If there is one word that sits at odds with government, it is probably ‘creativity’. However, for new, powerful ideas to emerge and become available for further development, scrutiny and testing, creativity is needed. The ability to embrace a divergence of possible solutions, and to keep those options in play for an extended period of time, is one of the characteristics that distinguishes truly innovative organisations from mediocre ones. However, as I have often suggested, public organisations and staff are sometimes decidedly afraid of ‘the Post-It’: worried that wild and unruly creativity, especially when it involves other actors outside the organisation, will unleash chaos and lack of control, and perhaps lead to political liabilities.

The previous chapter analysed how design methodologies, in part inspired by ethnographic research, contributed to making particular representations of the problem space for public managers and to bringing ‘empathic data’ into play. Approaches such as field research, generating emotional and empathic data, and visualisation of user journeys were key in this process.

The second dimension of design concerns the processes of identifying which possible actions to take – sometimes with the starting point in the input generated through user research, sometimes simply starting with an ambition, vision or inspiration to create change. This can be perceived as even more challenging than the research work, since the process now becomes more future oriented. Even though managers in government routinely are called on for their advice and suggestions, the practice of systematically generating new scenarios for the future is often not well developed. It can sometimes seem that where new ideas ‘really’ come from is somewhat of a black box.

The research behind this book offers insight into the idea-generating activities and experiences of public managers. In this chapter I first present and discuss the design methods associated with creating alternative future scenarios through a range of creative methods, user involvement and collaboration. What is the role of creative workshops (ideation processes) and systematic development of new concepts for solutions?

Second, I explore how the public managers in the cases experience the process of generating new solutions under conditions that are often complex, uncertain and open ended.