Research
The DESIS Lab’s activities are informed by research. Our work builds upon our expertise in qualitative methods to develop strong theoretical contributions and contribute meaningfully to the current academic conversations by developing a rich theoretical understanding of different forms of organizing for collaboration and social innovation. We are interested in understanding the everyday challenges of cross-sector collaboration, open social innovation, co-creation as well as of public administration and political collective action.
Selected publications
2025
Fayard, AL, and Tamisier-Fayard (Forthcoming). Designing for Collaboration in Cross-sector and intra-sector collaboration for social impact, edited by Miguel Pina e Cunha and Rita Diniz, SILABO
Ortiz Casillas, S. (2025). The Politics of Regulatory Oversight: How Analysts Expand, Shield, or Bend their Mandate while Reviewing Regulations. Regulation & Governance. Early view. https://doi.org/10.1111/rego.70029
Ortiz-Casillas, S. and Arellano-Gault, D. (2025). Public administration in the Global South: Some clues to its contradictory richness and the limits of prescriptions from the north. In M. Aristigueta & E. Ramirez de la Cruz (Eds.), Handbook of Public Management in Latin America and the Caribbean (pp. 26–41). Edward Elgar Publishing.
Bento, B., Fayard, AL. (2025) Reimagining community through Living Assemblage: the Nova SBE Community Garden Cross media arts – creative assemblages for social impact, 2025
2024
Gerchow, L., Lanier, Y.,Fayard, A.L., & Squires, A. (2024). Co-creating first steps, a toolkit to improve adolescent sexual and reproductive health services: A human-centered design study with Hispanic and Black Adolescent Mothers in New York City. JMIR: Pediatrics and Parenting.
Fayard, AL., Mendola, M. (2024). The 3-Stage Process That Makes Universities Prime Innovators. Harvard Business Review and Inspiring Minds by Harvard Business Publishing (blog post), April and June.
Fayard, AL., Majekodunmi, J., Mendola, M., Kenny, R. (2024). Nurturing Innovation. Harvard Business Review, March-April.
Fayard, AL. , Fathallah ,S. (2024). Design Thinking Misses the Mark. Stanford Social Innovation Review, Winter 2024 Print Issue (cover story).
2023
Fayard, AL. (2023). Making Time for Social Innovation: How to Interweave Clock Time and Event Time in Open Social Innovation to Nurture Idea Generation and Social Impact. Organization Science, September.
Anthony, C., Bechky B., Fayard, AL. (2023). “Collaborating” with AI: Taking a System View to Explore the Future of Work. Organization Science, January.
Fayard, AL, (2023), Open Social Innovation, In Encyclopedia of Social Innovation. Eds. J. Howaldt and C. Kaletka, Edward Elgar Publishing
2019
Fayard, AL, Bill, V., Chase, J and Kush, S. 2019. Designing Interactive Artifacts to Generate New Modes of Engagement in an Academic Makerspace”. Paper presented at the International Symposium on Academic MakerSpaces October 2019: https://isam2019.hemi-makers.org/program/
2018
Fayard, AL. November 2018, Why Design Thinking Matters? Special issue on Design Thinking, Journal of Financial Transformation. Capco Institute, vol. 48: 42-47
1988
Mackay, W., Fayard, AL., Frobert, L., and Medini, L. 1998. Reinventing the familiar: Exploring an Augmented Reality Design Space for Air Traffic Control In Proceedings of CHI'98 (Conference on Computer-Human Interactions), LA, USA.
1987
Mackay, W. and Fayard, AL. 1997. HCI, Natural Science and Design: A Framework for Triangulation Across Disciplines, in Proceedings of DIS'97 : Designing Interactive Systems, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
OpEds
2026
Impact: Moving beyond what we can count (Expresso, July 2026)
Impacto: ir além do que podemos quantificar
The Missing Variable in Innovation (Observador, March 2026)
A variável de inovação em falta
2024
Who’s Afraid of Frankenstein (Observador, June 2024)
Que tem medo de Frankenstein?
A praise of nuance (Observador, April 2024)
Um elogio da nuance
The Hare and the Tortoise (Observador, January 2024)
A lebre e a tartaruga
2023
Why writing is a future-ready skill in the 21st century (Observador, October 2023)
A escrita é uma competência com futuro
2021
There is no magic formula for climate change: it is everyone’s responsibility and work!
(Publico, November 2021)
Não há fórmula mágica para as alterações climáticas: é da responsabilidade e trabalho de todos!
Check stories of our work on our Substack "Social Innovation: Chasing Change"