The Other L Word—Addressing Workplace Loneliness with Kat Vellos
Kat Vellos, author of Connected From Afar: A Guide for Staying Close When You’re Far Away and We Should Get Together: The Secret to Cultivating Better Friendships, is our opening speaker on day one of the DesignOps Summit this October 21-23, 2020.
Here, she discusses the issues of loneliness in the workplace, and how managers can support their teams—especially in the time of remote work and added stresses from a global pandemic. In addition to supporting employees’ humanity, a manager who keeps their staff happy enough to stay can have a major impact on a company’s bottom line—at the average national voluntary turnover rate of 25%, a company of 100 people with an average salary of $50,000 will spend between $625,000 and $2.5 million dollars on staff replacement costs in one year.
Empowering Communities Through the Researcher in Residence Program
We are excited to welcome Xenia Adjoubei, Research Specialist in territorial analysis, sustainability and emergent tech, and Associate Director at Studio intO to our upcoming Advancing Research session on Wednesday, 29 March at 9:45am-10:15am.
Xenia will share her insights and experiences on a range of topics, including the power of community-led research, the democratization of knowledge, and the impact of new-old tools in promoting social good.
Her talk will be an engaging and thought-provoking exploration of the role of research and innovation in addressing humanitarian crises and promoting social justice. We invite you to join us for this inspiring and informative event, and to be a part of the conversation about the future of research and innovation in our communities.
Why Community is Key to Professionalizing Design (Videoconference)
Over the last 5 years, design as a profession has become more established in the public sector. What does it mean to professionalize design? And how does community play a part? Jaskiran Kang, Head of Service Design at TPXImpact shares her experience moving into government from the private sector, leading design at the Department for Education, and building community to further design practice.
Envisioning and Creating New York City’s Next Park with Rosa Chang
Listen wherever you get your favorite podcasts!
Apple podcasts | Spotify
Imagine transforming a forgotten, dark space beneath one of New York’s most iconic landmarks into a vibrant community hub—this is the ambitious vision behind Gotham Park. Facilitating the vision and creation of the space beneath the Brooklyn Bridge is Lou’s guest, Rosa Chang. She shares her dream of transforming the neglected nine-acre area into a community-driven park. Initially underutilized and uninviting, the space is now being reimagined as a vibrant public hub for diverse groups to gather and connect.
Rosa discusses the process of bringing her idea to the public, emphasizing the importance of listening to the community and allowing the vision to evolve through conversations. Rather than adhering to a rigid design from the start, she facilitates discussions with local stakeholders to ensure the park meets the needs of the people it serves. She highlights the significance of respecting the space’s history while meeting contemporary needs.
Their conversation also touches on Gotham Park’s early successes, including the opening of the first acre and the push to revive iconic spaces like the Brooklyn Banks skate park. Rosa’s approach has been one of connection and collaboration, bridging gaps between individuals and organizations to create a public space that fosters unity. Listen and be inspired!
What You’ll Learn from this Episode:
- The Vision Behind Gotham Park – To transform nine acres of neglected space beneath the Brooklyn Bridge into a vibrant, accessible public park for the community.
- The Role of Community Engagement – Discover how Rosa involved local residents and stakeholders in shaping the park, ensuring it meets the needs and desires of the people it’s meant to serve.
- Overcoming Bureaucratic Challenges – Hear about the obstacles Rosa faced in navigating New York City’s bureaucracy and how she’s used persistence and creativity to overcome them.
- The Power of Public Spaces – Understand the importance of creating public spaces that are inclusive, open, and accessible to all, and how these spaces can foster connection and community.
- The Importance of Adaptability – Rosa’s flexible approach to the project allows the vision to evolve based on feedback and the changing needs of the community.
- Rosa’s Challenge to Listeners – step outside your comfort zone and connect with someone new, embodying the spirit of Gotham Park in everyday life.
Quick Reference Guide:
0:00 – Meet Rosa
1:49 – The vision of Gotham Park
4:52 – Progress already made
7:59 – The vision
10:55 – Rosa’s background
13:20 – Why you need the Rosenverse
15:34 – Visions past and present
19:58 – Conversation before renderings; the anchoring values
23:20 – More facilitator, less designer
27:14 – Catching visions through history and renderings
31:41 – Rosa’s gift for listeners
Repository Retrospective: Learnings from Introducing a Central Place for UX Research
While many researchers see the value of a central research repository, how to introduce one in an organization is still a big question. Today we have the chance to learn from two researchers who have done it.
Taylor Jennings, Senior UX Researcher at Chili Piper, and Joe Nelson, User Experience Researcher at MasterControl, will share their process and experience gained from implementing their research repository. We’ll cover how they realized the need for a repository, how they convinced stakeholders, evaluated solutions, and what they’d do differently in hindsight.
Join us live as we leave plenty of opportunities for the audience to ask questions.
HITS, Microsoft’s internal human insight system: From research library to living body of knowledge (Videoconference)
Imagine a workplace where every research request you receive takes into account what your organization already knows. Product teams have the answers to common UX questions at their fingertips, and finding insights has become second nature to everyone. You rarely wonder whether the insights you find are still true because other researchers are always adding new evidence that supports them. In this session we discuss HITS, the human insight library Microsoft uses internally to achieve these goals, and the culture we’ve been working to develop around its use.
Cross-Functional Relationship Design
As designers, we all know that the majority of our time is spent on people, not on designing. Nearly every designer has experienced some kind of “people problem” at work – such as a cross-functional partner that won’t collaborate. In this talk, Alla will offer an introduction to relationships – what they are, how they work, and how designers can create relationship interfaces so they can be 10 times more effective at work.
Are My Research Findings Actually Meaningful?
You should not be doing research for the sake of doing research. Research takes time and needs to be well throughout. More importantly, you need to determine if your findings are actually meaningful to the organization. In this session we will look at the idea of statistical significance and meaningfulness when reporting research findings.
How to create actionable insight in the face of politics and silos [Advancing Research Community Workshop Series] (Videoconference)
Three of your research colleagues discussed and defended their respective positions on creating actionable insight in the face of politics and silos. Pariticipants then engaged with them in a discussion and Q&A, facilitated by Robin Beers.
“In organizations that may not incentivize informed decision-making, researchers need to study power dynamics, cultivate their political influence, and consistently communicate their value to the business.”
– Sonja Bobrowska
“AI tools will change the way people consume researchers, relying more and more on receiving personalized summaries. This will only exacerbate silos and lead to miscommunication. To avoid this, the best skill researchers can learn is creating compelling visual frameworks rather than weighty reports.”
– Mujtaba Hameed
“The best report and presentation ever do not necessarily mean your findings will be adopted. Insights virtually don’t exist if you aren’t able to make them stick by putting them to work.”
– Josh Morales
Failure Friday #3: Ethics, Startups, and the Dolly Parton Test
At April’s Failure Friday, Jane Ruffino shares a tale of her own misstep in a high-stakes startup environment. A battle with a CEO? Check. Profits prioritized over ethics? Check. Pushing for a feature that could have exploited financially vulnerable users? You got it!
Jane will candidly discuss how she underestimated the CEO’s motivations and ignored warning signs, including her ingenious “Dolly Parton Test” for assessing someone’s openness to new ideas. Join us to explore how to recognize when to stand firm, when to walk away, and how to build genuine relationships rather than trying to “manage” stakeholders. It’s a powerful reminder that failure can be a catalyst for growth, and that sometimes, the best lessons come from the toughest fights.
