Operations + Human Centered Design + Art with Alvin Schexnider — DT101 E116
Release Date: 07/11/2023
Leadership & Strategy + Fighter Pilots + Design Education with Jason "TOGA" Trew — DT101 E145
Design Thinking 101
When I first connected with Jason Trew (callsign: TOGA), I knew this conversation would challenge some assumptions about where design thinking belongs. Jason is an Air Force fighter pilot and strategy leader turned professor. What emerged from our conversation wasn't just another story about design thinking adoption, but a deeper exploration of what he sees happening when we distinguish between capital-D Design Thinking and lowercase-d design thinking, and why that distinction matters for everyone trying to create meaningful change. Jason's journey from F-15 pilot to design educator reveals...
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Operational Excellence in Design + Leadership + Design Ops with Jon Fukuda — DT101 E144
Design Thinking 101
Jon said that when he first discovered the design operations community at the 2019 Design Ops Summit in Brooklyn, it felt like coming home. Here was this entire tribe of people who cared about the same things he’d been passionate about for years—creating systems that help designers do their best work. In this episode, I'm talking with Jon Fukuda, co-founder of Limina.co, about how design operations has evolved from an unnamed set of practices into a vital discipline that drives organizational excellence. As organizations continue to face economic pressures, the conversation around design...
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Building Sustainable Design Research Systems with Sam Zucker — DT101 E143
Design Thinking 101
The tension between doing good research and delivering on tight timelines is something I've experienced throughout my career in design and innovation. This conversation with Sam Zucker unpacks powerful approaches to making research more sustainable and equitable while building systems that support continuous learning and engagement. What particularly struck me was Sam's practical framework for embedding research into organizational workflows. Her approach transforms research from a periodic, resource-intensive effort into an ongoing capability that shapes decision-making and product...
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Architecture + Decision Design + Learning Spaces + Strategy with Adam Griff — DT101 E142
Design Thinking 101
In this episode, I explore how architectural thinking enhances strategic decision-making with Adam Griff. Our conversation reveals how his architectural background shapes his approach to helping higher education institutions navigate complex decisions and create flexible space solutions. We dig into the challenges of designing spaces that can adapt to unknown futures and discuss how universities can better integrate with their communities. I particularly love how Adam frames flexibility in building design as creating platforms for future adaptations rather than just multi-purpose spaces....
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Joy, Transformation, and Design as Creative Liberation with Sahibzada Mayed — DT101 E141
Design Thinking 101
Sahibzada Mayed is a creative alchemist who uses design and storytelling to cultivate joy and imagination as tools of liberation. Mayed serves as the Co-Lead for Strategy and Research at Pause and Effect, a liberation-focused imagination and design collective based on Coast Salish territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh Nations. Beyond that, Mayed leads a small-scale startup, Naranji, that focuses on gender justice and decolonization in fashion. Today, we talk about decolonizing design and creative liberation. Listen to learn about: >> The impact of colonialism and power...
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Healthcare Design: Evidence-based, Business Fluent, and Change Prepared with Matt Van Der Tuyn — DT101 E140
Design Thinking 101
Matthew Van Der Tuyn is a designer and healthcare innovation strategist. Matt is the Senior Director of Design and Strategy at the Center for Health Care Transformation and Innovation at Penn Medicine. The mission at the Center is to serve as a catalyst and accelerator for initiatives that dramatically improve health outcomes, patient and provider experiences, and decrease the cost of care. Matt has had the unique opportunity to help build the Center’s design, discipline, and elevate design thinking as a key tool in Penn Medicine's organizational toolbox. Matt's design process balances...
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Behavioral Science in Human-centered Design with Christina Hanschke — DT101 E139
Design Thinking 101
Christina Hanschke's career journey has spanned many diverse roles. She's been a music therapist, nanny, and UX researcher, and she’s currently a Design Lead at Final Mile, where she applies a multidisciplinary approach to address pressing societal changes, drawing from behavioral science, human-centered design, and systems thinking. As an adjunct faculty at DePaul University, Christina extends her passion for leveraging behavioral science in human-centered design to the next generation of innovators fostering a diverse culture of curiosity and continual learning. Christina and I talk about...
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Organizational Design + Strategy + Change with Stephanie Gioia — DT101 E138
Design Thinking 101
Stephanie Gioia is a founder at Future Work Design with a focus on strategic planning and organizational innovation. She also serves as the director of the Either/Org project and teaches human-centered design for organizational innovation at the University of Oregon's Executive MBA program. She’s taught at Stanford’s d.school, University of Michigan, and Pacific Northwest College of Art. She is the founder of deckaholic.com, the world's largest library of card decks for problem solving and creativity. We talk about organizational design and strategy, and helping organizations navigate...
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Designing Your Career + UX for Small Business with Sarah Doody — DT101 E137
Design Thinking 101
Sarah Doody is a user research experience designer and researcher. She's also the founder of Career Strategy Lab, a UX career coaching program. In 2011, she co-created the curriculum and taught for General Assembly's first 11-week UX intensive program in New York City. She has extensive experience doing experience design, product strategy, and user research for companies including Fatherly, Sling, Citi Bike, We Work, Domino Magazine, Tictail, the Muse, Dow Jones and more. She speaks at conferences and teaches workshops worldwide. Today, we talk about designing your career and user experience...
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Design Ethics with George Aye — DT101 E136
Design Thinking 101
This is the inaugural DT101 Live!, with guest George Aye. George co-founded Greater Good Studio with the belief that design can help advance equity. Previously, he spent seven years at global innovation firm IDEO before being hired as the first human-centered designer at the Chicago Transit Authority. He speaks frequently across the US and internationally. George holds the position of Adjunct Full Professor at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Today, we are talking live about ethics in design in the design industry. Listen to learn about: >> What is ethical design?...
info_outlineAlvin Schexnider is an emancipatory designer and a business operations strategist who helps institutions become more effective, just, citizen-centered, and innovative. He has 15 years of experience in leadership across design, strategy, equity, and business operations in the government, nonprofit and for-profit spaces. Currently he is a part of Capital One's Equity and Design team as a senior equity design strategist. Outside his day-to-day work, he runs GraffitiVersal, an organization that makes resources to inspire, elevate, and catalyze change. GraffitiVersal’s latest release is called A Continuum of Freeing Design and Vigorous Futures, a card deck detailing an approach for designing for both equitable and just outcomes in the present, and for thriving worlds in the future. We talk about bringing human-centered design to operations and human resources.
Listen to learn about:
>> Alvin’s roundabout road into design
>> Alvin’s experiences at the Greater Good Studio
>> Using design at the Illinois Department of Health during the COVID-19 pandemic
>> Alvin’s role as Senior Equity Design Strategist at Capital One
Our Guest
Alvin (he/him) is a designer, futurist, strategist, and illustrator. He's a right brain / left brained DesignOps leader, with 10 + years of tri-sector people management, who uses foresight and equity to build and vitalize impactful organizations. He leverages his 15 years of experience and leadership across strategy & business operations, multidisciplinary design (service design, human-centered design, equity design), and org change to drive concepting, adoption, and implementation of major initiatives.
At present, he is a Manager, Design Practice & Equity Design on Capital One's Experience Strategy & Operations Team; previously, he was Sr. Equity Design Strategist in its Equity by Design Program. Before this role, he was Chief People Officer of the Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS - agency budget of $9 Billion), focused on improving the experience of 14,000 staff while leading a department of 130 people, and before that, he was also Senior Operations Lead for IDHS focusing on strategy, bizops, and service design projects. Alvin began to build capacity in human-centered design as the first Director of Design Operations at Greater Good Studio, a human-centered design firm that works with global foundations, government agencies, and national NGOs.
Outside of his day job, Alvin is also Founder & Organizer of GraffitiVersal — an emancipatory lab using design, art, foresight, & Afrofuturism for change. GraffitiVersal's Racial DeckEquity Cardset & Continuum of Freeing Design & Vigorous Futures CardDeck have been used at organizations such as: Meta, LAB at OPM, Univ. of Chicago, and Slalom Consulting. He's also the author of A Kids Book About Radical Dreaming (via A Kids Co.) and is currently writing & illustrating his first Afrofuturist graphic novel for middle schoolers through the Sequential Artists Workshop's Graphic Novel Intensive.
Besides hanging with his partner and 2 kids, you’ll find him reading N.K. Jemisin or a Black Panther comic book.
Show Highlights
[00:39] Alvin’s love of art and storytelling started early, as a kid creating his own comics.
[05:06] Starting college as a PolySci major with plans to be a lawyer.
[07:18] The moment Alvin realized he didn’t want to pursue law as a career.
[07:56] Moving on to business management studies, and his time in Beijing.
[09:02] Starting his business career at Abbott Laboratories and returning to China.
[13:21] Sidestepping away from for-profit into mission-driven and non-profit spaces.
[15:14] Realizing he had a knack for business operations and systems thinking.
[16:47] How his time as Director of Operations at Greater Good Studio transformed his thinking and started him on his own path into design.
[21:07] Immersing himself in design spaces and in learning design.
[21:57] Taking all he’d learned about human-centered design into his next job — COO of Erie Neighborhood House Services.
[23:52] Getting recruited to work for the Illinois Department of Human Services.
[27:10] During the COVID-19 pandemic, Alvin used design to help shape the department’s response.
[29:19] Redesigning policies and spaces to keep staff healthy as essential workers.
[35:27] Taking over as the head of HR for the department, and working on improving employee experience.
[38:33] Alvin’s current role as the Senior Equity Design Strategist for Capital One’s Equity by Design team.
[43:06] You don’t have to be an official designer to use design in your work.
Links
Alvin Schexnider on LinkedIn
Alvin Schexnider on Medium
GraffitiVersal
GraffitiVersal on Instagram
A Kids Book About Radical Dreaming (A Kids Co Publishing) by Alvin Schexnider - recently released!
Wakanda Forever - A Film Review - Human Futures Magazine
AIGA Chicago Podcast - Designing For: Equity
Interview with Slalom Consulting
Continuum Deck of Freeing Design & Vigorous Futures
Traveling through the spacetime continuum to escape racism
Books Recommendations
Kindred, by Octavia Butler
We Do This Til We Free Us, by Mariame Kaba
Black Panther: A Nation Under Our Feet, by Ta Nehisi Coates
Design Justice: Community-Led Practices to Build the Worlds We Need, by Sasha Costanza-Chock
This is Service Design Doing, by Marc Stickdorn, Markus Hormess, and Adam Lawrence
Afrofuturism: The World of Black Sci-Fi and Fantasy Culture, by Ytasha Womack
Far Sector, by N.K. Jemisin
Employee Experience: Develop a Happy, Productive and Supported Workforce for Exceptional Individual and Business Performance, by Ben Whittier
Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds, by Adrienne Maree Brown
Good Services: How to Design Services that Work, by Louise Downe
Drawn Together, by Minh Lê and Dan Santat
Other Design Thinking 101 Episodes You Might Like
Designing for the Greater Good, Strategy + Design Thinking, and Measuring Design Thinking with Jeanne Liedtka — DT101 E1
Critical and Emancipatory Design Thinking with Lesley-Ann Noel — DT101 E57
5.5 Things Every Designer Should Know About: The Opioid Overdose Epidemic (Part 1) with Stacy Stanford — DT101 E102