Why every organization needs a human-centered design hallway: lessons from the Akron-Summit County Public Library
In an interview with Jennifer Stencel of the Akron-Summit County Public library, I learned how a scrappy, makeshift space is transforming the library from the inside out, making it a more human-centered place for the community.
How a small arts organization on Vancouver Island is dreaming big with design thinking: an interview with the Nanaimo Art Gallery
How can small arts organizations with limited budgets and lean teams leverage the power of design thinking? Learn how the Nanaimo Art Gallery on Vancouver Island is using design thinking in this interview.
Five mistakes of beginning design thinkers (and how to overcome them)
I’ve observed a set of common errors that practitioners new to design thinking often make when implementing the process. By leveraging the learnings of others, you can more successfully champion, utilize, and apply design thinking.
Join the conversation about design thinking and design sprints in museums
Are you curious to hear from other practitioners who are dipping their toes into the waters of design thinking and human-centered design? We've launched a new LinkedIn group and have started a Twitter hashtag for professionals to share stories, ask questions, and join the conversation.
How the Computer History Museum is using human-centered design to develop a new education center
The Computer History Museum, in collaboration with the design firm IDEO, is using human-centered design methods to research the needs of local communities, generate creative concepts, and build consensus for a new Education Center opening in fall 2017.
Design sprints for content development: How Phoenix Art Museum ran a design sprint
For a series of printed visitor guides, The Phoenix Art Museum adopted an innovative approach to content development: a design sprint. For this post, I interviewed Christian Adame, Assistant Education Director, about the sprint and what they learned.
Managing up design thinking: 5 steps for promoting human-centered design in museums
“How do I get our director/my boss/the curators/my colleagues on board with the design thinking process?” This question touches on one of the most demanding aspects of human-centered design in museums: promoting change. In this post, I share five steps for managing up design thinking in museums.
Embedded participatory design: 5 principles for designing with and in communities
This guest post by Maryanna Rogers explores how museums and cultural organizations are looking outside their walls and co-designing public space with their communities.
Cooking with your users: reflections on the Museum Computer Network (MCN) Keynote
The keynote speaker at the 2015 Museum Computer Network, Liz Ogpu, talked about the power of human-centered design and its potential for impact in museums.
Daring greatly through human-centered design: an interview with Hannah Fox of Derby Museums
Earlier this summer, I came across the Derby Museums Human-Centred Design Handbook, developed by the Derby Museums Trust in Derby, England. I spoke with Hannah Fox, Project Director, to learn more about the Museums' use of human-centered design methodologies.
How might we embed design thinking into a museum? 5 steps from the Denver Museum of Nature & Science
How might we embed design thinking into a museum? This is the question I've been exploring with the Denver Museum of Nature & Science over the past six months.
Activating the museum with design thinking: stories from the Minneapolis Institute of Arts
The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, one of the largest encyclopedic museums in the country, began a design thinking process in 2013 to find new ways to enhance museum visitors’ experiences.
Lean and smart human-centered design: three lessons from the Grand Rapids Art Museum
How is design thinking being implemented in smaller museums? Recently I spoke with Jon Carfagno, the Director of Learning and Audience Engagement at the Grand Rapids Art Museum, or GRAM, about how the museum is taking a human-centered approach to the development of everything from strategic planning to in-gallery experiences.
Spreading design thinking throughout an organization: lessons from Atlassian
For this post, I interviewed Karen Cross, the Design Manager at Atlassian, about the internal design thinking program the company has been building up over the past year. Atlassian makes tools for software development, collaboration, and project management, and several museums and nonprofits use their products. Readers may be wondering why I’m featuring an interview with someone from a software company, and the answer is simple: I’ve always looked outside the museum sector for models of new ways of working, thinking, and collaborating. I believe museums can look to the private sector for new models of working, and adapt these processes to make museums smarter, more efficient, and more awesome.
Using design thinking to connect the physical and digital at the Rijksmuseum: an interview with Shailoh Philips
Last week I had the honor of interviewing Shailoh Philips, who worked for the last two years setting up the Media Lab at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, about a project titled Augmenting Masterpieces. The project explores connections between the physical and digital within the gallery space, and aims to build a theoretical framework for digital interfaces in a museum context from a human-centered design approach.
Needfinding in the galleries: overcoming blind spots with direct observation
Museum professionals are faced with design decisions on an almost daily basis, from developing tour guidelines to building digital resources. In the routine of everyday work and with a lack of in-house visitor research staff, it is too easy to base design decisions solely on experience and precedent, and make choices based on assumptions and habit. But by conducting simple needfinding activities, such as direct visitor observations in the galleries, we can override our blind spots and arrive at new insights.