The Ecosystem Project
November 2024 Update
Reserve Your Seat
Our Creative Community is collaborating to offer a workshop series to share what we’ve learned about ecosystemic design, intervention, and change. We’ve partnered with the Society for College and University Planning, the Association for Managers of Innovation, and the Renaissance Center. This workshop series of seven 2-hour workshops was developed for three audiences: Leaders & Executives, Facilitators & Practitioners, and Planners & Change Agents. Participants will learn to apply the basic principles of ecosystemic thinking to their world and its inherent challenges. Using a design toolkit and intuitive canvases, you will depict relevant ecosystems while employing the three stage process of Sensing, Illuminating, and Intervening, making the invisible, visible and taking action for change.
→ Register Here ←
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The sessions will be scheduled on alternating Tuesday afternoons beginning in January 2025 from 12-2pm pacific time, 3-5pm eastern.
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January 14, 2025 – Applications: The Ecosystemic Approach and Mindset – Roles in Depiction, Design, Intervention – Introducing The Ecosystem Toolkit
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January 28, 2025 – Live Design Session: Ecosystem Sensing – Purpose, Boundaries, and Inhabitants – Depicting Complex Ecosystems – Using the Canvases
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February 11, 2025 – Applications: Exploring Landscape Dynamics and Living System Metaphors – Ecosystem Components and Dynamics
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February 25, 2025 – Live Design Session: Illuminating the Ecosystem – Value Dynamics and Exchanges – Future States Ideation
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March 11, 2025 – Applications: Designing Interventions and Ecosystem Shifts – Ecosystem Health and Intervention
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March 25, 2025 – Live Design Session: Intervening to Transform the Ecosystem – Four Orders of Complexity – Applying the Theory of Change
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April 8, 2025 – Applications: Implementation, Planning, and Resourcing – Preview the Secret EDT Session 4 – Reflections and Intentions
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Over the course of the four interactive application sessions and three live design sessions, participants will explore ways to bring about change working within complex ecosystems where no one is in charge. You will be able to apply the four orders of complexity and learn how to our theory of change focuses simultaneous efforts on the transactional, functional, strategic, and ecosystemic levels to create a more healthy ecosystem that better serves its purpose.
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The seven workshop sessions will be fully virtual using a combination of Zoom for video conferencing and Miro for engaged and interactive application and design. The sessions feature peer learning, easy to digest theory, a stunning toolkit you’ll be able to use right away, and case study examples to enrich the experience. The workshops cycle between interactive application sessions that include recent case studies with our institutional partners and a live problem based learning experience where you’ll work in a team to depict an actual ecosystem and design potential interventions.
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This first round of workshop sessions will be offered free to participants in exchange for engagement and feedback from each participant! In the spirit of reciprocity, we are asking that participants commit to all seven sessions and provide feedback at the end of the program to help improve the experience for future participants. Price for future sessions is yet to be determined.
→ Register Here ←
Destination Hawaii… Join us next July in Hawaii for our book release!
Put a hold on your calendar now for July 13-15, 2025 and immerse yourself in planning to change the things that just aren’t working for you right now. We will deliver a workshop at the Society for College and University Planning meeting, their 60th anniversary. We’ll release the book and toolkit to the public at that time and I’ll bid a fond farewell to my sabbatical and consider the future of The Ecosystem Project.
JUNE 2024 Update
Expanding Our Learning Circle
We had a wonderful first year immersed in the theories of systems thinking and systemic design, developed our toolkit and methodologies, and launched case study projects with institutional partners. In this second year, we'll focus more on using these tools and the practice of ecosystemic design as we produce book chapters and move toward publication about this time next year.
We'll invite others from the broader Creative Community to join us for a series of workshops over the coming year, perhaps three in the fall and three in early 2025. Topics will include:
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Purpose, Boundaries, Ecosystemic Health, Fit to Purpose
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Ecosystemic Thinking and Competing Mindsets
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Landscape Dynamics with Internal and External Forces
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Value Exchanges and Networks that Reinforce the Ecosystem
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Selecting and Designing Interventions to Shift the Ecosystem
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How to Lead the Process (identifying an ecosystem, key inhabitant, EDT, scheduling, session facilitation, depiction, narrative, next steps)
I’ll send updates about these sessions once we have dates and times.
Sharing What We Are Learning
Karyn Zuidinga, John Cimino, and I presented at the annual meeting of the Association for Managers of Innovation in April and discussed some of the key components of the theory behind our work. We shared a copy of our first case study chapter from SUNY New Paltz (keep reading for the link to the chapter) and included samples of the canvases in the toolkit.
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We have two upcoming presentations this summer, one at the Society for College and University Planning on July 21st in Philadelphia and another at the annual meeting of the SENCER network regarding their own ecosystem project focused on science and civic engagement. Please join us if you can.
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Case Study Chapter Drafts for Review
Two case studies from our early partnerships are now ready for your review and consideration. The link below opens a flipbook with two case study chapters, one from SUNY New Paltz and their Entrepreneurship Ecosystem and another from Claremont Lincoln University and their Leadership Ecosystem.
https://heyzine.com/flip-book/51ef3010e5.html
Additional Ecosystem Design Team Projects
We have completed five case studies with institutional partners and are working on chapters at this time. We have also launched five new projects and are in the process of running sessions and exploring their ecosystems. Those chapters should be completed in early fall. We are also planning a third round of partner projects and there are opportunities for you to engage in two ways:
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If you are interested in partnering with The Ecosystem Project, please send me an email at the address below and I will share the materials we have that describe the process. There are no costs while I continue my sabbatical and in return, I ask that you allow us to share and publish the case study with the results. Your institution will receive a chapter as a project report with recommendations that can help make the ecosystem healthier with a better fit to purpose.
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We are also recruiting Ecosystem Design Team members who may be interested in joining one of the upcoming projects and participating in the development of an ecosystem depiction and interventions. Let me know if you are curious about joining a team.
Make a connection!
The Ecosystem Project is employing a creative community concept and we are growing. If you can connect us with someone who may be interested in this work or who might need some help with a tough problem at their institution where the ecosystem approach might help – please connect us. Send an email of introduction and I’ll pick it up from there. They can also sign up at my website using the link at the top of this email.
JANUARY 2024 Update
A Big Thanks to Our Institutional Partners
Our creative community is composed of individuals, organizations, and institutions collaborating to make higher education a stronger industry. Together, we generate reciprocal outcomes through dialog and the generation of new ideas and ways to understand the often hidden fabric of our institutions.
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There are several nonprofit organizations offering support and guidance that I’d like to call out and thank:
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The Society for College and University Planning
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The Renaissance Center
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The Association for Managers of Innovation
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National Center for Science and Civic Engagement
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Lincoln Institute of Land Policy
So far, our institutional partners include:
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State University of New York at New Paltz
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Claremont Lincoln University (part of the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy)
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Southern Oregon University
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Humboldt CalPoly
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Large, private, East Coast R1
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Central US State University
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Canvas Magic
Much of the work last fall focused on building our creative community, recruiting institutional partners, and developing the methodologies to produce ecosystem depictions. It all went remarkably well. At the heart of the process is a series of canvases that we employ over the course of three online sessions. These canvases contain the theory and details we use to build the ecosystem depictions and they are each essentially landing pads for a thousand virtual stickie notes. We are still refining the details and will make these available to our creative community and partners well ahead of the publishing of the book. Here is a quick preview of the nine canvases:
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Session One Canvases
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Ecosystem Landscape, Boundaries, and Inhabitants
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Ecosystem Orchestrators and Activities
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The Inhabitant Experience
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Session Two Canvases
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Ecosystem Review and Enhancement
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Ecosystem Value Dynamics
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Future States
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Session Three Canvases
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Future Horizons
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Ecosystem Shifts and Interventions
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Key Orchestrator Capacities
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First Ecosystem Project Nearly Complete
We have partnered with the SUNY New Paltz School of Business to explore and model a fascinating ecosystem in the seven-county area in the lower and mid Hudson Valley. The work is nearly complete and we’re now writing the first full chapter of the book. It will be a few weeks before we have a sharpened draft, and we plan to share this preview with the entire creative community as it nears completion. We learned a lot during the
process and achieved impactful insights in a short amount of time.
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Upcoming Ecosystem Design Team Projects
Our target is somewhere between 12 and 20 ecosystem depictions and accompanying narratives by the time we publish the book in mid-2025. Each of these will be a chapter of about 10 pages or so. Most of these will be based on case studies in collaboration with institutional partners. Here is an incomplete list of emerging partner projects:
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learner integration in social, academic, and professional dynamics
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curricular and program innovation and program portfolio management
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physical and emotional safety
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learning to learn from the new student to self-directed to life-long learning
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social, cohort, and peer-to-peer learning dynamics
There are a few, however, that will be amalgams, ecosystems designed by teams of experts who have knowledge and experience across many institutions over time. Here are some examples of amalgam projects currently underway:
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Institutional Cognition and Consciousness
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Knowledge Workforce Ecology
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Experiential learning, Internships, Co-ops, and Clinical Education
If you see something that interests you or would like to partner with The Ecosystem Project, please reach out to me, and let’s talk!
August 2023 Update
What is this all about? The Ecosystem Project is an exciting set of activities to advance the study of the complex ecosystems at play in higher education and related industries. I have found that in my roles of university administrator, faculty member, and strategy and innovation consultant, our industry has lacked a deep understanding of the complex ways our institutions achieve their missions and provide value to learners and the many stakeholders who depend on what we do. We still complain of silos within our institutions and suffer misunderstood value propositions with our partners and the public. In the last few years, I have worked to depict and apply new models with my higher education clients and have found new ways to solve intractable problems.
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Why now? While I have found great success depicting ecosystems in my work and applying innovation and strategy approaches to help institutions one at a time, I have not yet taken the time to collect the learning to better share it with others. I have decided to reduce my client work and publish my methods and models to share these insights. My aim is to leverage the creativity in my communities to design and publish my next book focused on advanced practice of human centered design, strategy, and innovation in complex ecosystems. I expect to release the book in 2025 after two years of focused effort.
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What activities are occurring? I am currently engaging scholars, practitioners, and generally smart thinkers to help me refine my ideas. The first phases of work focused on discovery and research to build a robust framework for depicting ecosystems and exploring ecosystem dynamics. Now, we’re working to identify and model a variety of ecosystems, perhaps up to three dozen or so. As the models are being constructed, I expect to collaborate with partner institutions to develop local depictions so institutions can explore opportunities to improve what they do and innovate. I expect to generate accompanying case studies to share more broadly. Organizing, depicting, writing, and formatting will take place in the later phases of the work and I will then turn to presentation and piloting opportunities.
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How can I get involved? I am employing what I call a creative community model that is fun, engaging, and highly virtualized. If you are interested, there are several ways to join us. 1) Play Catbird – By catbird, I mean an experienced leader who has observed the dynamics at play in our industry. While catbirds may be experts, it’s the senior, generalist’s 50,000 foot view that is most helpful. The demand on catbirds would be singular or occasional at best. 2) Be an Expert on an Ecosystem Design Team – Once a dozen or so potential ecosystems are identified, I’ll build small micro-communities of experts to help better understand the dynamics, agents, forces, and leverage points and build depictions. 3) Organizational Partner – I am also seeking a handful of partner organizations to collaborate in this work. Partners can help by co-hosting collaborative sessions in Miro, participating in virtual sessions, hosting live invited sessions during meetings and events, sharing insights with their communities, or joining in other ways that create value. 4) Be a Lurker – it’s just fine if you’d like to read occasional communication and get some ideas and inspirations. Connect when and how you’d like.
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Can you keep me updated on your progress? For sure! Please subscribe to The Ecosystem Project newsletter using the form below. I'll send updates to subscribers about every six weeks. I'll also include additional options to get involved as we move forward.
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Thanks again for your interest!
