Catarina Lelis (DigiMedia member) participated in the international conference of the Design Research Society, that took place in Bilbao, from June 25 to July 3, being chair of the panel “Retail and Brand Innovation & Intelligence and presenting the workshop Anticipating the impact of design projects: contributions to the SDGs.
Anticipating the impact of design projects: contributions to the SDGs
Creative Industry professionals often receive several briefs simultaneously, having to priori- tise or choose the one to work on at that moment, usually by considering aspects such as budget, time frame, strength, and longevity of the relationship with the client, but also, the project itself, its message, challenge, values, and purpose. These situations involve difficult decisions and anxious moments, due to the lack of 1) a supporting and defining framework for said decision, and 2) a system for reflecting on how each of the possible projects to choose from can become a more or less impactful, meaningful and pleasurable action.
The Impact Plan operates as a Determine heuristic, which is to happen prior to Discover stage of the Double Diamond framework, for rapid project impact assessment, grounded on surfacing desired identities: the individual’s or a team/brand’s identity, and the identities of those benefiting from the possible outcomes of said projects.
The tool involves a canvas and a deck of 20 cards, aiming at supporting the design-related project or activity selection’s “moment of truth”, namely, when having to choose from a pool of many possibilities; it presents a system for early strategic decision-making, individual or group continuous development planning, and impact-centred thinking. It does so by matching the projects’ anticipated impact with the motivations, capacities, ambitions, and perceptions of value of those involved in its execution, making them consider not only the usual aspects mentioned above for choosing a project, but also their perception that they can (by choosing this project rather than the other), to some extent, contribute to a better world — especially if considering the now in force UN’s 17 Goals for Sustainable Develop- ment that we all should observe.
Within this half-day workshop, delivered exclusively face-to-face, the main concepts and problematic is initially shared with participants, who will be given time to reflect on the construct of purpose and any current generic-societal dilemma (so they can prepare their hikigai), and then a team-based positioning is to be instilled. The teams are then given a few topics of possible design projects, and the time to assess the anticipated impact each project might have on them — teams constituted by individuals with both individual and shared (sometimes conflicting) agendas — and on humanity.