This Web Platform is an extension of an award winning design research project conducted within a group. I take a ‘how might we’ question, and make a personal attempt on solving for it through a digital product.
User Experience Design / User Interface Design
SHE SERVED WEB PLATFORM
Facilitate connection between established women veterans and young women veterans
The digital platform is an attempt to connect the two parties for mutual growth and support
HOW MIGHT WE?
The She Served Project is a campaign and story telling platform aimed at changing the way people “see” women veterans in American society.
The project was developed as part of Products of Design’s partnership with the NY Veterans Affairs office and held through the Design Research and Integration class taught by IDEO’s Lawrence Abrahamson.
COLLABORATORS
Alexia Cohen / Jiani Lin / Teng Yu / William Crum / Kevin Cook
Human-Centered Design / Design Research / Visual Design / Campaign Design
SHE SERVED PROJECT
Won the Core77 2017 Design award in the following categories:
Student Runner Up / Strategy & Research
Student Notable / Design for Social Impact
How might we establish a new cultural norm that a woman veteran is also a veteran?
THE CHALLENGE
Starting with secondary research, pouring over VA and VSO (Voluntary Service Overseas) materials the team prepared interview guides for a variety of subjects. Then they moved onto primary research by conducting 10 expert interviews, 27 intercept interviews in New York City, along with online surveys distributed through social media.
HUMAN-CENTERED RESEARCH
Downloading the research the team extracted 5 core insights which lead to 5 design principles in the form of How Might We questions.
INSIGHTS & DESIGN PRINCIPLES
By turning insights into a playable board game the team generated empathy for the women veteran’s experience, helping participants explore the insights viscerally.
For Insight 2 they designed The Game of Military Life, a highly-researched (and playable) board game that takes players through journey of Active Duty and Veteran Life. Gameplay reveals countless obstacles; though women and men veterans have experiences in common, the game quickly reveals that the deck is indeed stacked against women, and gives the players a glimpse into what they might experience in reality.
TANGIBLE INSIGHTS
The majority of the subsequent work centered on the design team’s creation of SheServed—a brand, campaign, organization, collateral, and website for women vets—along with it’s first “interactive” initiative, the Postcard Stories Campaign.
The team was very inspired by the “Live Strong” campaign and bracelets, which together raised both public sensitivity to cancer—along with donation funds for cancer research. With SheServed, the managing organization puts out the messaging materials to vets and to the general public, telling them about the initiative and driving them to purchase the branded materials. In turn, the funds collected are given to organizations that support female vets.
THE SHE SERVED CAMPAIGN
And of course there’s the power of social media, the campaign collateral also gets shared on social media through the #SheServed Campaign, which in turn helps create organic momentum around the campaign and promotes the project further. Once the pins, hats, t-shirts and other collateral make it out into the world, the social media posts become infinitely more powerful and empathy-loaded.
“There’s a big difference between an image of a logo pin, and an image of a person wearing that pin. Once Instagram fills with photos of real-life vets identifying with the movement, along with civilians wanting to show their support, the campaign will have a greater authenticity—and a higher likelihood of success.”
