Breakthrough Game and Collaborative Tools Workshop - CSPS

For best results please view this page on a desktop browser Pour la version française, cliquez ici Event Details and Registration The Canada School of Public Service (CSPS) and the Archipelago of Design are pleased to announce an upcoming offering of the Breakthrough Game and Collaborative Tools Workshop, designed for federal government analysts and managers to experience a world-class "serious game" and explore how we conceive of, and make decisions about, complex challenges.​ WHEN December 18-19, 2023, 9am-5pm WHERE John G. Diefenbaker Building (in-person only)​ - 111 Sussex Drive, Ottawa HOW To register for that workshop, please reach out to nationalsecurityprogram-programmedesecuritenationale@csps-efpc.gc.ca

Who we are

The Geopolitics and National Security Learning Program is a special initiative created in 2020 by the CSPS to introduce public servants to the latest thinking, practices and tools related to geopolitical and national security issues.​​

Archipelago of Design is a Canadian non-profit promoting design thinking, innovation, and change leadership through consultation, facilitation, toolkits, coaching, and serious games.​​​

What you will do

During this workshop (in collaboration with Archipelago of Design), participants will:

• Investigate a complex, fictive crisis set in Canada’s North in 2040 as part of the Breakthrough Exercise, a serious game/role-playing exercise undertaken in small groups
• Learn about collaborative learning tools and practice applying these tools to the analysis of real-life complex issues
• Deliberate Canadian interests, values and the nature of public service with colleagues from across the federal government

Day 1 – Breakthrough Game Participants play the Breakthrough Game, a serious game that immerses small groups of participants in a fictive scenario taking place in Canada’s North in 2040. In this game, participants play the roles of federal investigators who must try to understand and resolve a highly complex problem in an extremely ambiguous environment and with very limited resources.

Day 2 – Reflection and Applications Participants reflect together on how their groups used sense-making strategies during the Breakthrough Exercise. Experts provide them with tools to help make sense of and tackle complex problems and systems. They then practice using those tools on real-life problems that the Government of Canada is or will need to address over the coming decades.