The Living Labs: Innovation in Real-Life Settings Free

Although a majority of the activity in living labs occurs in Europe, the concept of living labs originally came from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Bill Mitchell, former dean of MIT's School of Architecture and Planning, originally developed this concept introducing the Smart Cities research group at MIT Media Lab. This lab “Pioneered new approaches to integrating design and technology to make cities more responsive to their citizens and more efficient in their use of resources” (Frost, 2010, para. 2). A living lab should be seen as a research concept and is user centered. It often is linked to, or operates in, a city or a region, and frequently involves communities, not as observers but as participants—as a source of creation. Living labs aim at changing users from observers to cocreators and to explorers of innovative concepts. In living labs, research is focused on capturing evidence and data from end-users involved in the LL case. Once data is analyzed for patterns, trends and unique/outstanding ideas, the findings become useful in the implementation process. The research also enables end-user perspectives to be shared with the other stakeholders.

Living labs encourage users and developers to work very closely together and the evidence from “real life” testing is used to improve the resulting products and services. MIT, one of the first LLs, sees as main function of the living labs to bring together interdisciplinary experts to develop, deploy, and test—in actual living environments—new technologies and strategies for design that respond to this changing world. MIT's LL spans in scale from the personal to the urban, and addresses challenges related to health, energy, and creativity (http://livinglabs.mit.edu/).

Living labs provide a place for companies, research institutes, students, residents, and visitors to share creative ideas and produce new services and business models. When the living lab is part of an academic institution, students collaborate with stakeholders. Depending on the goals and content of the LL, specific students from relevant disciplines are chosen to participate. Students in these areas are chosen for their skills and expertise, and receive credit for participation.

There are currently 320 living labs around the world. The collaboration between the LLs is fostered by the European Network of Living Labs. The JAMK University of Applied Sciences in Finland is one of the current driving forces behind the development of the LLs. For this article we interviewed Piotr Krawczyk, a senior lecturer at the JAMK University and an enthusiastic and competent advocate for Living Labs. Krawczyk suggested that to understand the objectives and the working of the living lab in Finland it is useful to first have a brief look at the education system in Finland.

Finland's education system ranks among the highest and best in the world and differs in several ways from the U.S. education system. The Education Index lists Finland's index score as 0.993. Since 1980 this index score has increased consistently, so that the country is tied with Denmark, Australia and New Zealand. The United States ranks 13th, with an index score of 0.978 (International Human Development Indicators, 2011).

There are two other major distinctions between Finland's higher education system and that of the United States. The model of education in Finland and that of the living labs is based on a win-win mentality. While the higher education system in the United States is a very competitive environment, the Finnish system offers less competitive pressure. Instructors are seen as mentors and are not expected to set direction but rather to listen and advise. This signifies a more equal relationship between professors/instructors and students, differing greatly from the more hierarchical division as practiced in other parts of the world.

The Lutakko Living Lab at JAMK University of Applied Sciences in Finland was created “to make an innovative, user-centered environment for service business development through use of service design methods” (Report of the European Network of Living Labs, n.d., para. 1). The Lutakko Living Lab (LLL) is situated in Lutakko, which is in the Jyväskylä City district that hosts some 20 large businesses and some 500,000 visitors each year. The LLL specializes in service and experience design, service development for private companies and public institutions in tourism, hospitality, and in the creative and well-being sector. The LLL and many other LLs belong to an organization called the European Network of Living Labs. According to Ballon, international secretary of the European Network of Living Labs, a Living Lab is “A repeatable structure for how cities can run research and innovations programs to gain greater insights into any kind of technology-aided innovation … it allows us to observe real users interacting with the technology in real-life settings” (cited in Waltner, 2011, p. 1). Together, the European Network of Living Labs members support the “innovation lifecycle” for all actors in the system: end-users, secure mobile environments, corporations, public sector and academia (http://www.openlivinglabs.eu).

Krawczyk describes LLs as open innovation ecosystems, in which stakeholders (universities, businesses, organizations, researchers, government entities, community members, and customer end-users) collaborate to develop products or applications; in other words, living labs are open structures.

Living labs require skilled leadership to be successful. The leader in a living lab facilitates the activities of the lab instead of overly dictating the structure of the work. Rather than being highly specialized in just one field, the facilitator needs to be able to converse across and among specialized individuals and groups. Because the goal of LLs is often to produce a marketable product, the facilitator must understand/speak the language of business. This empowers not only businesses but also all other organizations partnering in a project. Similarly, a basic information technology background is important to understand information technology issues, at least conceptually. Academic experience is also necessary to include the researchers, students and other academics involved in the LL. Most, importantly, a LL facilitator has to be open to different viewpoints. Many facilitators do not possess all of those skills: it is, however, fundamental to the success of the projects that the facilitator can work with all stakeholders and participants to ensure effective communication. It seems useful to first discuss aspects of leadership in Finland and then focus on the Lutakko Living Lab in particular.

Krawczyk emphasizes that leadership styles in the Nordic countries may differ in important ways from leadership styles in other parts of the world. Nordic countries believe in a flat leadership style as being the most effective model for encouraging the growth and sustainability of living labs. Flat leadership can be defined as a leadership structure within an organization that carries neither hierarchies nor fancy titles. Students are at the core of any relevant learning experience, and effective leadership in education may often have fundamental impact on these experiences. According to Harris and Chapman (2002), leaders should be able to handle tension and problems effectively in an unpredictable setting. Also, effective leaders should put human needs above organizational needs, and thus be people centered. Finally, effective leaders should be able to encourage collaboration among colleagues and subordinates.

Reflecting on characteristics suggests that understanding various characteristics of leadership and how these characteristics persist in an educational setting. Krawczyk suggests that it is very important to provide relevant opportunities for real learning experiences can be created, for students as well as for community stakeholders so that collaborative existing services can be improved and new services can be launched. Krawczyk is well suited to play an important role at Lutakko's living labs. He has a varied and wide experience in, among other areas, global product development and management, global business development, e-commerce, and in research methods for business. He loves to share this experience with his students and with those involved in the development of the LLL.

There are currently 320 living labs around the world. Krawczyk suggests that there are as many different leadership models as there are LLs. The interview limits the discussion to the living lab housed at JAMK University of Applied Sciences. The LLL is structured around a flat leadership model. As we discussed already, leadership structures in Scandinavia are usually flat. Krawczyk prefers the term followership to leadership, and describes three models he incorporates into his definition of followership. These are Jim Collins's Good to Great, Robert Greenleaf's Servant Leadership and Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Successful People. Based on his experience these models can be effective in the context of day-today running of living lab activities. Krawczyk observes that participants from non-Scandinavian cultures may find adjusting to flat leadership/followership structures difficult.

Krawczyk refers to Jim Collins's level five leadership, Good to Great, and states that humility is fundamental to the highest level in Collins's ranking of executive capabilities. Level 5 leaders exemplify the exact opposite characteristics that most entrepreneurs personify or what most venture capitalists expect them to personify. They are “humble, quiet, reserved, shy, mild mannered, self-effacing, understated, [et cetera]” (Robinson, 2012). Krawczyk observes that the work in the LL is very hands-on and, as all members of the group participate as peers, humbleness and modesty are necessary.

Robert Greenleaf's notion of the servant-leader also includes humility and is based on the idea that a true leader should also strive to nurture employees as a compassionate servant might. Defined in Greenleaf's book, The Servant as Leader (1970), such leaders believe that “service to followers is the primary responsibility of leaders and the essence of ethical leadership” (Yukl, 2006, p. 420). The third theory is Covey's. The fourth habit in Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People is called “win-win”; it contrasts strongly with many types of leadership theories. Krawczyk likened this particular part (the win-win strategy) with some of the Scandinavian leadership styles. In order to be successful, win-win must replace unhealthy competition, or the win-lose paradigm. Simply put, win-lose is in place when “one's success can only be achieved at the expense of other person” (Covey, 2004, p. 206). Krawczyk explains why these models are relevant for the LLs. “The idea of open innovation requires you to be very humble and open to the end users, toward the community and you need to be driven by actually trying to create the value based on user feedback as one of the ways to ensure living lab sustainability” (Krawczyk, 2012). The leadership environment is a very informal one where authentic end users/customers are encouraged to take the lead. Living labs focus on “creating value” and thus “ensuring their own sustainability as open innovation ecosystem.” The users become co creators of solutions, products, and services. In the product definition or service development phases, the labs are often temporarily user led, but once the parameters are defined, if required, experts and professionals can take over during the implementation or any other phase. Yet most of Living Lab interactions often benefit from flat leadership structures.

To complete our overview of the living labs it may be useful to briefly discuss some applications. Krawczyk proposed the following examples:

• mobile learning;

• an exhibition center; and

• cloud computing.

Krawczyk highlights JAMK's Mobile Learning Project as an example of a successful LL. As part of an ongoing mobile learning (mlearning) project at LLL, JAMK University of Applied Sciences, a mobile learning platform called Movel has been developed and provided by a local secure mobile environment for testing. The project created clear evidence of value added based on implementation of user feedback in the development of mobile learning platform. Moreover, the documented evidence of value creation through user feedback implementation convinced the stakeholders involved to continue the innovation process.

The goal of the using service design methodology was to come to a better understanding of customer needs, by producing new service ideas and improvements for the existing service at International Congress and Trade Fair Centre Paviljonki. The following link provides extensive information: http://blogit.jamk.fi/lutakkolivinglab/files/2010/09/poster_paris.pdf.

Using an action research approach, the Lutakko Living Lab team studied effects of motivation and rewards on participation and performance of software developers in voluntary open source cloud environment of the SkyNest factory. The LLL participated in the SkyNest factory by codesigning, cocreating, implementing and observing the impact of reward system on project's general process, software developers’ satisfaction, and offered comprehensive reports aiming at the overall cloud development environment improvements.

The expansion of LLs into the developing world represents an opportunity. Krawczyk states that there are approximately 20 living labs in developing parts of the world, including in Latin America and Asia. There is potential for more labs in developing countries and “test beds” have been established to help pilot innovations. Historically, in Europe as well as the United States, there has been a tradition of a “technology push,” where companies in a closed innovation environment coordinate with research and development personnel and engineers to develop products and test them on potential and existing users. Instead of these kinds of closed environments, founding more living labs in the developing world may lead to more creative and inclusive innovation that in turn may produce more culturally friendly services and products.

One of the more successful projects at the Lutakko Living Lab is the Mobile Learning Project introduced above. It aims at enhancing eLearning at JAMK and its goal is to develop mobile extension to enhance the existing virtual learning environment. As with other LL projects, the Mobile Learning Project is a business/education collaboration between JAMK and a locally based company. The data and findings may be used by the for-profit company as well as for academic use and continuing research and development in the LL (Cases and Projects, 2011). The Mobile Learning Project works with a local subject matter specialist. Students involved in this project are also authentic end users. The benefit for LLs is that the same people who need these mobile tools for their own education are developing them for others.

The literature review on living labs carried out for this article has been greatly enriched by interviews with senior lecturer Piotr Krawczyk. He provided a unique and close-up view of the LLs and formed the basis of this article. The LLL is an example of collaboration between stakeholders, and it can be argued that, in part, the successes of the use cases can be attributed to the flat leadership model used.

The lessons learned from this interview and the literature review provide reference points for comparison with the worldwide development of eLearning and distributed/distance education. In the United States collaborations between publishers and K-12 have increased, as is the case in higher education. These collaborations seem to be primarily marketdriven. Businesses need to make a profit, but Ballon maintains that government bodies tend to rely on recommendations from information technology vendors when making technology and software decisions (Waltner, 2011). As they are for-profit businesses, they may not always have the best interest of the users at heart. Moreover, vendor-based solutions are not necessarily the correct ones to address identified needs. Working based on what community needs are, in an open innovation environment such as a living lab, the actual needs of an organization can be determined without involving a vendor knocking at the door. Living labs are based on a win-win model, and have a far better chance at meeting the user needs in collaboration with business. In other cases LLs create systems of government entities, collaborating with vendors and citizens to support improvements leading to sustainable cities (Waltner, 2011).

Krawczyk is of the opinion that there is a potential for more living labs, especially in the developing world. These LLs act as test beds where the for-profit industry and research industry may collaborate more in the future. There is likely to be more to learn from the worldwide network of LLs as more geographically and culturally diverse collaborations take place.

One challenge to LLs in geographically and culturally diverse environments is the leadership structure. LLs are innovative ecosystems that function quite efficiently when managed within a flat leadership approach, and when multiple stakeholders collaborate to produce new ideas and reform old ones, a system based less on a hierarchical structure, but on one where all stakeholders have an equal contribution. Further research and study into determining whether the flat leadership structure is indeed most effective in a great variety of circumstances seems to be needed.