This post is long overdue. Ive been caught up with the madness that trails behind deadlines, mundane activities like getting my driving license, visas etc. In the midst of all this thankfully, I managed to have a chat with Aditya Dev Sood,  Founder and CEO of the Center for Knowledge Societies (CKS). CKS is an innovation consulting firm based in Bangalore, India.

How CKS began – Aditya Sood came to back to India from the States, after studying Architecture, Critical Theory, Sanskrit and Anthropology, amongst other things in 1999, when the Dot Com revolution in India was just about turning into a raging bull, much like the Silicon Valley in the West. As most of these things go, it got Aditya thinking about Information, Communication and Technology and most importantly how these resources can fuel the local ecology and economies. One thing lead to another, and CKS was born. Aditya, while travelling through the country, had collected photographs of village information kiosks, showing how people were clustering around computers. These pictures were noticed, and he was invited to talk about how to use technology more effectively in a non profit world, at The Doors of Perception conference in Amsterdam in 2002. The next couple of years, from 2003 to 2007, were spent in the realm of mobile services and telecommunications. A lot of time was spent researching and studying street technologies and how they were used here in India. All this, while still thinking about the deep and large question of how to design for our economy and ecology. Interrogating and understanding these principles have made up the core DNA of the company.

In 2009, CKS diversified its portfolio and made a bold foray into the world of financial, medical and health services. With a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (that is in the forefront of applying innovation to the social sectors) and in partnership with the Government of Bihar, CKS took on the Innovation for Improved Maternal and Child Healthcare (IIMCH) study, the outcome of which are the 34 ways to save a life that provides solutions as identified by its antecedent,the Vaccine Delivery Innovation Initiative (VDII)

From the report - (Context of the study) – The northern Indian state of Bihar is witnessing rapid change today. It is the fastest growing state in India with an astonishing 10.5% growth rate (CSO, 2010-11), in comparison to the national average of 8.6% (CSO, 2010-11). This is a major leap from 6.3% recorded in 2009 (Economic Survey 2008-09). Bihar has, thus, come a long way from the morass state it was in about a decade back, with growing promises for the future, but not without its own set of challenges.

One of the most critical challenges that the state encounters today is in its health scenario. Being the second most challenging state as far as health care service delivery is concerned, Bihar today, cannot afford to tread the traditional developmental path of continuous roll out and upgrade. Set back by at least a decade of no active development, Bihar now needs to look at innovative ways of leapfrogging a decade of little development.

Keeping with the research and innovation that CKS’s work surround, the  34 Ways to save a life special report focused on studing and developing and detailing out potential design solutions to address key challenges identified through its antecedent, the Vaccine Delivery Innovation Initiative (VDII). The main objective was to facilitate innovation in the delivery of maternal and child healthcare services in Bihar and other rural parts of India through design solutions that not only address challenges in the vaccine delivery mechanism, but also cater to related services within the broader ecology of maternal and child healthcare.

A broad array of design solutions have emerged in this report, which are presented against five metacategories:

• Managing Health Information

• Enhancing Service Delivery Infrastructure

• Improving Medical Equipment

• Strengthening the Healthcare System

• Transforming Community Perceptions

One of the solutions that has emerged from this extensive study has been the redesigning of the Vaccine Delivery Service Kit.While its currently still at its early stages of development, the kit used by the frontline health workers, to delivers vaccines to children in remote parts of the district.

The challenges address by this concept are -

• Immunization session execution and logistics
• Tracking children and work activities
• Accountability and training

Types of problems addressed-

• Unwieldy structure- Very large and heavy vaccine carrier box, making its transportation and handling difficult.
• Space and function- Carries only vaccine vials irrespective of its large size, and has no provision for incorporating other components (e.g. syringes, needles, hub cutter) that need to be transported to the immunization session site.
• Safety issues- Difficulty in cleaning and maintenance of pockets provided for ice packs lead to formation of molds. No provision to carry cotton, disposable needles and syringes, leading to unhygienic practices and disposal methods.
• Temperature control- Melting of ice packs owing to improper freezing, large distances of transportation from the cold storage and lack of provision for refilling poses potential threat of spoiling the vaccines. Handling of the vaccine vials using sweaty hands also poses a challenge.
• Potential for institutional branding to build recognition, credibility and empowerment remains unexploited.

The existing vaccine carrier box can be judiciously redesigned to incorporate multiple functions such as storage of RI paraphernalia, easy transportation and collapsible work surface.

The RI kit here is designed in the form of a briefcase, with adjustable straps to provide flexibility to the ANMs to carry it either on their shoulder or back. Alternatively, the RI kit can also be designed in the form of a roller bag, provided with wheels and telescopic handle to allow easy mobility. It also has shoulder straps for the ANMs to carry it on their backs on rough terrains.

Multifunctionality is the highlight of the concept, with storage provision for registers, disposable syringes and needles, cotton, Vitamin A bottle, and medicines, in addition to vaccine vials. The extensible tray acts as a work surface for holding vials and other paraphernalia while in use and as a writing surface support. Incorporating technological features such as an information display screen and smart card reader could help in improved session execution.

Characteristics creating potential value

• The compact form with its smooth rounded edges adhering to the shape of the body, enhances its ergonomics. It would also help in easy stacking, enabling courier men to carry more than one box at a time.
• Accommodating all required paraphernalia for vaccine administration and record keeping, as well as providing work surface in the same box would improve its functionality. Color-coded vials would allow easier identification of vaccine types. This would help in resolving the challenges around equipment management, enabling smoother work flow.
• Replacing ice packs with materials such as PCM would reduce space wastage as well as help in easy cleaning and maintenance.
• Integrating the hub cutter and compartments for safe and easier disposal of needles, syringes and vials ensure effective waste
management.
• Use of innovative materials such as Phase Change Material (PCM) provides insulation to the vials and constantly maintain them at the desired temperature range of 2 to 8 degree Celsius. Provision of an outer case to hold the vials prevents direct contact with
person holding the vials, and contributes towards maintaining the temperature intact.
• Additional features such as information screen displaying the names of due recipients and vaccines due could aid in easier tracking of children, and faster vaccine administration. Incorporating smart card reader would make data entry faster and error proof, and also provide an in-built feedback mechanism by tallying due recipients with recipients administered vaccines at the end of every session. This would generate better accountability.
• Branding the RI kit (e.g. NRHM logo) would create improved recognition of the services provided, impart a professional identity to the ANMs and make them feel more empowered.

One can read the full 34 Ways to save a life report here.

All images from the 34 ways to save a life and the Vaccine Delivery Innovation Reports by CKS.

As design minds in the US try to figure out whether effective problem solving can still be called design-thinking or needs to be replaced by another buzz word called creative intelligence (refer to Bruce Nussbaums recent article on the subject, and Robert Fabricant’s take on creative intelligence) a conclave in India tries to figure out how to incorporate design-thinking in the process of governance to create effective citizen government interfaces.

Design!publiC conclave was held in India on 18th March. The event was organized by a number of partners including Center for Internet and Society, Center for Knowledge Societies and sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation. The conclave tried to elaborate upon design-thinking and the challenge of governance innovation.

India is not the sole government that lacks empathy when it comes to delivering services. However, the government of India does happen to be the largest service provider in the country. Other than the blatant corruption and bureaucracy that plagues the various systems and services that the government provides, there is little effort amongst the heads of the states to simplify the tediousness that goes with anything government related.

Visiting India this time and speaking with my brother who lives in Singapore about the salaries the government employees in Singapore made, made me think that maybe there needs to a simpler system to bribe the government employees in India. Wherein a bribe can be considered a service fee and can be paid easily through legal channels. More along the lines of tipping the wait staff in certain countries. My ideas did not make it to the round tables of this conclave but other better ideas did. A bunch of case studies on government innovation formulated a part of this conclave like a new design for a vaccine services delivery kit in Bihar by Center for Knowledge Societies; Design for public transportation in the sparsely populated Oppland County in Norway by Live|Work; Reduction of red tapism in private industry and government interaction by Mindlab; Redressing Gender imbalances with Bicycle gifts by Government of Bihar to name a few noteworthy projects.

As previously stated, the conclave was centered around design-thinking and governance. There were representatives from design practices, social awareness groups, the government of India as well as Denmark and many more interesting places. Anand Dev Sood, one of the organizers is quoted as saying, ” the application of design in the public arena can create systems and services that are more efficient, more cost effective and more useful for the people whom they service’.

The conclave included a few panel discussions that discussed questions like – What do Designers do? How can Physical, Informational and Interaction Design Impact the Everyday Life of Citizens? How Can Governments Best Use Designers and Design Thinking? How Can Social / Media Promote Design and Governance Innovation? What Institutional and Organizational Models can best Foster Governance Innovation? On the other hand, there were brainstorming and concepting sessions around ‘Conducting Ethnography to Inform the Innovation Process’ and ‘Approaches to Institutionalizing Innovation in Government’.

Public sector innovation is the next new thing in India and it won’t be long before it gains momentum through such conclaves and efforts. There is growing interest in the approach of user centered service design. This involves ethnographic research where design researchers go out into the field to understand the needs of the user who is the center of this initiative. The tools employed to conduct this research may be many and could include workshops with the users, use of technology to record experiences and living patters, interviews etc. The second phase involves collecting all this data into a digestible format where common themes can be grouped together to understand patterns, the patterns are later developed into insights and the insights are synthesized by designers in actual products. This may seem like a whole lot of design jargon but is an effective way to capture the needs and necessities of the users who are often ignored and left out of services that are being created for their benefit.

In countries like India, this road is full of skepticism and challenges. Governance is often conservative and traditional. Very few countries have the luxury of having truly innovative leadership. India is certainly not one of them, not because there aren’t any talented and progressive thinkers in the government, but because a big part of governance in India is leftover from the British Raj. It is archaic, hierarchical, complex and old. Government systems are also very different from private sector. In this case, key partnerships need to be formed with government departments so that they can benefit from more progressive and innovative thought leadership. An effective citizen government interface will be formulated if there is adequate interest from both the sides to make this relationship work. Citizens need to ask for effective governance and the government needs to listen. The presence of representatives from the National Planning Commission and the Ministry of Housing in this conclave is an optimistic sign that things are moving in the right direction and we hope they continue to do so.

For more details on the conclave:
Using Design Principles for Good Governance for Livemint by Aparna Piramal Raje (also has a video in the post which is informational)
Design!publiC: design for governance in India by Putting people first
The Designpublic blog

India seems to be on the brink of exciting new things especially in the realm of art and design. As a young creative practitioner, its inspiring and encouraging for me to see examples of the new work that is emerging from the country.The UnBox festival was once such platform that brought together 200 practitioners, academics, and thinkers from the fields of art, design, technology, research and entrepreneurship. The festival acted as  a space to share cross-disciplinary reflections on bringing about cultural change.

Held last month in New Delhi, the festival is the brainchild of four successful Indian creative practices that have successfully crafted an inter-disciplinary approach towards driving impact and change. They go by the name of The Box Collective; made up of Quicksand ,Codesign, BlindBoys and Basic Love of Things (B.L.O.T.). Wanting to share and exchange the experiences of their combined creative endeavors, they decided to organise  and use the format of a festival; as it would help express and celebrate the diversity, that is the core idea behind it.

The festival that ran for the duration of four days, had as part of its iternary – a conference, fellowships, workshops and public events that drew in people from various fields like sociology, business and development, entrepreneurs and of course, art and design. The fellowships were offered in the fields of new media, sanitation, organic food and rural livelihoods. Unbox aimed to build momentum around design thinking and interdisciplinary collaborations to drive sustainable innovation for businesses, society & culture in India.

Some of the speakers included John Thackara ( Doors of Perception ),MP Ranjan, and Ashish Rajpal (CEO, iDiscoveri). The conference had a bunch of workshops that dealt with a variety of subjects such as design thinking, brain storming and developing future scenarios, conceptual principles & techniques of telling stories, typography, the basics of film making and theater, making sure there was a little bit of something for everyone.

The festival also had an open day, where the participants visited a host of studio spaces, kitchens, offices, and common spaces, where new idea are constantly brewing. Another interesting and fun activity that found its way to the Unbox schedule, was an all day – all night platform for hacking, tinkering, learning, creating, and playing. The three parallel festivals that were organised to coincide with Unbox were TechnoDrome – a festival of emerging electronic music, visual arts and performances, BeatRepeat – a  festival bringing interdisciplinary perspectives to the spoken and written word using electronic music, cinema & new media, and EyeMyth – a festival of visual music and experimental film.

Having garnered the support of the Goethe-Institut, and the British Council, it definitely got the attention it deserved. Plus it had a great turn out. All in all, the first ever Unbox festival went down a success. When I spoke to the some of the Unbox peeps last week, they were gearing up for a meeting to discuss the future plans of the festival. Here’s hoping that next year, it only gets bigger, better and more awesome.

Images compiled by The Unbox team. Shot by various participants.

To know more, visit – http://unboxfestival.com/home/

The Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh laid the foundation for an upcoming National Institute of Design at Jorhat in Assam. It is one of the first of four which are in the pipeline for the next 11 years. The government has allocated a good amount of funds towards this initiative. A request for proposal has been circulated by the Department of Industrial Policy (DIPP) for a consulting firm to advise on the project. Even though the new design institutes have been received with a good amount of enthusiasm and cheer, there has been concern amongst the design community that not enough thinking has gone behind the vision of the institutes.

A group of design thinkers, academics and professionals in India have launched a campaign called ‘Visionfirst’ that seeks to create a design education model by a collaborative thinking process and with a definite mission in mind. The campaign is spreading its wings because of conversations and debates on the interconnected online communities. As per Visionfirst, the requirements for the RFP seem suitably matched to a large civil engineering firm. Setting up a physical infrastructure is a part of setting up a design institute but not the end all. There is the whole academic realm, the vision behind the school which needs to be crystal clear which is why figuring out the core mission behind these new design schools is so important.

Sam Pitroda, the advisor to the Prime Minister of India on Public information Infrastructure & Innovations was sent a proposal outlining the vision. His response has been positive and he has gone a step ahead expressing a desire to set up 40 innovation clusters in different parts of India serving different sectors of the economy. At present the core group of visionaries that include Rashmi Korjan, Uday Dandavate, MP Ranjan, S.Sundar, Jatin Bhatt, Jogi Panghaal, Ashish Deshpande, Amit Krishn Gulati, Poonam Bir Kasturi & Dinesh Korjan are looking for people who can commit to help create 40 innovation clusters across India.

The Visionfirst proposal proposes a rigorous co-creation process, events, workshops and roundtables that can be held across the nation. There is a definite requirement for different kind of stakeholders to be involved in the process that includes policy makers, students, teachers, entrepreneurs, NGO’s etc. There needs to be a heart to heart regarding what design education and thinking mean in India. For a country where the general public still thinks of a designer as a fashion design person, India still has a long way to go. The idea is not to install the infrastructure and then think of filling in the classrooms, the core needs to come first and then the rest could follow.

The conversations and debates that Visionfirst has sparked is one of the better things that has happened to the design community in India in some time. This might actually lead to rapid prototyping of ideas that call for a desperate need to re-imagine design education in India. Even the National Design Policy of 2007 sadly falls short of expectations, it does not include opportunities and growth for local and indigenous craft sector but just limits itself to export and luxury product industries. The students in general are trained for fashionable, narrow fields of design that include car design, packaging, hospitality design, etc. India is missing from these policies, agendas and syllabi. As the proposal states in its last line ” We need to readjust our dream for India and for India’s role in service of humanity. That is our new tryst with destiny.

References :

What kind of design institutes for India?

The VisionFirst Blog

Towards articulating visions of design education in India

The practice of design research and design innovation has picked up in the past decade. Design thinking is not the forte of design related businesses alone but is being extensively used to rethink businesses that have nothing to do with design. The idea of thinking outside the box, looking at things upside down and gaining a fresh perspective on whatever we are working on can be termed as a part of design thinking. One such approach which I came across recently was the Dream:IN project. Some familiar names on the roster of people involved in the project made me look deeper. To my pleasant surprise, the project is being conducted in India. It entails decoding dreams and aspirations of Indians. More than 100 students from 20 well known management, design, technology schools were tasked to gather dreams and aspirations of Indians from different parts of the country. They were first trained to decode the dreams and aspirations of Indians and then were sent packing all across India to catch the dreams of the nation.

Methodology Card

Why did the project take me by surprise? Having spent my childhood and a big part of my adult life in India, one thing I can say about the Indians is that we are a practical set of people. The price of onions can bring down a government. Nothing could be further away from reality than deciphering dreams. However there is more to this project.

The database of dreams thus collected across demographies is being synthesized into concrete plans, steps and strategies that entrepreneurs can build businesses off of. As per the Dream:IN website, the Dream:IN conclave is being conducted between Jan 11th and Jan 14th, it is a four day event to bring together the thinkers and doers connected to the project to understand, interpret and synthesize over 11,000 dreams and visions of people from across India. The conclave will include thinkers, designers, educators, policy makers, entrepreneurs and people to synthesize outcomes from the database of dreams.

These outcomes will help generate ways and means to realize those dreams. Future scenarios and ideas will be generated out of this conclave and the teams created in the conclave will be allowed to pitch and their scenarios to venture capitalists and leaders in various sectors on the last day of the event. By the end of it all one team will be nominated to take their idea to realization. Some dreams will be realized and some wont but almost of all them will be addressed and discussed.

This utopic dreamcatching idea was the brainchild of idiom design, a design consultancy based in Bangalore. The idea was home brewed in Bangalore by SPREAD, the design outreach and the radical education initiative by Idiom. The key partners for the project are Sonia Manchanda – Project designer and director DREAM:IN, Principal Designer and Cofounder Idiom/Cofounder Nodes. Jose Carlos Texeira – Principal Consultant, Assistant Professor and Director of Academic Affairs at the School of Design Strategies, at Parsons, The New School for Design. Nimesh Pilla – Conclave Leader DREAM:IN. Akanksha Luther – Journey Leader DREAM:IN, Rahul Vijaykumar – Project leader DREAM:IN, The project is also being supported by Kishore Biyani, who is a heads a number of retail businesses in India including Big Bazaar and Pantaloons. As per Meena Kadri’s blog, an open portal will be launched in Febuary that will allow users to upload and categorize dreams by sector. These will add to the dream database to further inquiry and scenario building which will be synthesized into future strategies. Meena was one of the 7 dreamgurus for the project.

As they say, there is strength in numbers. Hopefully all our dreams will have affinity to each other and the clever people decoding these affinity maps can infer patterns in our collective dreams that can change somethings for the better. As I said earlier, hopefully some dreams will come true.

Dream:IN twitter
Dream:IN blog
Dream:IN videos
Dream:IN flickr

Dr Simone Ahuja is the founder and principal of Blood Orange Media, a multimedia production and design company that creates content in emerging markets, focusing specifically on examples of innovation with global relevance. Most recently she developed, produced and directed the Best Buy Corp supported television series, Indique – Big Ideas from Emerging India, for which she journeyed across India to explore how innovation within India drives socio-economic development on the sub-continent and beyond. Meetings with CEO’s of multinational corporations as well as grassroots entrepreneurs heralding bottom up, small scale innovation gave her a holistic, on-the-ground look at the methods of innovation employed in India and the mindset behind it. The Center for India & Global Business at Judge Business School, University of Cambridge, served as a knowledge partner for the series. Indique – Big Ideas from Emerging India is currently airing in PBS markets across the US.

Dr Ahuja currently serves as an advisor to the Center for India and Global Business and has served as an Associate Fellow at the Asia Society, NYC. She provides consulting services to trade delegations, academic institutions and Fortune 100 companies and regularly contributes to a Harvard Business Review Blog on HBR.org, including a recent post about innovation mindset entitled Jugaad: A New Growth Formula for Corporate America. Her pending book, Leading in a World of Scarcity:New Strategies for Doing More for Less for More, will be available in 2011.

Blood Orange Media is based out of Minneapolis, USA with affiliates in Mumbai, India and across the globe.