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Social learning
Social learning
Social (or collaborative) learning refers to learning processes among a group of people who seek to improve a common situation and take action collectively. It is useful to think of five main strands that support the process.
Social learning – overview
Strand 1: Systems thinking
Systemic co-design
Design thinking and co-design
Methods and tools
Conceptual modelling
Strand 2: Building networks
Team building, CoPs and learning groups
Cross-sector partnerships and collaborations
Strand 3: Supporting deliberation and dialogue
Values and behaviours
Managing conflict
Strand 4: Knowledge management
Conceptual modelling
Participatory model building
Co-production of knowledge
Through indigenous lenses
Organisational learning and knowledge management
Strand 5: Reflective and reflexive practice
Creating an environment that supports learning
Capacity building, social capital and empowerment
PM&E
PM&E
Planning, monitoring and evaluation form a natural structure for social learning. They need to be linked together, and when seen in this way can naturally underpin a collaborative and outcome-oriented approach to management.
Planning, monitoring & evaluation – closing the loop
Theory of change
Managing for outcomes: using logic modeling
Selecting evaluation questions and types
Rubrics – as a learning and assessment tool for project planning and evaluation
Complexity-aware monitoring, evaluation and learning
Developing indicators for sustainable and performance-based management
Related evaluation topics
PM&E – a range of approaches
Planning & evaluation: scope and scale
Evaluation-based methods and approaches
Evaluating public engagement
Collaboration/Engagement
Collaboration/Engagement
A growing challenge for managers in our complex world is to step beyond a narrow operational focus that deals with individual technical aspects, and engage more meaningfully with a range of partners and key stakeholders through improved communication and engagement activities.
Stakeholder mapping and analysis
Designing collaborative processes – systemic design
Is the system complicated or complex?
Systems thinking
Design thinking and co-design
Methods and tools
Conceptual modelling
Participatory model building
Cross-sector partnerships and collaborations
Managing participation – including more marginalized voices
Risk communication and engagement
Social license to operate
Related collaboration/engagement topics
Developing and evaluating an engagement plan
Working across cultures
Integrated & interdisciplinary R&D
Supporting change
Supporting change
The basic principles underpinning successful change are universal and there are a wide range of guides developed in many different contexts that can help us. However, to achieve change policy makers and others need to be aware of the characteristics of complex social systems, and what these mean for the design of constructive interventions. It is also important to involving the right people in the co-design of interventions that recognise when to use synergistic links across both individual and wider practice change initiatives.
Systemic co-design
Design thinking and co-design
Adaptive management – “learning by doing”
Managing adaptation in a changing world
Governance and good governance (incl. equity & social justice)
Behaviour change – guides to approaches and theories
Practice change
Communicating for change
Values and behaviours
Older guides and literature
Guides to help initiate and manage multi-stakeholder processes
Co-innovation systems
Related change management topics
Social marketing
Scenarios and visioning – as strategic thinking
Strategic planning and reviews
Social research
Social research
Participatory action research that operates within the area of practice, and works with the different stakeholders and partners involved, can accelerate learning and actions that lead to the wider system transformations that we want.
Expanding the role for the social sciences
Participatory action research
Managing integration: trans- & inter-disciplinary R&D
Managing ethics – considerations and protocols
Through indigenous lenses
Links to social science resource sites
Related social research topics
Using narrative and stories
Citizen science
Integrating impact assessement
Checklists for social processes
Postgrad research – ideas and tips
Practical links
Practical links
This section provides links to guides and tips for facilitation and ways of collaborating in on-line meetings and events. And it hosts some more miscellaneous resource topics that I follow from time to to time.
Facilitation guides, tools & techniques
Managing virtual teams
Guides to managing virtual meetings
Global reports – acknowledging sustainable development challenges
Community resilience and adaptation
Using the Internet
Useful Internet-based tools
Building an online prescence
The growing role of the Internet
On-line games about sustainability
Jobs & volunteering opportunities
Job opportunities in environment and development
Volunteering: ethics & opportunities
Other things
Starting a social enterprise
DPSIR (Drivers, Pressures, States, Impacts, Responses)
The impacts of climate variability on the world’s global aquifers
Blog
About
About
Here is where you can see the range of work that I get involved in (managing this website is just a way of sharing some lessons from that work), and meet a few of the people that I work with on a regular basis. You can also find out more about the Learning for Sustainability site's 20 year history.
Subscribe to LfS site update email
Will Allen & Associates – Consultancy and research
My publications (journals & book chapters)
My publications (reviewed reports)
Associates – people that I regularly work with
About this site – aims, structure and development history
Disclaimer and Privacy policy
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Archived pages
facilitation foci
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The growing role of facilitation in driving sustainable transformations
Posted onBy
July 23, 2023
Will Allen
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