Reflection Canvas – An Approach to Structure Reflection Activities in Engineering Design

Abstract

Digitalisation affects all areas of organisations including processes, methods, tools, roles, or information flows and results in frequent changes with short intervals. In engineering projects (EP), new methods, and process improvement are important. Reflection, as a dynamic process between consciousness and activities (Jobst et al., 2020), has proven to enhance processes by offering benefits for team performance, team innovation and team effectiveness. In this paper, reflection is not aimed only at the solution but at the structured action and thus an active participation process of action. However, despite the high relevance and ongoing discussion about agility in engineering design, reflection as an agile method is rarely established in EP. While a plenty of reflection methods is described in the literature, only a few consider the entire Method EcoSystem (i.e. method use, context, design goals, information artifacts, and design outcomes) relevant when adapting and improving EP. To address the analysis and adaption of methods and design processes within existing Method EcoSystems, this paper considers the objects and process of reflection form an engineering point of view. Following a framework established in earlier work, a Reflection Canvas is proposed as a tool to raise awareness and structure and support reflection activities to implement new methods, adapt processes and improve collaboration in EP. Therefore, the analysis reflects on the tactical (development team) and operational (development team member) level and focusses on the three reflection dimensions social, process and goal. To assess the quality of the approach, we subjected it to a first practical test. The proposed canvas was evaluated to be helpful. On the one hand, the results illustrate the relevance of structured reflection in organisations. On the other hand, support for planning (e.g. in documentation or clarification of responsibilities) for implementation in everyday work is given.

Evaluating Reflective Behavior in Engineering Design Retrospectives: An Initial Coding Scheme

“…The development of reflAct4teams-short was based on the previous act4teams-short categories (Klünder et al, 2020) and on the reflection procedure according to Ammersdörfer et al (2022; cf. Section 1.2) and validated by comparison with previous instruments for capturing reflection (cf.…”

“…Figure 1) and to examine the characteristics (e.g. reflective competence, motivation, acceptance) of the engineers, Ammersdörfer et al (2022) propose the tool "Reflection Canvas". Through the Canvas, we encourage the reflection-typical behavior of the engineers, provide guidance for the reflection procedure, and guarantee the written documentation of the results.…”

“…Across all of them, it is difficult to make reflection measurable in tangible terms, as the definition of reflection often varies widely. Ammersdörfer et al (2022), for example, refer to different approaches to reflection in terms of timing, level of detail, content, and process steps and, following Inkermann et al (2020), distinguish between conceptual and generic reflection procedures. Kalk et al (2014) further differentiate between various methodological approaches that have been used.…”

“…Overall, 31% of the codes assigned fall into the Awareness part of the reflection model used (cf. Ammersdörfer et al, 2022). 57% fall into the analyzing part.…”

“…A total of eight people participated in the meeting, the duration of the meeting was 63 minutes, and the reflection was led by a facilitator from the engineering field, coded by two organizational psychologists in the background, and the responses were recorded by one person. The reflection workshop was divided into the three areas of feedback, reflection (operational and tactical), and measures and strategies according to the procedure based on the Reflection Canvas by Ammersdörfer et al (2022). This moderation procedure according to a reflection framework, should already sensitise the participants for the structured reflection procedure and offer a certain security through the moderator that reflection will take place on several areas.…”