Program

Q1 – 2023

Session 1 – “Making Meaningful Spaces” with Andrea Resmini

15 Feb 2023, 1-2:30pm, Sweden time (Hong Kong time – 8pm) (time converter)

Description

Culture is the interactions and relationships between people in spaces (both physical and digital) and space is the root element of human behaviour. 

But how do we know if we have included the critical elements in the making of meaningful spaces using explicit (soft skills) we call practices, to have the desired behavioral outcomes that encourage people to make meaningful work? 

This session will outline critical elements to make meaningful spaces including building trust, creating belonging, promoting the importance of active listening with storytelling, deeper reflection and practice, building awareness between people/time/place, seeing and connecting the dots that influence narratives, growing perspectives and other relevant spatial elements required to build character, grow leadership and encourage healthy cultures.

We invite you to join us in this “Make Meaningful Work Studio” so we can record, reflect on and action the practices and behavioral outcomes influencing Meaningful Spaces.

Goals & Benefits

This session will help you to identify: 

• Critical elements required in making meaningful spaces
• Practices to insert meaning and influence in both digital and physical spaces
• How to create your own “Make Meaningful Work Studio” space encouraging sustainable learning and development
• Behavioural outcomes to facilitate and sustain healthy digital and physical 21st century work culture, leadership and culture.

Practice Outcomes

This session will outline the following practices to:

• ​​Enable Active Listening by listening to people’s stories and to spot the practices that support meaningful spaces
• Build Awareness with individuals, teams and organisations to influence leadership practices that influence cultures at work.

Speaker 

Andrea Resmini

Andrea Resmini is associate professor of Experience Design and Information Architecture at the Department of Intelligent Systems and Digital Design at Halmstad University, Sweden, where he researches and teaches courses on IA and UX for blended experiences, digital / physical ecosystems, XR, and AI. An architect turned information architect, Andrea is a two–time past president of the Information Architecture Institute, a founding member of Architecta, the Italian Society for Information Architecture, the Editor–in–chief of the Journal of Information Architecture, and the author of “Pervasive Information Architecture” (2011), “Reframing Information Architecture” (2014), and “Advances in Information Architecture” (2021).

Session 2 – “UX Strategy” with Susan J. Wolfe

23 Mar 2023, 6-7:30pm Sydney, Australia time (Hong Kong time – 3pm) (time converter)

Description

UX strategy is a blend of business strategy and UX design that fosters creating, developing, and deploying the right products and services to satisfy ‘users’ and the business alike.

It’s one thing to develop a strategy for doing ‘good’ UX, but it’s another thing to make it work. 

Despite the best intentions, people are not going to buy into what’s proposed in the strategy unless it suits their needs and it’s convenient for them to do so.  As we’ve seen time and time again, a UX strategy is only as good as its ability to be executed.

We invite you to join us in this “Make Meaningful Work Studio” so we can record, reflect on and action the practices and behavioral outcomes influencing UX Strategy.

Goals & Benefits

This session will help you think through the development of a strategy that works, given there are people who:

• Have other perspectives about how to approach the solution
• Are going to be impacted by what you propose
• Aren’t going to understand what you propose (and even if they understand, they’re not going to care)
• Have different deadlines, KPIs and priorities than you.

Ultimately, this session is about: 

• Understanding the importance that holistic thinking plays in crafting and iterating on UX strategies
• Considering and crafting values that are meaningful to me, us and we

Practice Outcomes

This session will reinforce practices to:

• Actively listen to better understand stakeholders’ challenges
• Clearly communicate value in terms that resonate with various stakeholders
• Seek alignment on ways to achieve the intended goals of the strategy

Speaker

Susan J. Wolfe

Susan has been involved in the UX field for close to 40 years, dividing her time between San Francisco and Sydney. In that time, she has practiced UX design, run consultancies, mentored project teams, and introduced UX design practices and cultures into organisations around the globe. Susan also shares her expertise as a teacher and mentor, directly driving the career transitions into UX for well over 500 professionals to date.

Q2 -2023

Session 3 – “Design Leadership” with Justin Dauer

10 May 2023 (6-7:30pm, Chicago time, USA) (Hong Kong time – 8am on 11 May 2023) (time converter)

Description

Being in the position of design leadership—as it can pertain to championing design within an organisation or supporting those whom you manage and are in the craft—is an incredible opportunity. Shaping how work is produced, how your team is supported to evolve and achieve their goals, and how those on the receiving end of the work are included throughout.

Ensuring connection is at the forefront—connection of us to one another, us to our work, and our work to those who engage with it—is paramount.

Goals & Benefits

This session will help you to: 

• Identify your values and how they align to servant leadership
• Leverage humility to always be a student, driving growth and evolution—yours, and your team’s
• Ensure a consistent baseline between how your team creates and how they engage with one another
• Understand what fulfills you, and your team, to ensure connection is always at the forefront

Practice Outcomes

This session will outline the following practices to: 

• Foster quality relationships to better connect our teammates to their work, and each other
• Build awareness of yourself, and of other people, to grow our perspectives

Speaker 

Justin Dauer

Justin is a multi-faceted, multi-pierced, multi-tattooed designer, author, and speaker with 23 years of experience (across agency, studio, and tech) from Chicago. His passions lie in building inclusive and diverse teams, fostering creative cultures, and advocating for design serving the human connection. 

You’ll find him often engaging with the AIGA’s speaking events, interviewed in Forbes magazine and Medium’s “Forge” publication, and penning articles for Aquent, CEO World Magazine, and A List Apart. He speaks internationally on culture and design (most recently via the ‘21 opening keynote at the UXPA International conference, and the ‘22 Leading Design conference). Justin is also the writer of the celebrated book “Creative Culture” and is the former VP of Design at bswift, a CVS Health company.

Session 4 – “Comfortable with Uncertainty” with Geke Van Dijk

14 June 2023 (1-230pm, UK, Netherlands time) (Hong Kong time – 9pm) (time converter)

Description

We often face complexity in projects and, when working on them, this can create doubt and fear in how to get a handle on the topic and the approach, and how to fully dive into it. 

We need to create space in such projects to help each other with navigating this complexity, to spot the value of it, and to be calm in gradually orienting ourselves. 

This implies developing an approachable language and opening up conversations. It also implies reflecting on the higher level of a project in conjunction with the more practical details to identify a more clear direction. 

This is an ongoing process of orienting and reorienting for the ‘me’, ‘us’ and ‘we’ involved in a project. The passage through complexity never reveals itself in one go, it is inherently a step by step process that you need to get comfortable with.

Goals & Benefits

This session will help you to: 

• Identity why orienting and reorienting is important
• Create the space to confront uncertainty and to lower the fear in doing so
• Providing paths so people do not get lost in the noise
• Encouraging meaningful conversations using approachable language
• Building confidence to connect to the larger project purpose and outcomes

Practice Outcomes

This session will outline the following practices to: 

• Orienting and reorienting to better navigate complexity
• Proactive sharing to encourage transparency and ensure everyone is on the same page

Speaker

Geke Van Dijk

Geke (Pronounced “Hey-kuh”) is STBY’s jetpack. As STBY’s Strategy Director, she is well versed in steering research projects on challenging topics and leading us to explore fresh contexts with new clients. She is a pioneer in Service Design since she published her PhD on co-producing service experiences in 2007. Geke loves setting the right circumstances for highly collaborative teamwork with colleagues, clients and international partners, while also making sure to maintain a shared focus on meaningful change.

Geke clicks to focus on the big social and ecological issues of our time, and tries to make a difference by contributing to systemic change processes that are ultimately the focus of our projects at STBY. As a pioneer and seasoned design researcher, Geke is keen to help others flourish through mentoring and coaching. Developing toolkits and playbooks is also a way she likes to combine her pioneering spirit and passion for capacity building and knowledge sharing. 

When she is not driving the team forward, you can find Geke surging ahead in the swimming pool. If she wasn’t a design researcher, Geke would be a Gardener or a Ninja.

Q3 – 2023 (coming soon)