Inquiry Inventory - 06/29/22
Here at The Human School, a big part of what brought us together is a deep love of reading and learning. We commit, as part of our learning journey, to sharing our week’s reading with you and what influences our thinking and learning.
Each week, you will see a post with what we’re reading, a quote, and an insight from that reading that leads us to deeper thinking.
To learn more about what we are reading, please take a look at our Connection Catalog.
What I Found at a Mennonite Wedding by Malcolm Gladwell
"I think we sometimes overlook how unexpectedly liberating it is when a culture abandons the aggressive pursuit of status markers."
I’ve been thinking a lot about power lately, especially around our mindshift: Lead from anywhere: Navigating from leadership is a title to leadership is a choice by anyone to take action.
In this article from Malcolm Gladwell, we see how the Mennonites seek to create low power-distance cultures. Part of this is to dispense of formal titles.
I have found that formal titles in education (Dr., Superintendent, etc.) rob people of their agency and leadership by creating high power-distance cultures.
What might be if we eliminated these barriers to connection and collaboration and focused on low power-distance cultures?
—Randy
What is Human Centered Design?
“Human-centered design is a creative approach to problem solving and the backbone of our work at IDEO.org. It’s a process that starts with the people you’re designing for and ends with new solutions that are tailor made to suit their needs. Human-centered design is all about building a deep empathy with the people you’re designing for; generating tons of ideas; building a bunch of prototypes; sharing what you’ve made with the people you’re designing for; and eventually putting your innovative new solution out in the world.”
We here at the Human School are not strangers to Design Thinking and especially IDEO’s special brand of it. One of the connections that I have made in their Human Centered Design Kit is a focus on the “mindsets” of Human Centered Design. Much like our Mindshifts, IDEO recognizes that change, iteration, growth (however you want to state it) occurs not through organizational mandate, but through individual reflection and a focus on moving further along on the spectrum of these mindsets/mindshifts. It’s important to note that mindsets are a continuum and also highly contextual.
