In celebration of Black History Month, the RGD is sharing stand-out DesignThinkers presentations by Black industry leaders and creatives for the entire month. See full list of presentations >
RGD Invites Douglas to support Canadian design community.
Strategic Thinking for Designers, an hour long live broadcast to an audience of about 40 design professionals (and then made available as recordings in the members-only section of the RGD website. The two part webinar/strategy session, began with The Creative Strategy Framework from CSBD, and ended with my communications planning framework. View on the RGD Website >
At Lead by Design, the AIGA Leadership Retreat, National D&I Taskforce Co-Chairs ask : Do I Belong?
This conference of 300 chapter presidents, Diversity and Inclusion reps and board members happens annually for the purpose of training the leaders. AIGA is going through a culture shift and membership growth is a particular challenge as professionals question the value of the organization.
As a Co-Chair of the task-force I presented messaging on inclusion. The premise being that just as our clients come to us with various forms of the exact same question when they ask for an identity, or a new site or campaign, They’re really asking you “What should I do?” Because they want you to solve their problem. Designers with a multitude of individual needs are coming to AIGA asking, “Do I belong?”
My Co-Chair Phim Her, then introduced her thoughts on change management using (late)Professor David Garvin of the Harvard Business School’s thoughts on systems organization. Phim ended by leading an exercise illustrating how many different perspectives groups must navigate to organize around inclusion.
Midwestern digital marketing conference invites douglas back for the second year to help creatives translate the language of business.
If you’re injecting creativity into solving business problems, it’s important to articulate how the business or marketing objectives factored into your solution. The first step is understanding these key business concepts in order to translate the rational language of business into the emotional language of design. Taken from his book Creative Strategy and the Business of Design, Douglas starts with the exposure to and translation of several key business concepts designers should understand. This session is a curated list of the business and marketing concepts most relevant to designers, writers, and art directors in a relevant digestible format. See the session here >
The Furtur's Chris Do & Douglas Davis wade into the touchy place of race.
So many questions and so little time this livestream w/ co-host, author, professor, Douglas Davis and an international panel of designers of color scratch the surface of what it means to be a minority in design. Be sure to look at the show notes! They are packed with resources from this conversation. The spirited comments, multiple points of view and every thumb up or down suggests a topic that will have a range of solutions. Shout out to Chris Do's bravery for taking the risk and lending his platform to discuss such a relevant topic. Watch here >