A few weeks ago I had lunch with a friend who introduced me to the concept of design charrettes (no, it’s not a classy version of Chat Roulette). A design charrette is a way to super-charge the planning phase of the project by collecting a group of cross-functional stakeholders together in a series of workshops to vet different design options. My friend works for a company that helps implement sustainable development projects, in many cases, building projects. In these types of projects, planning is tremendously important because design choices become locked-in and are costly to change. Also, when designing to simultaneously optimize for natural ecosystems, the usability of public spaces, and aesthetics, there is a great deal of complexity, both from a sustainable planning perspective and from a stakeholder perspective. Complex systems result in more long-term unintended consequences (see Complexity and Wikinomics), so a p