WAVETIME
A research project to learn how surfers find, share, and track information about weather and breaks.
Un-baised
A design challenge to create a product to address the challenge of diversity and inclusion in tech.
THE PROBLEM
Tech companies are not diverse and need to diversify their workforce which is predominantly white, Asian, and male.
The increased public scrutiny has resulted in some larger tech companies disclosing their employee information, which indicates little progress. A recent survey of the top 9 tech companies in Silicon Valley by Fortune 500, reveals that on average women comprise about one-third of the workforce. That gap expands the higher up you go in an organization, with the best company showing women holding 29% of leadership jobs. In general, companies made slightly better progress on ethnic diversity than they did on increasing their percentages of female employees, although not in leadership roles.
The starting point for this project was a Design challenge at Tigerspike London with women in tech club. We had two hours in groups to create a product to help address the challenge of diversity and inclusion in tech.
I have included the work done within our group in that session and I have built upon it since the event to create the first MVP.
HIGH LEVEL TIMELINE
2 hours at a design challenge. - Team
3-4 hours post-workshop spent creating further wireframes - Solo
MAKE OF THE TEAM
Team- 2 UX designers, 1 UX student, 1 frontend developer and an account manager.
KEY GOAL
Create an idea for a product to help address the issue of diversity and inclusion in tech.
MY ROLE
I worked as part of a team researching, defining and designing an initial concept that we then presented back to the other participants.
We were all equal in our contribution to the ideas behind the concept on the day. The paper stuck on the whiteboard is what we presented at the end of the session, everything else I have created since to build on the idea.
DESIGN CHALLENGE
A design challenge is a way to tackle a problem and cycle through the phases of design thinking.
Within this design challenge, we were given snippets of research to read, then we did a mini opportunity workshop. We voted on our favourite opportunity for development and with some of those ideas in mind we created personas for the people we would be aiming to help with our product.
Then in the group, we voted on our favourite persona.
After doing so we then all generate 4 ideas based on that persona and opportunity before voting on our favourite idea.
Collectively we then worked on that winning idea and presented it back to the other groups.
THESE WERE THE STEPS WE WENT THROUGH ON THE DAY.
Research
Each team was given pre sourced print outs of research around the topic of diversity and inclusion to read.
Mini opportunity workshop
Then in our groups, we did a mini opportunity workshop. Starting by writing down ideas around what diversity and inclusion meant to us. Then we looked for themes and brainstormed ideas around those themes.
Understanding the user
With our brainstorm in mind in pairs, we then created personas for people we thought this product would be aimed at. Then we voted on what we felt was the persona we had the most opportunity to help.
Ideate
With our persona Sarah in mind we went back to our opportunities and clarified the area we felt Sarah would most benefit from. Then we all created 4 ideas each, after doing so we voted on our favourites.
Refine and present
Considering the winning idea we started to shape a product. We combining ideas that shared similar themes, then presented our idea back to the other groups.
TITLE OF THE CALLOUT BLOCK
NEXT STEPS
Developing our team's idea further
I felt our idea had real merit and value and I wanted to take the opportunity after the workshop to push it further. I began by taking an hour to go over my usual steps in the template below, also creating a rough persona.
THE CONCEPT
Unconscious bias is everywhere
Everyone is talking about diversity and change but it's not enough to put it in a PowerPoint. Large organisations are faced with a big challenge when it comes to changing their habits on so many levels, we wanted to create a tool to be used within organisations to address unconscious bias.
The concept
My example is a concept for an app for large organisations but it could also insert into the companies home page/ employee website.
All employees would answer questionnaires designed to identify areas of bias.
After completing the questionnaire it would suggest areas for improvement and connect them with relevant learning.
This would be an ongoing process, the questionnaire could be altered based on company data to try and identify areas for needed change.
The final page would be real-time company data displayed in infographics that employees could see and learn from, holding people accountable and the business accountable.
This is the journey
Identify
Learn
Measure / Change
IDEATE
This project is a work in progress!
My next steps after further developing the wireframes will be to create interactive prototypes and test the concept.
