TAKEOVER
Health Equity
Advocating for those
traditionally left behind.
TIME FRAME
3 Weeks
May 2020
May 2020, I was part of a team that organized a consortium of players from various industries to challenge ourselves with the question: How can we use design to eliminate health disparities? We ensured the group represented a diversity of life experiences; fresh and seasoned professionals in industries like technology, healthcare, food, supply chain, finance, and design. This group provided real-world context for identified health disparities persistent within the US. We utilized Human-Centered Design to uncover true needs within marginalized communities and created a service and platform concept to support these communities during trying times.
DELIVERABLES
User Research
Problem Identification
Low Fidelity Prototypes
Workshop Facilitation
Marketing Materials
Race, gender identity, ethnicity, sexual orientation, zip code, and wallet size are but a few indicators that dictate health outcomes. While this gross inequity is not new, our approach to remedy this disgraceful embarrassment is. We are determined to take measurable and tangible action against these longstanding, systemic disparities that have plagued our country for too long.
WE ARE PISSED
Define
We brought together a consortium of passionate leaders across diverse industries including traditional players in the healthcare ecosystem; hospitals, providers, pharmaceutical, and health plans. The Consortium will collaborate to identify problem prompts to dive deep into and design around.
How might we eliminate food deserts in South Brooklyn by empowering the community to advocate for themselves?
South Brooklyn has a history of issues with public housing, poverty, child mortality, and obesity. Despite these challenges, the community is resilient and we knew that if the design proposal we create is to be of value, then the community has to feel a sense of trust in the process and ownership over the product. Inviting the community to the table to co-develop the ideas will increase the chance of success.
Unexpected food Surplus
New form Community Education
Collective Fare & Brownsville Community Culinary Center have teamed up to give out fresh pre-made meals for their neighbors who need it. This was a dedicated group of people who worked hard to offer food to those who need it. They struggle to deliver the food to people during quarantine though.
Made in Brownsville runs programs that teach young adults technical skills, allowing them to bypass university costs and embed themselves in the gig economy. However, out-of-date technology in neighboring areas, typical in underserved communities, prevents them from effectively expanding.
Making Bodegas Healthier
Felixible & Friendly for Food
Listening to your user
Evelyn Brito started Bodega Makeovers out of frustration in seeing members of her community continuously eating cheap, unhealthy foods.
No More Empty Pots is a food hub that found being open with key stakeholders about their policies and practices led to increasing their long-term success.
Brown’s Super Stores success when eliminating urban food deserts came from listening to and acting on community members’ needs and wants.
Matching Pains to gains
Collective fare
Lyft
During our interviews and research we realized that some organizations had surplus that matched other organization's needs. We found an opportunity to be an organization match maker, relieving each other's pains.
gains
Pains
Collective Fare
Their challenge was getting food to the people who needed it – they didn’t have a strong delivery system.
Lyft
Lyft
Very strong driver and delivery system with tons of open availability for drivers.
Collective Fare
During the COVID-19 crisis this organization was
surprised to find themselves with a surplus of food that needed to be delivered.
Lyft
Lyft employees have been suffering due to fewer people ordering rides during the pandemic.
The Greenbook
The Digital Green Book is a unifying service and platform between these community oriented organizations, designed to help them find reliable partners who can gain mutual benefit from solving problems or sharing best practices together.
The Green Book was once an essential tool for African American families to safely navigate the South while on vacation in the 1960s as the Civil Rights Movement was at the forefront of Americans’ lives. The Green Book held tips and insider knowledge of safe places for these families to stay, eat, and enjoy without worry.
The DIGITAL greenbook
Future State
Current State
Hand picked partnerships to help solve each other's problems, and move from surviving to thriving.
Most community oriented organizations work in silos due to limited resources.
Nation wide community building based on overlapping interests and needs from organizations.
The Service – companies working collaboratively
These organizations are hardworking and even though some barely break even, they're not looking for a handout.
The Platform – companies Sharing collaboratively
The platform is built to further the service offered; it’s for community focused organizations to better their own products and services by sharing best practices across a network of similarly purposed organizations.
Tags support curating content based on users' identified values and needs. In the example above they can connect to the organization highlighted in this article to view more about them and maybe even reach out for a deeper connection.
Curated content around best practices and learnings from other users on the platform. These articles and links connect the user to content and other organizations based on matching their needs and skills.
Next Steps
We devised a partnership service concept paired with the “digital Green Book” platform. Yet, we still have feasibility assumptions we need to validate with our concept:
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How might we foster lasting partnerships?
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Is fostering lasting partnerships our job or the platform’s job?
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If some organizations lack the technology to use the platform, how can they still be supported?
Considering these questions, we plan to build out the concept further and find a few organizations across the country that are willing to pilot test our partnership service concept.