In 2022, Aaltonians experimented with collective practices for cultivating embodied ways of knowing and making space for new possibilities.

The experiment was called Capacity Building of Creative Radicals (CBCR). It was a strategic, experimental initiative within Radical Creativity, one of the cross-cutting approaches of Aalto University’s strategy, made in collaboration with Aalto's Human Resources services, Communications services, School of Arts, Design and Architecture, School of Business and School of Engineering.

The aim of CBCR was to empower the experimental culture in Aalto University. The project was also connected with Aalto's wellbeing activities. Current working life requires even more collective interaction and renewal. In order to solve the systemic challenges, we also need new kinds of social skills: the ability to learn and unlearn together with other people. CBCR offered Aalto University's personnel the opportunity to try out methods that support radical creativity in a safe environment.

The focus was on the inner and collective capacities of learning, creativity and change. The tolerance of uncertainty was explored. CBCR removed barriers to creativity and highlighted multifaceted intelligence for dealing with complexity and systemic challenges.

Based on the CBCR's impact evaluation, the pilot project achieved the expected outcomes well. It reinforced skills important to radical creativity, such as experimenting, developing new ideas and particularly risk-taking among the participants.

The CBCR pilot was a learning journey both to the project team and to the participants. With the help of this guide, skills learned in the pilot can be practiced further even though the pilot itself has now ended. All new participants are welcome on the joint learning journey!

Capacity building with international collaboration

The CBCR initiative was based on Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) professor Otto Scharmer'sTheory U, a framework for catalysing transformative personal and systems change. It integrates systems thinking, innovation, leadership, and awareness to investigate and utilise deeper sources of learning.

The participants of the initiative experimented with over ten different practices for embodied intelligence and collective creativity, both online via Zoom and at our campus. The practices stem from Social Presencing Theater (SPT), developed through a collaboration of Otto Scharmer and Arawana Hayashi, to enable and facilitate systems change pointed out in Theory U.

The pilot project started with a kick-off with a keynote lecture by Otto Scharmer, and a panel discussion which he also participated. The work continued in two full day practice workshops and voluntary check-in meetings between the workshops, which were all facilitated by Arawana Hayashi and Ricardo Dutra, a social designer, artist and researcher.The pilot's work got a closure in a voluntary check-out meeting after the workshops. We acknowledge that building up these skills need more repetition and rehearsal.