Results from your search will be shown on this page below the search form – you may need to scroll down to the results if the page does not automatically take you there after you submit your search.
Instructions:
- All blog posts are searched (pages from the menu are not searched)
- Search outputs are weighted by relevance.
- If searching with two or more words, the system uses an AND operator.
- Selecting a tag, author tag and/or category binds the search to only those posts which have those taxonomy term/s.
- A search output can be obtained by filling out any one field (ie., the search box; or, categories; or, tags; or, authors). If all fields are left blank, then the search returns the blog scroll.
- Exact word combinations can be searched for by using quotation marks (eg., “transdisciplinary learning”).
- Keyword matching is on partial words.
- The reset button (beneath the ‘Submit search’ button) will clear all entries in the search form, as will clicking on the ‘Search…’ link in the top of the right sidebar; or, reloading the page.
- Stopwords are used and for more information on stopwords and how search generally works on this page, see the ‘in-detail’ instructions below.
The search function checks all blog posts but not pages (ie., it does not check the ‘About’, ‘Index’ and other pages listed in the main menu).
For posts, search checks within titles, body text, category and tag text (and not comments).
Searches are weighted by relevance, with affects the order in which posts appear, with titles and content getting the most weighting, tags and categories lesser weighting.
Increasing the number of search terms and selections generally focuses the search output (ie., decreases the number of outputs).
Keyword matching is based on whole words.
If you enter two or more words into the search box, the relationship between the words is based on an AND operator (meaning the more words you add, the tighter (less content is returned in) the search output).
- For example, entering transdisciplinary learning into the search box would provide an output that lists all posts with both the word transdisciplinary and the word learning anywhere in the text. Posts with only transdisciplinary in the text or posts with only learning in the text would not be included in the output.
To find a specific word combination (eg., critical systems), wrap in quotation marks (ie., “critical systems“).
The search system uses ‘stopwords’; which are words that are overly common and so are excluded from being searched for if they are put into the search field (in order to avoid flooding the user with results). For example, words such as ‘has’, ‘sometimes’, ’whether’ are stopwords and can’t be searched on individually (that is, no search result will be returned). Such stopwords can be entered as part of a string of words, but as they are not in the search index they do not count towards the search output. There are also words that are very common across our blog posts and which we allow (to be searched on). These words relate to the way we build the content of our posts (eg., ‘biography’; ‘online’) or are related to the blog’s subject matter (eg., ‘research’, ‘university’). Just be aware that if you search on such words (either alone or in a string), you will get a very large number of results. At the time of writing, the following words are examples to avoid using: biography; change; development; experience; knowledge; science; PhD; policy; practice; process; research; social; time; university; work. A good rule of thumb if using a single search term and if there are a lot of results returned (in 2026, there were over 500 blog posts on this site), is to use one or more of the other fields (eg., tag), or add extra search terms to the search field, or try a different term that speaks to what you are searching for.
When you open a post that was found by your search, you can find where your specific word or word combination appears by using your computer’s search function (eg., on a computer running Microsoft Windows, Control ‘F’ will allow you to search the post (as well as anything else in the active screen)).
Restrict searches to particular tags, categories and/or author tags by using the dropdown selectors.
- Eg., if you choose the tag Advocacy, the search will only be conducted within posts that have that tag assigned to them.
- If you added the category Cases to that search, then only posts that had both the tag Advocacy and the category Cases assigned to them would be searched.
An alternative to selecting categories, tags or authors from their respective long drop-down list is to type the term or author name you are looking for in the relevant selector field. Typing one letter will jump to the lead word in the alphabetical listing (ie, typing ‘s’ takes you to the first tag or category in the list of those starting with ‘s’). Further addition of letters will home in on a tag, category or author until it is found or until the choice of letters exhausts the possible set of tags, categories or authors (in which case that tag, category or author is not in our list). NOTE: all authors are also available in reverse name order under ‘Authors‘ in the menu bar.
In the category, tag and author dropdown list, the number in brackets after each entry indicates the number of posts with that category, tag or author assigned to them.
Tags or authors with a zero in brackets “(0)”, placed after the tag or author text, are not currently linked to any blog posts. In the case of tags, most of these tags identify alternative tags, which, if searched, will yield a result. For example, “Assumptions – see ‘Mental models’ tag (0)” signifies that blog posts about ‘assumptions’ are tagged with ‘mental models’ and not ‘assumptions.’ Occasionally there will be a tag (or author tag) with “(0)” which refers to a new tag (or author tag) on a blog post which has not yet been made public. This tag (or author tag) will be searchable once the blog post is public (usually within a week).
For the category selector, choosing one of the two parent categories (main topics or resource types) searches all blog posts, as all blog posts are assigned a main topic and a resource type.
Transforming experts into team science leaders
By Gemma Jiang.
Are you transitioning from a subject matter expert to a team leader? What is key to leadership? What challenges are you likely to confront? What questions will you need to address?
Defining leadership
Leadership is about influencing change among a collective of people, not about titles or top-down decision-making.
Influencing change
Change is an enduring and accelerating force, from the actions of ancient mythological heroes to the demands of our rapidly evolving VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) world. Effective leadership bridges deep personal transformation and profound organizational change, guiding individuals and institutions through transitions and innovations.
Influencing a collective
Insights into the science of complexity
By Jean Boulton
What are the key ideas that define the science of complexity? How do they help us better understand our world so that we can engage more effectively?
The science of complexity conveys a view of the world as dynamic, richly interdependent and full of variety.
“A world – organic and emergent, shaped by history and context – naturally patterned, yet always in process” (Boulton 2024: 39).
Ilya Prigogine asked why classical physics and evolutionary biology seem to contradict each other. The word that brought these two sciences together and shaped the development of complexity theory, was ‘open’ (Prigogine 1977).
Situations that are open to their environments display emerging order in the form of patterns of relationships.
Setting up your team for knowledge integration
By Shalini Misra, Megan A. Rippy and Stanley B. Grant.
2. Megan A. Rippy (biography)
3. Stanley B. Grant (biography)
What kinds of collaborative arrangements best foster knowledge integration? Should you keep your team together by forming one big group to work toward your shared goals? Or should you differentiate tasks by breaking work into smaller components and assign the pieces to sub-groups? How large should sub-groups be and how should they be composed? What types of engagement processes lead to successful knowledge integration?
If you have led a large cross-disciplinary research effort, you have grappled with these questions.
We addressed these questions by assessing the linkages between integration processes and research products in a self-evaluation of the first two years of our National Science Foundation Growing Convergence Research project on inland freshwater salinization (Misra, Rippy and Grant, 2024).
Breaking boundaries: Transforming research with co-production and bridging knowledge systems
By Truphena E. Mukuna and Alemu Tesfaye Shekunte.
2. Alemu Tesfaye Shekunte (biography)
What role do communities play in shaping research that affects their lives? How can academia break free from the constraints of traditional disciplinary boundaries to foster more inclusive knowledge production? We explore these questions based on our experience in researching forced displacement.
The challenge of traditional research methodologies
Historically, much research in the Global South has been dominated by Western perspectives and methodologies. These often lack cultural relevance and fail to engage meaningfully with the communities they study. Consequently, the resulting body of knowledge can be disconnected from the lived realities of those studied. In addition, disciplinary biases often overshadow the philosophical underpinnings of research methods. Researchers may adopt a ‘positivist’ or ‘constructivist’ stance or prefer ‘quantitative’ over ‘qualitative’ methods.
Designing serious games to address transdisciplinary problems
By Katharina Gugerell.
What are serious games? What are their benefits? What is involved in developing serious games?
Serious games are digital, analogue or hybrid games designed in a way that goes beyond pure entertainment. They aim to educate or inform players or evoke discussions and conversations and provide an environment for futuring processes – in various fields, such as land-use, healthcare, water management, commons or natural hazards.
By integrating engaging gameplay elements with real-world scenarios or real-world contexts, serious games are expected to facilitate (different forms of) learning, interaction, world-building and scenario-building, as well as critical reflection on social, cultural, consumption and production practice. These games can incorporate real-time simulations, joint problem solving, and interactive storytelling to immerse participants into the topic. Serious games are celebrated for their motivational, emotional and entertaining aspects, that allow players to become familiar with different perspectives of complex problems or engage in futuring processes in a very intuitive and emotional way.
The role of frames and framing in communication and change
Edited by Gabriele Bammer
What are frames and framing? What roles do they play in making change happen? What are some essential principles of framing? Can framing be used to manipulate people?
This editor’s addition draws on the 2014 updated edition of George Lakoff’s classic work “Don’t think of an elephant.” Lakoff provided these ideas in the US context of the contest between progressive and conservative ideas, and here they are adapted to be more general, including highlighting issues relevant to dealing with complex problems.
What are frames?
There is no simple definition of frames, with key elements including that they are embedded in neural circuits, that they are linked to morals or values, and that they are evoked by language. Lakoff highlights that: