Digital Commons Network^™

Design Thinking Community Health & Well-Being: Creating With And For Community Capacities, Danielle Lake, Phillip Motley, Megan Casner, Kathleen Flannery

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper shares initial findings from an ongoing study assessing the value and limitations of a two-year community-engaged design thinking initiative intended to foster more inclusive and holistic public health community-based innovations with underserved communities across one county in the southeast U.S. The initiative hopes to institutionalize and socialize community-based design within a public health framework and build organizational and individual capacities. Initial findings indicate that participants find value in design thinking tools and processes, and that such processes have transformed mental models, fostered relationships, and built skills for participants' professional, civic, and personal lives. Findings also surfaced challenges related …