Field Notes

What we have learned in the room

Notes on creative problem-solving, design thinking, first principles, and the resident model. Drawn from real engagements, written to be useful.

Case Study

What a 24-Year-Old Cold Case Taught Us About Stuck Problems

We paired the Simplexity process with AI to reinvestigate a decades-old homicide alongside IMPD. Much of the technology fell short, and the real lesson is the one every stuck business needs to hear.

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Facilitation

How to Run a Problem-Reframing Workshop

The two-day framework, move by move, that turned twenty-five people in Manitou Springs from adversaries into a team with a shared plan.

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Facilitation

How Competing Agendas Become Shared Vision

When people from rival organizations leave a room as allies, something structural changed. A look at what actually shifts, and how.

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Method

The Simplexity Framework, Step by Step

A working guide to the eight-step creative problem-solving process, and why skipping the early steps is what leaves teams stuck.

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Method

Design Thinking in Practice: From Empathy to Action

Design thinking is not a workshop you attend. It is a way of working you keep. The difference lives entirely in the facilitation.

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Method

First Principles Thinking: How to Question Everything

Strip an assumption down to what is actually true, then rebuild. The three-step method we teach, and where it earns its keep.

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Facilitation

Why Workshops Fail, and How to Run Ones That Stick

Day one everyone loves it, day seven nothing changed. The failure is almost always baked into the design, not the delivery.

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Model

The Resident Model: Why Embedded Innovation Works

Consultants leave decks. Residents leave capability. Why embedding an Innovator in Residence changes the outcome, and when to choose it.

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