Complex systems, competing priorities, and limited resources can easily lead to overwhelm and poor execution.

Too often, teams jump into implementing a solution to a challenge without first aligning on what they’re really trying to achieve and what they most need to learn. The result? Well-intentioned projects that frequently fail to deliver the impact they aimed for.

Find the “sweet spot” between strategy and design—where a clear vision of where you want to go meets a curious, iterative approach to finding the best path forward—for any project or goals.

Join this interactive two-part certificate program and learn how to advance your mission by combining innovative strategic logic, systems thinking, and active human-centered design work.

This program series is produced in partnership with the Stanford d.school and will include interactive exercises, illustrative examples, and case studies. You will have an opportunity to apply these lessons and frameworks to your own project throughout the workshop. Register now!

By the end of this program, you will leave with:

An understanding of key concepts in design thinking
A clear, actionable scope for your project
Practical tools for aligning teams and sharpening focus
A repeatable process for confidently moving from vision to tested solutions

This program is developed, facilitated, and presented by Thomas Both and Nadia Roumani who teach Design for Social Impact at Stanford d.school (Hasso Plattner Institute of Design). They have been training and working with social sector leaders to address complex systems-level challenges for seven years, steering change in government, nonprofit organizations, foundations, and social enterprises.

Program Details

Session 1: Strategy and Scoping: Setting the Stage for Impact

Description: In the first session, presenters will guide you through methods for clarifying your intended impact, aligning your team, surfacing assumptions, and identifying critical questions. You will explore different scoping tools, including Scopey, the Stanford d.school’s AI-powered assistant.

Session 2: Design for Impact: Exploring and Iterating Your Way Forward

Description: The second session will be a workshop to plan out your design work. Learn to apply human-centered design mindsets and methods to explore, test, and refine solutions, enabling your work to stay grounded in real needs and move toward meaningful change.

Register Now!

This program is produced in partnership between Stanford d.school and Stanford Social Innovation Review.

Who should attend?

Any nonprofit innovator, philanthropic leader, or public sector changemaker will get the opportunity to turn complexity into clarity—and clarity into impact.

Program Features

Experienced Speakers

Nadia Roumani is a social entrepreneur, educator, coach, and consultant. She is passionate about developing a more equitable, creative, strategic, collaborative, and impactful social sector. She is the co-founder and senior designer with Stanford’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design’s (the d.school) Designing for Social Systems Program. Nadia focuses on helping philanthropists, government employees, and nonprofit leaders become more strategic, creative and effective. She has co-designed a curriculum that integrates design thinking, systems thinking, and strategic planning to help organizations better scope the challenges they want to address by engaging end-users, increasing intra-organizational creativity, and incorporating radical collaboration.
Thomas Both is a designer and design educator whose passion is helping people understand the practice of human-centered design—and their ability as designers—to innovate how they learn, think, and solve problems. He is the associate creative director at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (the d.school) at Stanford University and director of the Designing for Social Systems program. In this program, he teaches and coaches social sector professionals how to apply design thinking to complex social challenges and develop a more human and strategic practice.

Certificate Program: Live attendees will receive a digital participation certificate from Stanford Social Innovation Review and Stanford d.school, the Hasso Plattner Institute for Design at Stanford University, with successful participation in both sessions of this program.

Interactive Sessions: Participants will be able to ask questions and engage with the presenters and other participants.

Who Should Join? Any nonprofit innovator, philanthropic leader, or public sector changemaker.

dollar symbol The price for this program is $249. This price includes:
— on-demand access to the webinar recordings for 12 months
— program workbook
— downloadable slide PDFs
— recommended resources

Refund Policy: Recordings of all webinars and any associated materials are accessible asynchronously after the live program for 12 months from the date of the program. As a standard policy, SSIR does not offer refunds on registrations. Any requests for refunds should be submitted in writing to [email protected] and will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

If you have any questions about this program, email us at [email protected].

Presenters

Nadia Roumani
Nadia Roumani is a social entrepreneur, educator, coach, and consultant. She is passionate about developing a more equitable, creative, strategic, collaborative, and impactful social sector. She is the co-founder and senior designer with Stanford’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design’s (the d.school) Designing for Social Systems Program. Nadia focuses on helping philanthropists, government employees, and nonprofit leaders become more strategic, creative and effective. She has co-designed a curriculum that integrates design thinking, systems thinking, and strategic planning to help organizations better scope the challenges they want to address by engaging end-users, increasing intra-organizational creativity, and incorporating radical collaboration.
Thomas Both
Thomas Both is a designer and design educator whose passion is helping people understand the practice of human-centered design—and their ability as designers—to innovate how they learn, think, and solve problems. He is the associate creative director at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (the d.school) at Stanford University and director of the Designing for Social Systems program. In this program, he teaches and coaches social sector professionals how to apply design thinking to complex social challenges and develop a more human and strategic practice.
Moderator

David V. Johnson
David V. Johnson is deputy editor, print, at Stanford Social Innovation Review. He is a former philosophy professor turned journalist with more than a decade of experience as an editor and writer. Previously, he was senior opinion editor at Al Jazeera America, where he edited the op-ed section of the news channel’s website. Earlier in his career, he served as online editor at Boston Review and research editor at San Francisco magazine the year it won a National Magazine Award for general excellence. He has written for The New York Times, USA Today, The New Republic, Bookforum, Aeon, Dissent, and The Baffler, among other publications. He has taught at Stanford University, the University of Michigan, and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). David earned a PhD in philosophy from Stanford University, a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University, a master’s degree in classics from Cambridge University, and a bachelor’s degree in philosophy and history from the University of California, Berkeley. He lives in Berkeley.

Deputy Editor,
Stanford Social Innovation Review

Leadership

Connecting the Dots Between Strategy and Design