Collecting crisis tools

This year has been rich in learning. The terrible pandemic has provided a lot of insights and required all of us to do things differently. As part of the preparation for Government After Shock, OPSI has been pulling together examples and analysis about the innovative responses seen across the world, undertaking some sensemaking and doing some workshops with different communities about the crisis, and learning from other events and practitioners. 

One thing we have seen happening a lot in practice, but have not been capturing however, is the use of different tools by people to make sense of the crisis, to reflect upon it and its implications, to re-prioritise, or to collaborate with different partners. But through other events and from discussions, we know there has been a lot of experimentation by teams and organisations in the public sector – whether it be adjusting to virtual engagement or dealing with a crisis as pervasive as the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Such tools include our own Portfolio Exploration Tool that teams can test and use as part of day 1 of Government After Shock, which will help organisations understand if their current mix of innovation activity is suited to the world we now find ourselves in. We also have some other workshop exercises that we have used that we intend to share when we have a chance to write them up (it’s been a busy year!).  

We are interested, however, in hearing from the wider community about the tools you have been using and the way in which you have used them. We want to know what worked for you, and how/if you had adapt your ‘toolkit’ to the crisis. What tools did you rely on to help navigate or manage the crisis, and how did you have to amend them to suit the crisis context? 

One of the few advantages of a crisis is that it provides a rich learning environment. As part of our efforts supporting Government After Shock, but also helping us learn more as we continue to develop our Toolkit Navigator, we want to understand how the public sector toolkit adapted. 

Either in comments below or by contacting us we invite you to share about what tools you found useful to adapting to the crisis context – whether existing (e.g. those in the Toolkit Navigator) or new ones that you might have come across or developed. 

So let us know – what tools helped you adapt to the context and deliver during the crisis?