Fluffy frameworks

Posted by on May 26, 2010 in Communication, Projects, Training, Work | 2 comments

Scaffolding

Scaffold, by kevindooley on flickr

I gave a brief presentation at the 2010 Science Communication conference yesterday, talking about the work that I did with the Sanger Institute on professional development in science communication.  You can download the report here.

The very concept of a framework was quite worrying to some people, for all sorts of reasons.  In bureaucratic-leaning organisations, things on paper can often take on a life of their own.   Personally I like frameworks because they help organise my thinking, but they shouldn’t stand alone.  They are not the Thing Itself, they are support for the Thing.   I am now pondering a picture of a fluffy, marshmallow-like framework.  A see-through skeleton perhaps: fine and strong, but not terribly visible to the naked eye.

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  • Michael Mooney

    I did some work with a charity a couple of years ago, and found that the image of bamboo scaffolding, of which there are some prodigious examples in India, worked well for them. Structure, but flexible and organic…

  • Alison

    Oh, that’s a great image. I remember them outside high-rise flats in Hong Kong.

    I was also thinking of wee see-through fish bones: slender and insubstantial, but incredibly strong.

    I’ve been so close to this particular project that it was interesting watching people’s take on it.