Thursday, September 15, 2022
The overturn of Roe v Wade in the US has highlighted the systematic challenges and exclusions which *womxn continue to face in their day to day lives. Additionally, the rising recognition of the importance of intersectional thinking, shifting definitions of womxnhood, the potential biases in big data, and many other shifting cultural contexts all contribute to an evolving set of best practices for how we should effectively be including womxn within the research process.
In our panel, we’ll be joined by three leading womxn practitioners, Megan Powell, Mansi Gupta, and Jamika Burge, who will be sharing with you their best practices for making sure that the insight work that we do effectively and empathetically reflects the needs of womxn, to ensure our work represents all voices.
*Use of the term Womxn acknowledges that gender identity exists in a sphere and one word has room for multiple gender expressions without weighing one more important than another. In addition, it highlights that more than one gender expression can be impacted by patriarchy, misogyny, and sexism. This term recognizes that in the past, the history of feminism has included racism, transphobia and harmful gender binary views.
About our panelists:
Megan Powell is a senior cultural strategist at cultural insights and strategy consultancy Crowd DNA, where she specialises in qualitative research and semiotics. After establishing her career in brand strategy and innovation with companies like Diageo and Hilton, Megan’s journey to Crowd DNA first took a detour through a masters in Middle Eastern studies and a year in social research, consulting the British public on the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Some of her insight work highlights include a food ethnography in Istanbul and Cairo, speaking at cosmetics conferences about the halal beauty industry, learning what success means to Russian men, and segmenting Tiffany & Co’s male gifters (where are the women based projects?!).
Dr. Jamika D. Burge leads AI Design Insights at Capital One. Her team uncovers learning & research insights across multiple platform experiences, including conversational AI, which supports Eno, Capital One’s customer-facing intelligent assistant. She’s an authority on intersectionality of Black women in computing and co-founder of blackcomputeHER.org (pronounced ‘black computer’), an organization dedicated to supporting computation & design workforce development for black women and girls. Prior to joining Capital One, she served as a research and tech consultant to DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, in the Information Innovation Office. While there, she provided technical and management consult for innovative DARPA programs which were funded at over $70M. Jamika is also Founder and Principal of Design & Technology Concepts, LLC, a tech consultancy that focuses on computer science education, tech research, and intersectional design. She has consulted for Google, the National Center for Women in Technology (NCWIT), and the American Association of Colleges & Universities (AAC&U). Jamika holds a PhD in CS from VA Tech.
As the founder of Unconform, Mansi Gupta partners with organizations to help them incorporate a women-centric design lens across products, programs and processes. She is the creator of Design for Women – a methodology focused on intentionally and actively designing for women; the author of Unconforming, a newsletter advancing dialogue at the intersection of women and design; and the curator of Design for Women Conversations, a monthly event series bringing together gender and design practitioners. Mansi has 10+ years of experience applying behavioral research & design strategy in social impact. Previously, she led projects at Women’s World Banking to increase financial inclusion among lower-income women in developing nations. Prior to that, she designed games to research reproductive healthcare in rural India as a designer for Final Mile Consulting. Mansi holds a BA in Computer Science & Economics from Bryn Mawr College, and an MFA in Products of Design from the School of Visual Arts. She grew up in India, and is now based in Amsterdam.
