Design Resiliency: Unpacking the Design Process to Create Adaptive Change
Unpacking the design practice to create adaptive change
Design Resiliency is the practice of adapting to change. Being nimble, flexible, reflective, adaptive, and even embracing chaos. - Elizabeth Lockwood
“Resilient thinking is about how and why the system as a whole is changing, we are better placed to build a capacity to work with change as opposed to being a victim of it. A resilient system that has the capacity to rebound from disturbances does this by increasing its diversity and redundancy, by forgoing growth and speed in favor of sustainability, and by engaging in a wide range of small local actions that connect to one another.” - Margaret Wheatley
Overview
In a matter of weeks, we have seen our entire health system retract, our economic system crash and our political system divide. Ironic! Guess again. We are in the middle of reorganizing some of the largest systems we value; our health, our economy and our political structure. In today’s episode, we are going to take a deep dive into the concept of design resiliency to unpack and inspire you as a designer to embrace change and sustain your design practice.
Health, economic and political systems collide.
Shortly after the world went into the stay at home order due to the COVID-19 outbreak, the conversation shift from human health to economic health and then it quickly became political. We began to divide as a nation and question even our good friends’ political views. It is more apparent then ever how interconnected our human health, economic health and political systems are. When we talk about one these days, we tend to lead into another. So now what? How do we unpack this all to advise our clients to make the best informed decisions when we are in the middle of a massive reorganization of our health, economic and political system. This is where the theory of Design Resiliency can be applied. It is a theory, model and tool to us during different phase of design or during business restructuring.
Moving forward through this episode I will speak on two different levels. One being the notion of having a healthy design practice during a recession and the second notion designing in response to pandemics.
What is Design Resiliency?
In my own words, Design Resiliency is the practice of adapting to change. Being nimble, flexible, reflective, adaptive, and even embracing chaos. For a more esteemed definition, Salt and Walker in Resilience Thinking state, “Resilience is the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and still retain its basic function and structure. This sounds like a relatively straightforward statement but when applied to systems of humans and nature it has far-reaching consequences.” Hence what I mentioned before. We are in the middle of a massive reorganization of some of the largest systems we value; human health, economic health and the political systems. These systems are so interwoven, you can’t disturb one without effecting the other.
If we are to have disturbance such as a global pandemic, we are going to see a fall out. We are going to see a ripple into other systems. And the very question, that many have wondered but I am sure few have verbalized, is the fear that a global pandemic might severely impact the human species or the fear that our economic system might crash and many businesses will be forced to close.
We have two options moving forward. We can either surrender and let this wash over us or we can try to change the systems at play. But, changing a system that is already in motion with ingrained patterns is challenging to change. So how does a design practitioner change their practice? Or how do we navigate clients to design better spaces in name of human health?
Margaret Wheatley states in Walk Out Walk On, “Resilient thinking is about how and why the system as a whole is changing, we are better placed to build a capacity to work with change as opposed to being a victim of it. A resilient system that has the capacity to rebound from disturbances does this by increasing its diversity and redundancy, by forgoing growth and speed in favor of sustainability, and by engaging in a wide range of small local actions that connect to one another.”
Because we can not fight with the same fire. We can not give it more will, prayer or muscle to turn things back around.
“Our resilience as a community depends upon our capacity to look forward, to look backward and to look honestly at our situation today. Resilience isn’t a new idea; there is much to learn from the past about how to create resilient systems. Were only here today because our ancestors learned how to deal with disturbances and upheavals.” Margaret Wheatley
Design Tip 1: Study the system in question and then study related systems to look for patterns. This can be within your design practice, others design practices and even other business structures. When the first rumblings of a recession appeared groups of interior design leaders began to meet and ask, is this going to be anything like 2008? What is different? What is the same? Many real estate brokers said, the paramount difference is, the lending is still there but it is the fear that is causing the downturn. The fear, the hesitation, and uncertainty. Our economy is based upon growth and a beautiful bell curve always going up. In actuality it is a brittle system that it easily influenced. But if you look at what Salt and Walker and Wheatley are saying. If you really look at it, every system goes through change. Change is an inherent vital part of a system. Think about after 2008? We had a massive growth that brought a lot of really great opportunity for many. The truth is, our health and economic health are no different. We have gotten really good at designing interventions, some short lived and some long lasting and some are a long time overdue for a upheaval.
What does the Resiliency Model look like?
Imagine the infinity symbol. It is one continuous figure 8. The beauty of the infinity symbol is that as time passes it cycles back on its self-creating a continues closed loop system. Within those loops there are ups and downs, highs and lows, growth and conservation and above all continuous change. To take it one level deeper, S. Holling is to thank for the theory of Adaptive Cycles when he applied it to the biological realm. I believe we can apply the Adaptive Cycle Model (or as I like to call it the Resiliency Model) to social systems such as human health, policy, economics and our design practice.
Adaptive Cycles: “The central theme to a resilience approach is how social-ecological systems change over time.” Whether that be “Social-ecological systems they are always changing. A useful way to think about this is to conceive of the system moving through four phases:
1. Conservation
2. Release
3. Reorganization
4. Rapid Growth
usually, but not always, in that sequence.” -Salt and Walker
Imagine the life cycle of a flower in the dead of winter it goes into conservation mode, it stores up its energy for its release in spring where you see massive rapid growth. As it moves through the seasons you see the cycle continue over again. So now apply that thinking to a business, economic structure, building process you name it. Any system out there goes through a version of these four stages in order to maintain its basic function and existence.
Unpacking the 4 phases of the Adaptive Cycles:
Conservation - Transition starts, energy stores, material slowly accumulated, system experiences caution and pulling in of resources
Release - Innovation opportunity, can feel chaotic, rapid, changes quickly
Reorganization - Redesign opportunity, shuffling of systems and structure, feeling of renewal
Rapid Growth - Transition ends, exploitation of resources begin
What phase are we currently in?
You got it, we are moving from conservation to reorganization phase. We are pulling in resources, we are questioning what is working, what has not and we are observing in order to make an informed decision. This is important to understand because if we don’t begin to recognize where we are at in a phase of a system, we won’t be able to identify the actions necessary to design within it. The first step is to recognize change is part of social systems and adaptation is an inherent part of working within a system. For example: We have seen this with our understanding of the impact buildings have on the environment and our evolution and response to how buildings can adapt and respond to data that has been gathered.
As Salt and Walker state, “Resilient social-ecological systems have the capacity to change as the world changes while still maintaining their functionality.”
So a resilient system is not one that crumbles into smithereens. It is one that has some basic resemblance of its self but adapts and changes over time. For example: in your design practice, if you solely worked in the hospitality sector you could consider looking for transferable markets or working with your clients to help them reposition their properties. Remember what I said earlier, a resilient system is one that is diverse. Diversity allows your practice or your clients spaces to be more agile. It is also one that has a variety of small local actions that connect. Explore how your clients could develop and tap into this notion. For example: small scrum spaces, small localized break rooms would help minimize the spread of viruses and reduce the load on each space.
Salt and Walker lay it out this way, “Resilience is the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance; to undergo change and still retain essentially the same function, structure, and feedback. In other words, it's the capacity to undergo some change without crossing a threshold to a different identity.”
Basically, change was going to happen. The key is how we move forward that matters. How we respond or not and how we design new systems for the built environment. The question should be now. How are we going to respond to keep the downturn from turning too far down, making it too turbulent? Moving through one phase too slowly or too quickly and how profound the transition to the next phase will be? Honestly, I can feel it. The design community is rallying around this pandemic and having amazing conversations. It feels as if it is our time to shine. We as designers of the built environment have the attention of the public right now. They are seeing the effects of poorly designed spaces. As far as change management goes this is the time to capitalize on their attention.
The Key to Living, Operating and Designing Within Social-Ecological Systems goes something like this. A resilient world would…..
1. Promote and sustain diversity in all forms (biological, landscape, social, and economic).
2. Embrace and work with ecological variability (rather than attempting to control and reduce it).
3. Consist of modular components.
4. Have a policy focus on "slow" controlling variables associated with thresholds.
5. Promote trust, well-developed social networks, and leadership (adaptability).
6. Place an emphasis on learning, experimentation, locally developed rules, and embracing change.
7. Have institutions that include "redundancy" in their governance structures and a mix of common and private property with overlapping access rights.
8. Include all the unpriced ecosystem services in development proposals and assessments.
Note social systems in particular are complex and have components that are independent and interacting. There is some natural selection process at work. Variation and novelty are constantly being added to the system through components changing over time or new ones coming in. -Salt and Walker
Why is the concept of design resiliency important to the field of Architecture and Interior Design?
As we have been discussing change happens yet we keep designing stagnate one-size fits all approaches to our business practice and clients design strategies. As a society we tend to resist change because of our societal emphasis on economizing. We even fear change at times because of the unknown that might come with the change. Yet change is a key component of the resiliency model. In short, in order to have growth we must see change. We have centuries of designers that have embraced this notion and create what we currently know as the built environment.
I see Design Resiliency as a tool to quantify where we are at in cycle. It helps me reflect and identify where we are at, then given this information it helps me to pin point the cycle and allow through mapping to be able to identify solutions to embrace/leverage the change I am experiencing. I believe the resiliency model can teach designers to think more holistically about their design practice and approach to projects. By doing so we can recognize that change happens in system therefore we can plan for that with clients. We can prompt those conversations during the planning process. Such as asking what happens when they need to restructure? How can furniture disable? How can we scale up or scale down their environments?
How to be resilient in your design career?
Your job, your client’s business structure, our economy, our political structure are independent yet interacting.
1. There is a natural selection process to any system. Some firms will survive some will not. Some markets will be stronger at times then others but non are immune to change and going through the 4 phases of the adaptive cycle: rapid growth, reorganization, conservation and release.
2. Change always happens. Expect it, accept it and prepare for it. We cannot have rapid growth with out conservation.
3. Explore how to absorb those disturbances. Its like skiing a mogul run. You can straighten your legs and bounce off of each bump or you can soften your hips, knees, ankles and actually back peddle and gracefully ski down the run. Both might get you down the run but one will feel better. I would choose the later and explore with your design teams how you can absorb disturbances.
4. Diversify: We know that from 2008 firms that were solely based on development struggled. Avoid redundancy.
5. Forgo growth and speed in favor of sustaining the system. Be OK taking a pause, gathering information and observing the system. Don’t rush through the process.
6. Engage in a range of small local actions that connect to one another.
And then:
1. Identify your practice. Reflect to evaluate the systems at play. Study historical models. Does precedent studies ring a bell? Many of you have already been trained to do this. At the initial phase of a project you are trained to observe.
2. Identify patterns between systems. When you see something that has worked multiple times it is probably something that is a very successful in a system.
3. Identify leverage points. How can you insert your self into the system to create adaptive solutions to your design practice and your clients spaces?
Closing: Design resiliently creating environments that are diverse decentralized smaller acts, prioritizing resiliency over efficiency. This type of model might mean we need to change our client’s business structures. We will have to lead and inform the clients through change management strategies. To start: meet them where they are. Understand their needs. Empathize with them. Gain their trust. Find out what their ethos is. Understand what matters most to them and then use that as a leverage point to help guide them beyond where they are at to create long term resilient spaces.
Keep Designing Y’all!
Quotes Pulled From
Salt, D. & Walker, B. (). Resilience Thinking: sustaining ecosystems and people in a changing world. Washington, DC: Island Press
Wheatley, M. & Frieze, D. (2011). Walk Out Walk On: a learning journey into communities daring to live the future now. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publisher, Inc.
Credit
Branding & Graphic Design work by Andrea Schwoebel https://www.andreaschwoebel.com/
Street Sign Photo by Daniel Giannone on Unsplash