We could never have foreseen it, yet it happened. From one day to the next our life was paused, forcing us to give up a stressful but reassuring routine. The stop is paying off: the contagions continue to slowly decrease, and most citizens have understood the importance of respecting the limitations, accepting the condition of isolation.
On the other hand, we have the opportunity to focus on ourselves: we finally have time to plan. Aware of the fact that, once the emergency is over, the world will no longer be the same, it will be necessary to redesign future plans. Hence the importance of sitting at a table, reflecting and planning: this means, in fact, stopping, understanding who you are, who you want to be and where you want to go, studying the ways to achieve old and new goals. Designing means giving direction to our existence. It is a valid process at an individual, school and company level, therefore it affects each of us to different degrees.
But designing is not just about being aware of the goal. She is there, fixed and well defined, but nobody has given us the indications to reach her. In front of us there is an insidious path, sometimes dark and hostile, but inevitable: it is the only road that leads to the finish.
First of all, it is necessary to observe our starting conditions and the resources available. Then you need training, in order to be better prepared to face a new challenge. At this point, fear and fear may emerge: we do not know the ground we will have to step on, but we can resort to the help of others to learn how to manage emotions. Once fear is internalized, awareness of the risk will come: we know that things may not go according to our plans, the road we have chosen may be abandoned in favor of another path, or dangers may arise that we did not know we had to face. Risk assessment is a key design moment, at all application levels.
Designing therefore means taking an unsafe road, on which the dangers are around the corner, and made up of many ramifications that could make us lose our sense of direction. We cannot predict everything, the only resource available to us is the past. Therefore the reading of experience is fundamental. From our previous experiences we can understand the present and formulate hypotheses about the future.
We will ask ourselves who we are, how we got to this point by learning to use the past to achieve future goals. Once the journey towards the new destination has begun, one must be ready to stop, evaluating each step and studying new ways to adapt to unpredictable contexts, such as those that will characterize the new post Corovavirus world.
So plan: define the objectives, choose a strategy, establish the intermediate stages, monitor, control and modify during the course of work, where necessary. Any task can be turned into a project.