Experiencing Interdisciplinary Research Alan Blackwell Reader in Interdisciplinary

Experiencing Interdisciplinary Research Alan Blackwell Reader in Interdisciplinary Design University of Cambridge

a policy agenda • ‘ESRC expects to support new and exciting research which combines approaches from more than one discipline’ – ESRC Impact, Innovation and Interdisciplinary Expectations (January 2009) • ‘The aim is to bring together participants from a wide range of disciplines to develop a fresh and innovative approach to research’ – EPSRC Connect call for participants (May 2009)

an ‘industry’ agenda?

my background • 19 years professional design experience (including design projects for London Underground, British Gas, Hitachi) • 4 degrees (engineering, philosophy, comp sci, psychology) • 30 products deployed • I learned that dramatic innovations come from multidisciplinary teams and perspectives. . . • . . . but how do you do this in a University?

potential: students in Cambridge Humanities & Social Sciences Arts & Humanities Biological Sciences Technology Clinical Physical Sciences

potential: research in Cambridge Arts & Humanities & Social Sciences

strategy “Created to encourage collaboration between technologists, and researchers in the arts, humanities and social sciences. ”

Academic Public sector Commercial

a Crucible “house style” • Start small and move fast • Bring creative and design practices to technology • Facilitate encounters between communities • Cheerfully transgress academic borders • Engage with reflective social science • Directly address public policy

Interdisciplinary Innovation – strategic creation or self-organising success?

Studying interdisciplinary innovation • Interdisciplinary team (psychology, economics, anthropology, engineering) taking a phenomenologically ‘bracketed’ stance • Conduct snowball sample to find leaders and brokers • Intensive workshops with practitioner witnesses • Consider any boundaries as potential ‘disciplines’ – complex problems cross organisational & policy boundaries – planning for the future extends beyond current knowledge

Expecting the unexpected • Not just transferring or translating knowledge – building teams with different kinds of knowledge • Disciplines predefine problems and goals – Innovative outcomes are necessarily unanticipated • Achieving radical (not incremental) innovation – Investment in collaboration is fundamental – ‘Capital growth’ is capacity for future response – ‘Dividends’ arise serendipitously

Making interdisciplinary innovation happen • Enablers – – ‘Pole star’ leadership Trust and generosity Time to build social capital, change one’s mind Allow, maintain and reward intellectual curiosity • Obstacles – Disciplines are the base of career structures – Even new inter-disciplines become silos – Patents are restrictive (value narratives are more generative)

Elements of interdisciplinary innovation • Build ecologies, creative spaces, ‘theatres of thinking’ • The interdisciplinary enterprise – A team – committed and curious boundary-crossers – A leader – who mentors, maintains focus, and sells the brand – A sponsor (which often requires goals) – Outcomes (which often require evaluation) • Practitioners – Offer personal histories, not qualifications – Tend to have imprinted ‘native’ disciplinary styles – Benefit from stereotypically ‘feminine’ personal skills