Miscommunication was found to occur during the weekend due to a lack of clarity around definitions of concepts and instructions for the activities as considered below.
8.4.4.1. Lack of Clarity about Concepts
Participants R and G considered that there needed to be greater clarity of the terms and definitions used particularly around types of cross-disciplinarity.
Perhaps some definitions displayed. (R)
Felt at times though some words were used that myself and others had difficulty understanding what you meant or wanted – discipline (multi, trans, inter – good examples of this). (G)
Participants C, N and E also struggled with understanding the typology and the language used to describe some concepts during the Movie activity, which impacted their ability to interact and engage in the cross-disciplinary process.
Struggle with the way models are presented: Would have needed more time to digest the models and the language of the models to gain from and participate well in this. (C)
Need more time to assimilate. Interesting, not yet contributing as I’d like. (N)
Language and even concepts, which are familiar, may take others longer to grasp. Frustration as trying to gain an understanding of others understanding of the concepts – Maybe everyone there already knew this typology? Maybe a bit more time might have helped this as takes time to feel comfortable. (E)
Discussion during one of the assistants’ feedback sessions, the observations of Assistant Brown and the reflections of Participant B also confirmed the lack of clarity around concepts during the Timelines and Typology activity.
Cross over of theory and lack of definition of meaning. More meaning and understanding of the personal rather than the theory. Group more accepting of the personal. (Brown)
Great activity. Enthusiastic sharing and discussion. We stuck together as a group. Loved the process. Not sure I learned too much – was struggling to digest concepts and voice my own thoughts in the group. It did solidify what I already know. (B)
As expressed by Participant B above, this lack of clarity of concepts was found to hinder engagement in some of the activities. Other examples are when Participant I struggled with the concept of worldview and spent time reflecting on the concept itself rather than expressing their own worldview and when Participant C found the lack of understanding of concepts impacted her ability to engage in the cross-disciplinary process.
I am finding worldview a difficult concept to get my head around – I can’t really work out why, and I’m not convinced it is startlingly relevant. It may become clearer as I think/talk about paradigms etc. (I)
I am very out of touch with the academic jargon and rhetoric and am finding it very difficult to engage with … the language used in defining concepts rather than the concepts themselves denoted the difference (C)
8.4.4.2. Lack of Clarity of Instruction
Assistant Brown and Participant J considered that engagement in the activities could have been improved with better instructions.
I know it is hard to do but being crisper and more precise on instructions for the various activities might have been helpful, including the time available –
perhaps an instruction sheet at each stage (as was done for the Dream) … a worked example of an Ishikawa (Fishbone) diagram might have been helpful … one observation: groups got a little confused in putting together the data from the interviews because the interview question asked the ‘core thing’ but the data collection sheet asked for ‘core values’… importance of sending groups off with a clear idea of timeframe for activity. (Brown)
I struggled a little to grasp the overall shape of the weekend and would have benefitted from a more thorough introduction to the purpose, process and concepts being used. I think others may have grasped this more easily since they are more immersed in academia. (J)
The impact of the lack of clarity relating to the instructions was also confirmed by Participants G, L and A and Assistant Red during the Appreciative Inquiry Discover activity. They considered that more direction was needed and that this lack of clarity detracted from undertaking the activity.
As this maybe something new for some more time and how AI works and how you story it. The feelings of the event would help – easy to link events to future happenings and get off track. (G)
I have never done a particular exercise using AI so I was actually quite looking forward to learning more about AI. It would have been good to have more foundation knowledge about AI. I thought the exercise of the interview was quite interesting but I was having some difficulty with just focusing on the event, rather than how the story begins and the process led to outcome of
afterthoughts. (L)
It looked simple at first but there were probably too many questions to really get a quality input. The interviews are a good idea but probably need more
direction/experience to maximise the potential. (A)
Some reluctance to getting started, maybe they didn’t clearly understand until they talked to each other. Once they got there was good interaction. (Red)
Participant G found that a similar lack of understanding about how to use the Ishikawa (Fishbone) diagram also hindered the process during the Appreciative Inquiry Design activity.
Required us to adapt our thinking if we were to utilise the design provided. Limited exposure in the group to using this model – also limited group to six links to reach goal. (G)