Combining Resources: A Participatory Intervention Promoting Organisational Learning, Social Innovation and Interorganisational Collaborations In Criminal Justice

Abstract

This chapter presents a participatory model for promoting organisational learning and innovation with potential application in criminal justice related organisations. We share the sensemaking process engaged in by the COLAB consortium tasked with comparing and contrasting a range of participatory interventions and developing a potentially hybrid model that combined the strengths of each. We describe this model on 11 key dimensions, that in themselves offer a useful tool through which different participatory methods might be compared. An expanded participatory model based on the Change Laboratory model and expansive learning cycle is presented, one augmented with the beneficial components of Activity Clinics, Boundary crossing workshops and codesign methods and developed within the criminal justice context.

Experiences of Vulnerability in Adult Male Prisoners: An Integrative Review

“…Professionals working on rehabilitation efforts should take into account the uncertainties of offenders, feelings of isolation, and their current fears of sexual, physical, and psychological harm. Greater inclusion of the prisoner as a service user in service development is essential in developing the so-called etemic perspective albeit this will not be without its challenges (Hean et al, 2021). Without addressing the vulnerabilities offenders feel in the here and now in prison, the less likely will it be that their engagement with rehabilitation and treatment programs in the prison will be successful.…”

A COLAB Model of Workplace Transformation in the Criminal Justice Context

“…This was built on the comparative framework developed by Vilela et al (2014) to compare participatory methods. The detail of the comparison between methods and the synthesis of the approaches is detailed elsewhere (Hean et al, 2020a). The first stage of the intervention, and the learning cycle, is a practicedriven need of some kind (Kajamaa & Lahtinen, 2016;Engeström et al, 2015;Virkkunen, 2006;Victor & Boynton, 1998).…”

“…The Change Laboratories model does not preclude these new elements and can accommodate and be enriched by these additions (Sannino, 2015). For example, it is suggested that the Change Laboratory lacks attention to power differentials and the emotional labour of its participants (Hean et al, 2020a(Hean et al, , 2020b. The prison is an already emotionally charged environment and participants may be less comfortable with an intervention that explicitly unpicks tensions and contradictions within services.…”

“…The chapter presents the efforts of a consortium of European researchers and practitioners (COLAB-H2020-MSCA-RISE-2016/734536) working together to merge their combined knowledge of methods of organisational change in other fields and apply these to the CJS. A more detailed description of these individual constituent methods, and how our model was developed, can be found elsewhere (Hean et al, 2020a). Sannino and Sutter (2011) describe interventions that promote organisational change as a toolkit.…”