Government Innovation x Collective Imagination Huddle
Exploring how imagination can (re)shape our centres of power
The Collective Imagination Practice Community project launched three Huddles — peer-to-peer learning journeys — this summer, focused on the application of collective imagination practices within local and national government.
In Huddles, individuals incubate their ideas and practice over a period of time, with the accountability and support of their community.
The journey so far
In early July, Host Daniel Ford kicked off a Huddle with twelve curious folks who work in either government innovation spaces or in the field of collective imagination. The group set out to explore how collective imagination can be applied in settings that influence central government policies, practices and processes, such as in policy labs or government innovation services.
Collective imagination is about the potential to imagine and grow different worlds together. It is a capacity needed to help us build alternatives to the broken systems that so many people are suffering from, and that are destroying our planet. This means starting from a different foundation of ideas.
The group have been looking at activating and resisting forces for collective imagination within government — and discussing some of the enabling conditions for collective imagination within government contexts. This is less about where there are opportunities for wholesale change, and more about where there are acupuncture points — or cracks in the system where we can start to seed and grow something different. In the peer-led sessions, they have explored systemic constellations as one method to shift some of the “stuckness” within government systems through a Policy Labs lens. Finding the right collective imagination support and allyship at the right time is essential in these contexts, where there are so many rigid structures, processes and procedures that often take imagination out by design. How to influence the design of these processes at different points, and how to keep building internal capacity and energy for these different approaches rather than delivering one-off interventions are recurring questions the group are exploring.
They’ve had another session looking at how to effectively include environmental voices in the future of tax policymaking — testing ‘4D mapping’ as an approach to voice unheard roles in the system, and exploring a ‘pallet of pressure points’ for activating collective imagination in government.
A term that has stayed in the group is ‘quiet radicals’. They are finding the quiet radicals in the system who they can work with, whilst also growing and developing as a group of quiet radicals themselves!
The group have just had their ‘Power Up’ at the midpoint in their process, and are starting to think about what they might want to share with the world by the time they finish their journey together.
🥁Introducing the Huddle🥁
Shruti Taneja
Mother of one, aspiring zero-waster and nature — lover, Shruti takes inspiration from all three to foster balance and harmony between self, society, and soil.. Having worked across sectors, she currently is part of Co.labx, which helps 3P orgs thrive by building high performing & sustainable teams. Shruti also leads EarthJust Ecosystem that cultivates a sustainability mindset among leaders in all walks of life. Shruti’s journey and enquiry right now is to make regenerative way of life and work a norm, rather than an exception.
Matthew Rabagliati
Matthew is the Head of Policy, Research, and Communications at the UK National Commission for UNESCO, with over a decade of experience in the cultural, environmental, and sustainable development sectors. He oversees the organisation’s policy work and recently led an international study mapping systemic sustainability threats to UNESCO sites across the UK and Canada. Building on this, he co-leads the £1.8 million Climate Change and UNESCO Heritage Project with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. Matthew also co-leads a British Academy Innovation Fellowship with the University of Manchester, demonstrating innovative systems approaches to global challenges. His practice, deeply influenced by systems thinking, positions culture as a foundation for addressing broader social, environmental and economic issues.
Uri Yitzchak Noy Meir
Uri was born in a small village near the sea of Galilee and is now based near Pisa, Italy. He holds a degree from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem as a Bachelor of Arts from the departments of Theatre and Latin Cultures studies. Uri is committed to research and making visible the capacity of the arts in growing a sense of interconnectedness and collective well-being in people, organisations, and the world. He is well versed and experienced in facilitating with activating the untapped collective intelligence and dormant creativity in communities, organisations and multi-stakeholders eco-systems. Uri trained with the world’s leading experts in Theatre of the Oppressed, Dragon Dreaming and Social Presencing Theatre, and uses them as trans-formative ingredients with which to empower communities and individuals in diverse settings and contexts.
Clara Giraud
Clara trained as a theatre maker, and worked as a performance producer for over a decade. She’s now working in the Mayor of London’s Culture Team, supporting policy making across Creative Health — exploring ways the cultural and health sectors can better work together to tackle health inequalities. She is passionate about social change, quiet radical work within institutions to instigate meaningful impact in day to day lives, and about working with people as people rather than job titles. She uses her arts producing skills to bring people together, and mostly feels like she’s out of place in local government — but then loves the work she does!
Steph French
Steph works in human resource aspects of systemic change with a focus on reconnecting with our intuitive knowing using the methodology of systemic constellations. Steph’s work includes supporting the embodiment of a new paradigm through inner change, and creating space for the voices of both Nature and of future generations in decision-making processes.
Matt Lloyd-Rose
Matt has worked as a carer, primary school teacher, volunteer police officer, and in leadership roles across the charity and social sectors. Matt lives in Cyprus with his wife and two children and balances writing with work supporting organisations to increase their social impact and bring about social change. He is the author of Into the Night: A Year with the Police, Curiocity: An Alternative A to Z of London and The Character Conundrum. Matt also writes the weekly newsletter Social Imagining, exploring themes of care, community, ecology and the role of imagination in social change.
Natalie Baron
Natalie works for the Government Digital Service where, as the head of user research, she supports practitioners to bring creativity and curiosity to their work. Before joining the civil service in 2016, Natalie trained as a community researcher with Camden council, where she developed a passion for participatory action research. Natalie is a poet and mother of three; a follower of many threads and a houser of many questions.
Neha Sharma
Neha Sharma is a Senior Policy Designer and Project Lead at Policy Lab UK. She has worked in policy design since 2020, leading projects to experiment with new methods for complex policy areas across government. She previously worked in the private sector leading the experimentation and piloting of new digital products for higher education.
Gael Welstead
Primarily Gael is a strategic designer who aims to understand the patterns and connections within complexity to make things better. She works in HMRC’s Policy Lab and likes creating experiences that aim to stoke imaginations and start conversations about what is possible and how to get there. Alongside this, Gael likes to work across disciplines — a published and exhibited poet, writer, designer, and photographer.
Jasmine Castledine
Jasmine (she/they) is a multi-disciplinary creative with an inquiry-based practice across design and implementation for radical governance and complex change projects. She is brought into her work by a belief and commitment that changing how we relate, from our smallest interactions to our wider systems, is a key opportunity for change towards a more sustainable and just future. Outside of work, she enjoys dancing in fields, running community raves, going for a mosey and sharing good food.
Joanne Doyle
Joanne has designed, developed and overseen partnership projects for many years both in the charitable and public sectors. This involves facilitating partnerships, building relationships, exploring funding opportunities and collaborations. Leading a Strategic approaches and programmes team in Natural Resources Wales, Joanne is concerned with systems approaches for an equitable and sustainable future for people and nature. She would like to shift her capacity for systems change and is excited to participate in this Huddle to embrace that.
Hilary Cox Condron also joined the Huddle but sadly had to step back for personal reasons. Hilary is an activist and former county councillor. Her passion for social and environmental justice through the arts has informed her participatory practice, and she has many years experience of making space for developing conversation, collaboration and the imagination — working with schools, new communities, marginalised groups, museums, cultural venues and local government.
This Huddle will be holding a Showcase event on Thursday 24th October. If you are interested in taking part in this event, please email hello@huddlecraft.com.
The wider Collective Imagination Practice Community will be hosting a Year 2 Celebration event on Tuesday 10th December, during which Huddlers will be sharing their experiences. Join our mailing list to receive the updates on this event alongside other news from our community.
