow. Penguin, Kindle edition.

Kelley, T., and J. Littman. (2004) The Art of Innovation. Profile Books(GB).

Kelley, T., and J. Littman. (2005) The Ten Faces of Innovation.Currency/Doubleday.

Kelley, T. (2001) "Prototyping is the Shorthand of Design" in Design Management Journal, Summer.

Kolko, J. (2011) Thoughts on Interaction Design. Morgan Kaufmann.

Kolko, J. (2014) Well-Designed: How to Use Empathy to Create Products People Love. Harvard Business Review Press.

Krug, S. (2009) Don't Make Me Think. Pearson Education.

Leonard, D. and Rayport, J. (1997) “Spark Innovation Through Empathic Design” in Harvard Business Review, November 1997. https://hbr.org/1997/11/spark- innovation-through-empathic-design

Nodder, C. (2013) Evil by Design: Interaction Design to Lead Us Into Temptation. Wiley.

Norman, D.A. (1988) The Psychology of Everyday Things. Basic Books.

Norman, D. A. (2007a) Emotional Design. Basic Book

Norman, D. A. (2007b) The Design of Future Things. Basic Books. Norman, D. A. (2013) The Design of Everyday Things. Basic Books.

Thaler, R. H., and C. R. Sunstein. (2008) Nudge. Yale University Press. Kindle edition.

Thomas, S. (2013) Technobiophilia: Nature and Cyberspace. Bloomsbury Academic. Kindle edition.s.

Weiser, M., R. Gold, and J. S. Brown. (1999) “The Origins of Ubiquitous Computing Research at PARC in the Late 1980s.” IBM Systems Journal Volume 38 Number 4.

Research element

Each design challenge is a small research project in itself.

Interdisciplinary

Fundamentally interdisciplinary, the module brings together insights from technology studies, software engineering, design, psychology, management, and the home disciplines of the students. We will also build on links with WMG's immersive technologies and 3D visualisation teams (who do relevant work with museums).

International

We will include opportunities to collaborate with our partners at Monash (Irwyn Shepherd as coordinator of their many immersive technlogies projects).

Subject specific skills

Each student will develop their own personal account of the relationship between their home discipline and digital technologies.

Transferable skills

Technology skills including advanced Teams use, Miro, web tools and platforms, and video production.
Technology consultancy and project deisgn.
Team working.
Design Thinking.
Systems Thinking.