Systems language has come to the forefront of many disciplines to describe some of the most pressing and complex issues of our time, highlighting the difficulty, dynamism and pervasiveness of these problems. Systems design elevates both system and human needs by forming an intersection between systems thinking and human-centered design. When exploring systems design, we leverage design thinking to center us on lived experience, to make sense of the problems before us by deeply understanding human perspectives and needs. We also leverage systems thinking to make sense of complexity, understanding the problems before us by framing them in the context of our interconnected, dynamic world.

In this 90-minute workshop we will dive into the concept of systems leverage. We all recognize that not every concept has the same potential for systemic change. Systems leverage mapping gives us a framework for differentiating our concepts by their potential to provoke change in systems and design for impact. The framework is built upon the theory and principles foundational to systems design.

Attendees will explore system leverage mapping through activities and application in our Transitions of Care work, where we utilized this mapping framework to strategically focus our design concepts aimed at improving communication between health care providers in Travis County and enabling more effective transitions—going home from the hospital and continuing care—for local area residents. We used this tool to collectively see both the current system and also what could be, bringing interdisciplinary stakeholders together in orienting around potential interventions to maximize impact.

Workshop Learning Objectives - By the end of this workshop, attendees (practicing designers + health system provocateurs) will be able to:

• Recognize, adopt, and develop a systems mindset (thinking in systems)
• Apply a specific systemic design framework—Systems Leverage Map—to frame a problem, understand the boundaries + elements of a system, and orient teams around future opportunities for system change
• Identify high leverage opportunities for design to impact and intervene in health and across other complex, adaptive, interdisciplinary domains

• SPEAKER
• Adam Zeiner, Systems Designer, Design Institute for Health
• Adam focuses on socially created "soft" systems, networks, integrating futures literacy into design practice, information architecture + visualization, and engaging w/ intimate and less formal communities of practice. Prior to joining the Design Institute, Adam held an extended product design internship at Khoros (formerly Spredfast and Mass Relevance) on the visualization cohort of the consumer experience team. He long-term contracted as an associate designer at Razorfish, worked in a multifaceted UX design role at projekt202, and worked in an interaction-focused experience design role at Drawn (formerly MU/DAI). Adam received a BS in Advertising from the University of Texas at Austin where he was accepted into the Texas Creative & TexasMedia Sequences and an Interdisciplinary Certificate in Digital Arts & Media through the Bridging Disciplines Program. Avocationally, Adam is a board member of The Design Futures Initiative, and was previously the Lead Organizer of Speculative Futures Austin, and one of the founding members of vurv tech-arts collective. He also enjoys getting outdoors, collecting tattoos, and traveling as much as possible.
• SPEAKER
• Andrew Do, Design Researcher, Design Institute for Health
• Andrew uses immersive approaches to frame and understand challenges within complex health and healthcare systems. His research guides the team through integrating human needs, tensions and dynamics to provoke systemic change in health. Prior to joining the Design Institute for Health, Andrew was most recently a Service Designer with the City of Austin at the Office of Design & Delivery, a governmental department focused on solving civic problems that confronted the City of Austin and upskilling the public service sector to embrace the power of design. While at the City of Austin, he worked on co-designing social services with residents experiencing homelessness, on enhancing the City’s public technology procurement process, and most recently on co-designing with City staff on how to better deploy funding to the local arts sector. Andrew’s background also includes policy research at a Canadian-based think tank focused on advancing Canada’s technology innovation ecosystem. Andrew holds an MPP in Public Policy from the University of Toronto with a BA in Peace and Conflict Studies.
• SPEAKER
• Arotin Hartounian, Systems Designer, Design Institute for Health
• Arotin focuses on complex systems and organizational challenges through human-centered design, design research, systems mapping, visual storytelling and co-design facilitation. Prior to joining the Design Institute, Arotin served under Mayor Eric Garcetti through a fellowship with the Los Angeles Innovation Team where he used systems and civic design methodology to help bring systemic change to the workforce development ecosystem in Los Angeles. Abroad he worked as a systems designer for Dagens Næringsliv, Norway’s largest business newspaper, helping develop a three-year engagement strategy for the organization as well as a research assistant for the Human-Systems Engineering Innovation Framework (H-SEIF) Project, a systems research project funded by The Research Council of Norway focused on increasing collaborative innovations between technology companies throughout the country. Arotin has also worked as a freelance illustrator and designer for the last 10 years, including projects like developing mobile homeless shelters for the Los Angeles-based non-profit EDAR. Arotin received a BS in Product Design from ArtCenter College of Design with a supplementary exchange semester at the Oslo School of Architecture and Design studying Systems Oriented Design. He is also a member of the Systemic Design Association.
• SPEAKER
• Nirali Oza, Design Fellow, Design Institute for Health
• Nirali graduated with the inaugural class of the Design in Health Master’s program and continues this career path as one of the first awardees of the MA in Design Alumni Fellowship. Prior to joining the Design Institute for Health, Nirali worked as a health care design intern at Omnicom Health design studio, where she developed and executed digital strategies and compelling visuals to promote health literacy. She also worked at UMass Medical school as a digital health specialist intern. She developed the information architecture for a digital research recruitment platform and worked with clinical researchers and business stakeholders to translate complex clinical trial information into easy-to-understand content for the patients. She also worked with the technical team to develop a Voice UI to create the app's corpus. In the Spring of 2020, she worked at the Health and Human Services Commission as a program specialist, where she collaborated with internal and external stakeholders to design Provider Training Applicant (PAT) certification educational materials and interactive learning modules for the Medicaid Providers. She was one of the distinguished scholars and student ambassadors in the MA in Design with a focus on Design in Health program at UT Austin. She has a professional medical degree from India (equivalent to MD in the US) and a postgraduate certification in Media and Medicine from Harvard School of Medicine. Her long-term goal is to develop a new empathy-driven healthcare design and delivery framework utilizing transition design and systems thinking.
• SPEAKER
• Natalie Privett, Systems Designer, Design Institute for Health
• Natalie Privett, PhD, Systems Designer for Design Institute for Health: Natalie Privett is a Systems Designer at the Design Institute for Health, a radical collaboration between Dell Medical School and the College of Fine Arts at The University of Texas at Austin. Natalie explores all aspects of complex health ecosystems and illustrates conflicting priorities and incentives, messy value exchanges, and challenging behaviors for the people that exist within them. She leverages design as a means of fostering transparency and identifying opportunities to shift how systems work in the future. Prior to joining the Design Institute, Natalie was Lead System Design Engineer and Assistant Professor of Health Systems Design & Global Health at the Mount Sinai Health System and Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. As part of the Health System Design Team, she sought to operationalize value-based care and transform fee-for-service primary care assets, specifically designing next generation care models, care products and learning networks. Her research focused on the design of scalable models for collaboration across hospital systems and community organizations. Prior to Mount Sinai, Natalie worked as an Assistant Professor at New York University’s Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and as the Global Health Research Fellow at the MIT-Zaragoza Logistics Center. Natalie received her MS and PhD from Stanford University’s department of Management Science & Engineering. She received her BS in Industrial Engineering from Texas A&M University.

• LOCATION
• • Virtual

• DAY
• Wednesday, November 10th

• TIME
• 3:00PM - 4:30PM

• ORGANIZED BY
• Dell Medical School

• INTENDED AUDIENCE
• Austin Design Community; Health System Provocateurs; Dell Medical School; Community Organizations; Individuals who are health and wellness curious
• PRICE
• Free
• Register here >>