Focused on developing future skills in networks and communities.
Define Your Indicators
Indicators define the type of data we will collect to understand our impact over time.
Share Inspiring Stories
Once you’ve had a chance to Download Your Learnings it’s time to make sense of them. One way is to share the most inspiring stories you’ve heard with your teammates.
Determine What to Prototype
There are so many ways to prototype an idea. Here’s how to isolate what to test.
Build & Run Prototypes
Build your prototypes quickly, share them immediately, keep learning.
Collage
Having the people you’re designing for make and explain a collage can help you understand their values and thought processes.
Frame Your Design Challenge
Properly framing your design challenge is critical to your success. Here’s how to do it just right.
Interview
There’s no better way to understand the hopes, desires, and aspirations of those you’re designing for than by talking with them directly.
Funding Strategy
Without a coherent Funding Strategy in place, you may not have the money you need to get your design solution off the ground.
Monitor and Evaluate
Your goal has always been to have big impact. Smart measurement will help you get there faster.
Role Play
A quick and tangible way to test an idea or experience is to get into character and act it out.
Build a Team
An interdisciplinary mix of thinkers, makers, and doers is just the right combination to tackle any design challenge.
The Five Whys
This easy research method will help you uncover the deep motivations and assumptions that underpin a person’s behavior.
Analogous Inspiration
To get a fresh perspective on your research, shift your focus to a new context.
Conversation Starters
Conversation Starters put a bunch of ideas in front of users to spark their reactions.
Create a Project Plan
Get organized, understand your strengths, and start identifying what you’ll need to come up with innovative solutions.
Draw It
Spur deeper and different kinds of conversations by picking up pen and paper and drawing.
Peers Observing Peers
Get a glimpse into the community you’re designing for by seeing how they document their own lives.
Immersion
There’s no better way to understand the people you’re designing for than by immersing yourself in their lives and communities.
Secondary Research
Getting smart around your challenge is crucial to success in the field.
Journey Map
A Journey Map allows you to identify and strategize for key moments in the product, experience, or service you’re designing.
Download Your Learnings
In the Inspiration Phase you gathered tons of information. Here’s how you share it with your team and put it to use.
Bundle Ideas
Now that you’ve got lots of ideas, it’s time to combine them into robust solutions.
Create Frameworks
A Framework is a visual representation of a system, and a great way to make sense of data. Use them to highlight key relationships and develop your strategy.
Mash-Ups
What would the Harvard of agricultural extension services look like? Mash-up two existing brands or concepts to explore new ideas.
Gut Check
You’ve been generating a ton of ideas. Here’s a chance to look at them critically and figure out what to pursue, what to evolve, and what to discard.
Co-Creation Session
The people you’re designing for can tell you plenty, and they can show you more. Here’s how to further incorporate them into your design process.
Get Feedback
You’ve learned and built. Now share what you’ve made with the people you’re designing for and see what they think.
Storyboard
A quick, low-resolution prototype, a Storyboard can help you visualize your concept from start to finish.
Rapid Prototyping
This method gives you an overview of the main steps involved in a rapid prototyping phase.
Business Model Canvas
This handy worksheet can help you think through some key aspects of a social enterprise, service, or business.
Get Visual
Incorporating drawing, sculpting, and building into the Ideation process can unlock all kinds of innovative solutions.
Integrate Feedback and Iterate
Let the feedback of the people you’re designing for guide the next iteration of your solution.
Find Themes
As you share your learnings, hidden patterns are likely to emerge. Here’s how to spot and make sense of them.
Explore Your Hunch
A huge part of human-centered design is following your nose. If you’ve got a feeling about something, give yourself a chance to explore it.
Create Insight Statements
A critical piece of the Ideation phase is plucking the insights that will drive your design out of the huge body of information you’ve gathered.
Brainstorm
Energize your team and drum up a staggering amount of ideas.
Live Prototyping
A Live Prototype is a chance to run your solution for a few weeks or months out in the real world.
Keep Iterating
Testing, getting feedback, and iterating will help you get a great solution to market and let you know where to push it when you do.
Build Partnerships
You may well need some help getting your concept to market. Build the Partnerships you’ll need now.
Roadmap for Success
You’ll need a clear timeline and a plan of action to get your idea out into the world. A Roadmap keeps you on time and on target.
Pilot
A Pilot is a longer-term test of your solution and a critical step before going to market.
Staff Your Project
Now that you’ve got an idea to put in motion, build the team that can take you from concept to completion.
Keep Getting Feedback
Even though your idea is now as close to market as it’s ever been, you still need the input of the people you’re designing for.
Create a Pitch
Now that your idea is pretty well set, you’ll want to communicate it to funders, partners, consumers, everyone!
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