Distributed Collaborative Sensemaking: Tracing a Gradual Process

Abstract

This Pictorial discusses the outcomes of a distributed embodied ideation workshop. In this workshop, students of a Bachelor program on Management by Design explained their thesis by visualizing and externalizing the problem space using everyday objects. The use of objects to represent and understand complex design problems is well documented in the fields of Design and Human-Computer Interaction, but is often researched in collocated settings. What happens when the design tools used to externalize and represent complex design problems are everyday household objects, and the discussion happens in a distributed, asynchronous manner? How is shared meaning negotiated and established? In this Pictorial, we discuss six pictures that were taken of the visual representations that the students constructed, and reflect upon the distributed, asynchronous process that was employed to create, develop, and agree upon meaning.