»Finally we feel we are all part of the same project«: Salzburg experience through the lens of Slovene team
For the past months, the participants of the second learning cycle of Active8-Planet were brainstorming, developing their ideas and facing sustainability-related challenges mostly within each 7+1 team, based in different European countries. The two meet-ups in December in February were held online and – despite the well-designed, skilfully facilitated workshops – the distance remained. And we, the »Planeteers« sometimes felt like we are living on different planets. Since October 2022 the Slovene group has been meeting regularly, drafting the project idea, discussing the methodological and practical challenges with both academic partners and industry professionals and consequently begin the ethnographic research, which was conducted in pairs, where we focused on car-sharing mobility practices in Ljubljana. After the fieldwork phase, the whole team started to meet again and – from a messy, contextual and rich qualitative data – identified some common insights that could lead to improvement of more sustainable mobility futures in the urban space of the capital city. We were aware that »somewhere« other teams are tackling similar environmental challenges, but we were occupied with our challenge and – so we thought – specificities of how and why people are driving, cycling and walking in Ljubljana.
Photo 1: Slovene team just before identifying the key after-fieldwork insights, Ljubljana, April 18, 2023
After our team arrived to Salzburg and the warming-up of the first evening was over, we quickly started to realize that even though each group was focusing on its unique challenges we have far more in common than we initially thought. Common points were not just the thematic challenges but also the practical ones: how to integrate the Active8-Planet activities within the busy student schedules? Can we include the findings of our work within the context of our studies? How to navigate between the horizons of the industry partners and our research ideas? How to transform knowledge we gained into the applied format? How to collaborate in a group and what kind of hierarchies to question? What differences do we have to keep in mind when engaging in intense group work, especially in interdisciplinary settings? How to be sensitive towards others’ (and our) needs? What kind of reflexivity is needed when tackling sustainable-related challenges? What is people- and planet-centered approach in times of increasing digitalisation, climate crisis, and complex global changes?
Photo 2: Slovene team discussing with Prof. Vaike Fors as part of the fishbowl method, Salzburg, May 16, 2023
All these questions were at least implicitly present during the intense two days we spent in Salzburg. But so were present the laughter, games and barbecue in the garden. As a servant leader I have had an opportunity to observe how the group dynamics were changing – the initial reservation quickly faded away as the students got to know each other better and realised they can learn from each other. This sense of togetherness and cross-team enrichment felt like the peak point of the whole learning cycle. Well, not to mention the moment when the Slovenian team was returning to our accomodation after the dinner and one of the students said to another: »What if you would sing to us?« And we stood in an empty picturesque Austrian square, mesmerized by Pia’s voice. Well, there are some moments that cannot be foreseen in any project goals. This was one of them.
Photo 3: Group photo after the Salzburg adventure, May 16, 2023