What happens when engineers paint digitalisation?

Researcher Linnéa Carlsson asked engineers at Siemens Energy to paint their thoughts on digitalisation — a method that revealed entirely new perspectives on their interview responses. Photo: Linnéa Carlsson.

Industry 5.0 is a concept that emphasises the importance of keeping humans at the centre when new digital technologies are introduced in industry. Digital solutions and implementation processes can vary widely between companies – no two approaches are the same.

“Tailoring technical solutions is one thing; including people’s perspectives and experiences in the process is something entirely different. I wanted to understand how employees at Swedish industrial companies relate to Industry 5.0 and what it means for them in practice,” says Linnéa Carlsson, researcher in Informatics at University West.

One of the companies participating in her research project was Siemens Energy.

“After interviewing several employees about how they view digitalisation in industry and how they feel about it, I realised that the answers were almost identical. Everyone highlighted the goal of creating smarter, more efficient and more sustainable production,” Linnéa explains.

Choosing an alternative method

“That made me wonder why no one talked about the people involved or shared more personal reflections. Were the questions wrong? Could I find a better method? After exploring different approaches and studies, I decided to try Visual Research – a method commonly used in healthcare.

This method allows interviewees to illustrate their thoughts using colours, pencils or brushes on paper or another medium. Linnéa introduced the idea to the Business Excellence team at Siemens Energy. Despite some initial hesitation, she received approval to proceed.

Opened up for more meaningful conversations

In a new interview round, Linnéa combined her questions with a drawing exercise. Participants used a tablet and could freely choose techniques, colours and tools to illustrate their view of digitalisation.

“There was plenty of laughter and some hesitation when I asked them to paint their thoughts on digitalisation. A few were even provoked and chose not to participate. But interestingly, people began drawing trees, suns, people and other images that led to entirely new and more meaningful conversations as we reflected on them together. New perspectives on digitalisation suddenly emerged.”

More focus on the human dimension

“It became clear that the human aspect of digitalisation had been forgotten or become secondary in our first conversation. Only now did the participants bring up creativity, joy and wellbeing as important factors in the transition to digitalised production. Perhaps their subconscious surfaced through the images?”

Instead of writing a traditional project report, all participants were invited to a vernissage where the images were displayed on large sheets, like in a classic art exhibition.

Vernissage instead of a final report

“Visitors who didn’t know how we had worked were both surprised and impressed. It led to stimulating discussions about the role of humans in industrial digitalisation.”

Despite initial hesitation, the response from employees and management was very positive.

“Everyone was pleased with the results and found the method inspiring and creative. They can imagine using visualisation in other contexts as well.

“I’m grateful that Siemens Energy dared to try this approach. Now I hope to apply the method in more settings to build a broader foundation for evaluating it.”

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Linnéa summarises learnings from the project:

What is often called “human-centricity” rarely functions as an explicit strategy. Instead, it becomes visible in how people weigh decisions, manage time pressure and try to make work run smoothly without stepping on each other’s toes.

From this, the BAS framework emerged, capturing a habitual way of thinking that helps organisations to:

• balance between adding new things and daring to let go
• ask before acting
• start with people rather than technology

The BAS framework highlights that digital transformation does not “just happen.” It does not simply strike the organisation. It is shaped by a series of small, recurring decisions and it is in these decisions, not in the vision statements, that the human perspective is either strengthened or weakened.

The Orchid research project was carried out in 2024–2025 in collaboration with Siemens Energy and GKN Aerospace and was funded by the KK Foundation.

Contact: Linnéa Carlsson, Senior Lecturer, University West