Centre of expertise Mission Zero

Living labs are complex multi-stakeholder collaborations that often employ a usercentred and design-driven methodology to foster innovation. Conventional management tools fall short in evaluating them. However, some methods and tools dedicated to living labs' special characteristics and goals have already been developed. Most of them are still in their testing phase. Those tools are not easily accessible and can only be found in extensive research reports, which are difficult to dissect. Therefore, this paper reviews seven evaluation methods and tools specially developed for living labs.

Evaluating Living Labs? Methods and tools

Today more than ever, higher education is finding itself at a crossroad. While the internet is filled with qualitative sources of knowledge, universities can often not provide their students with the skillset they actually need for their professional life. Traditional education will get less and less relevant, if it doesn't transform itself into a learning experience the internet can't offer.

An example of such transformation has been 'Mission Impact', a minor taught for the first time in the fall semester of 2020 at The Hague University of Applied Sciences. 17 students of nine nationalities and 12 different bachelor programmes came together to work on wicked problems and apply their respective knowledge, through transgressive, place-based learning.

Connecting to a place in the middle of a pandemic has not been the easiest task. While all learning contexts had to be translated to the new online reality, students were scattered across Europe, preventing some, from meeting their group members or the place they were trying to impact. That it is still possible, is proven through this magazine. After the end of the minor half of the group decided to spend their time and work on this artefact, to create a visualisation of their learning experience over the past couple of months. The change of narrative at Mission Impact and the focus on a more ecological and relational practices has allowed these students to learn and thrive in a safe environment.

This magazine is an open invitation for all sorts of learners. We hope this magazine will inspire our readers. To connect, to transform, to learn. And most of all, we hope you'll enjoy reading it.

IMPACT Magazine Issue 1, February 2021 (pdf)

Key Insights and Policy Recommendations 

Our predominantly linear economy based on a take-make-dispose model of consumption is incompatible with the finite resources available to us on Earth. Major organisations such as corporations and governments make a large proportion of purchases that prompt immense material demands which negatively harm the planet. The government of the Netherlands, for example, made up 12% of total spendings on products and services within the country in 2019.  

While circularity is a promising model to close loops and put an end to the take-make-dispose mentality, such issues should be tackled at the root; material inputs. Procurement thereby becomes a promising area to study and reform. 

While many barriers exist that slow the adoption of circular procurement practices, there are plenty of opportunities in this area that can help to pave the way for a circular future. 

This policy brief concludes with four policy recommendations:  

(1) a new hierarchy of R strategies 

(2) true pricing 

(3) implementing material flow passports and  

(4) improved contract management 

Download the whitepaper 

In collaboration with Future-Proof Labs, researchers have developed three tools that provide support for multi-stakeholders that are dealing with challenges like miscommunication, differences in values and uncertainty about tasks and goals when collaborating.

Cooperating with people is always difficult since miscommunications and different views of tasks and concepts can get in the way. This is exponentially so in spaces for creative collaboration towards sustainability transitions, when stakeholders come from different backgrounds and institutions with their own way of working.

These three tools will help users to reflect on their own values and goals, listen to and understand other stakeholders’ point of view and vocalize the participation and expectations one has regarding a common lab project.

The complexity related to co-creating in labs tends to come from a lack of understanding of one’s own biases, other partners’ perspectives and the expectations each 'new teammate’ has regarding their own and other people’s roles and participation levels during the project. The three tools in this chapter aim to tackle three different aspects of these issues by allowing participants to gain a deeper understanding of themselves and their partners, as well as the dynamics in a lab.

Even though they were initially developed for a lab environment, the tools can also be used to facilitate stakeholder collaboration within any field. They also encourage the consideration of the natural environment as a stakeholder. Therefore, these tools are most useful for coordinators and facilitators of dialogue among varied groups of people that might struggle to see eye to eye.

Download here the three tools:
Tool 1. Stories from Watertown
Tool 2. Lab Conversation Cards 
Tool 3. Mountain Sight planning game

Living labs are complex multi-stakeholder collaborations that often employ a usercentred and design-driven methodology to foster innovation. Conventional management tools fall short in evaluating them. However, some methods and tools dedicated to living labs' special characteristics and goals have already been developed.

Download the whitepaper