Tag: Project Kickoff

Homework: Fill out the Stakeholder Mapping worksheet. 

In version 2 of this project kick-off, Collabo did a bit of review, with a high-level “talkshop” on Design Thinking, People-centered Design, and Design Research. The purpose here was to get the core Red Cross Design Team all on the same page and ready to get into action. If you’d like to review the talkshop presentation you can download that here: Talkshop Slides – Design Thinking, People-Centered Design and Design Research

A little more background… after an informative and wonderful conversation with Donna Stephens, Regional Volunteers Services Officer, we determined that the best way to move forward with the Volunteer Experience project was to have a consistent core design team made up of specific Red Cross folks. You all, who are essential to carrying out this project work and—more importantly, being the “spark of change” that brings People-Centered approaches to the way the Red Cross of Indiana works. (check out the new Design Team page to see a list of our core Red Cross Design Team members)

So, now that everyone was on the same page and all felt comfortable-enough with what Design Thinking, People-Centered Design and Design Research are all about, the second focus of Kick-off version 2 was to review our project process and set up what that would look like moving forward.

The main outcome here specified a project meeting schedule where the core team would meet with Collabo, either in-person or remotely, over the next 5 months with a goal of completing a design phase in 1 month each. It maybe a bit ambitious, but you Red Cross folks are amazing people!

Here’s a look at that working schedule so far:

MAY 2016
“Understanding” phase
Friday, May 6th — In-person
Friday, May 20th — In-person

JUNE 2016
“Framing” phase
Friday, June 3rd — Remote
Friday, June 17th — In-person

JULY 2016
“Ideating” phase
Friday, July 1st — Remote
Friday, July 15th — In-person
Friday, July 29th — Remote 

AUGUST 2016
“Iterating” phase
Friday, August 12th — In-person
Friday, August 26th — Remote 

SEPTEMBER 2016
“Implementing” phase
Friday, September 9th — In-person
Friday, September 23rd — Remote 

OCTOBER 2016
Project Completion!

Final Project Wrap-up Meeting: TBD

For our own sake (Collabo), we’ll call this third session our ‘first version’ of kicking off the Indiana Red Cross Volunteer Experience Redesign project, as those of you who worked with us in the past know that we love iteration. 

Once a background foundation was set through the 2 capacity building talkshops on Design Thinking and Design Research, we (Collabo and the Red Cross experience design team) could kick-off the meaty part of the project: Setting Project timelines & Sensing current conditions (Phase 1 of Collabo’s design approach)

The main outcomes from this session lead to a rough journey map, (which has since seen some refinement thanks to the trusty hands of our amazing Visual Experience Designer, Jennifer) and a project timeline, which we’ll need to readdress in this next session (Friday, 4/22!!).