Human-Centered Design for Social Innovation

Interested in learning more about the human-centered design process? IDEO.org is proud to announce Human-Centered Design for Social Innovation, a five-week course that we've created in conjunction with Acumen. This free course will get you started using the human-centered design process to create innovative, effective, and sustainable solutions for social change in your community. Register at http://bit.ly/1fPOkId.

Hi! My name is Sean, and I work for IDEO.org.

I'm here today to tell you about an exciting

human-centred design workshop that we created

with Acumen. Human Centred Design starts with people,

and we place people at the centre of each stage

of the design process. HCD is about getting out there, prototyping rapidly

and iterating until we get our ideas right. This workshop, just like the HCD process,

begins with discovery. As part of this course, you'll learn

interviewing skills and other design methods to give you the

confidence to get out there and start the HCD process

yourself. Let's hear from one of our designers:

I was on an ideo.org project last year in Mexico, and

we were focused on helping low-income people save

more easily. One of the things we went into the

field thinking was that people never had bank accounts

but we found that many had had bank accounts but

gave them up due to bad experiences and instead

had developed all sorts of innovative ways to save

in their communities, families, between friends. So what we

ended up doing was shifting the focus of the project

to help them save better with existing means and methods

they had created. We would never had

made the support breakthrough if we hadn't got

out there and talked to people at the very start

of the project.

Thanks Adam! The next stage in the process is called

Ideate. You and your design team will analyse what

you learned, and begin brainstorming new ideas. This

part of HCD involves lots of post-it notes.

"First, to capture everything you've heard out in the field,

and organise them into themes.

From there, you start to brainstorm and generate ideas

really quickly, and for that being visual is key.

The last stage in the course is Prototyping.

You'll gain the skills to build and test your ideas with real

people. Most importantly, you'll learn to iterate

and evolve your ideas until you get them right.

Let's hear from the shop.

"When we wanted to test a new model for selling

low-cost, clean water in Kenya, we couldn't spend

a lot of time thinking about what it would look like.

Instead we went out, got some uniforms. We also

made some posters, got a kiosk, and sold some items!

The key was getting feedback from real people about

whether or not they'd buy the product.

Want some water?

We created this course to give you the skills

and confidence you'll need to begin designing

solutions yourself. Sign up today!