Usually a sprinkle of smaller assignments is nesting in the folds of our larger projects.

This spring and early summer we facilitated two sessions of debate and reflection with the Strategic Advice Council for Wellbeing, Health and Family Policy (Strategische Adviesraad voor Welzijn-, Gezin- en Gezondheidsbeleid).  The council groups representatives of the Flemish health care system, socio-economic partners and independent experts and advises the Flemish government in pressing health care matters. The strategic reflection facilitated by shiftN centered on concerns related to the imminent next stage in the process of state reform. For health care this will be associated with the transfer of significant budgets and mandates from the federal to the regional level.

iMade, on the other hand, is an innovation project that wants to valorize the potential of rapid manufacturing in a transition to greater economic competitiveness and sustainable materials management in Flanders. The project is funded by the Flemish Government and led by Plan C, the transition network for sustainable materials management. shiftN was asked to facilitate a future scenarios-based innovation process for one of the two lead plants (Helbig, a producer of modular retail environments). In two sessions we developed a set of scenarios for the future of physical retail environments and put a foundation in place for the identification of promising novel business concepts for Helbig.

Our colleague Angela Wilkinson, who has been leading the Futures programme at the Smith School for Enterprise and the Environment (but has since moved to OECD as head of Futures) invited us to co-facilitate two workshops in a project focused on exploring future low-carbon mobility regimes. The project is led by the Transport Studies Unit at the University of Oxford. More information on this project can be found on their websites.

Finally, we conducted an innovation session at KBC Bank centered around the Sustainable Innovation System Toolkit (which we co-developed with Pars Pro Toto for OVAM, the Public Waste Agency of Flanders). The SIS Toolkit is a generic instrument to help innovators in any sector to develop more sustainable products and services.