CLIENT: Gray Area, American Express, Mayor’s Office of Civic Innovation

SERVICES: Design Research, Strategic Insights, Community Engagement

Question & Framing

American Express, Gray Area and the Mayor’s Office of Civic Innovation sought to crowdsource innovative solutions based in new economic principles that reimagine systems of exchange, grounded in the underserved community in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district. 

Questions included:

• How can financial data empower low-income residents?
• How can local currencies support local businesses and community organizations?
• How can sharing platforms be tailored to fit the needs of under-served communities?
• How can tools like crowdfunding and microcredit be put to work for social service organizations and individuals alike?

Approach

The program model included four phases: community outreach, prototyping, development and acceleration, and, finally, implementation and adoption.

Our work focused on developing a baseline understanding of the community and the opportunities that existed within through Community Outreach. The design research methodology was designed to understand and track dynamics of resources, players and relationships. With this understanding, we focused on learning what was already of value in the community. 

The process included:

• 20 in-depth qualitative interviews
• 155 individual surveys 
• 37 business surveys

Analysis was primarily done through grounded methods and open coding, using affinity diagrams, actors mapping, and system mapping to contextualize and group the emergent themes and understand how the players connect with one another.

Resulting Principles & Outcomes

The result was an extensive community brief that informed the subsequent phases, and particularly the ideation and prototyping of digital and creative technology solutions. 

Patterns of exchange identified were: 

• People x Agencies
• Organizations x Organizations
• Businesses x People
• Businesses x Organizations
• Agencies x Businesses

Key issues included:

• Housing and shelter
• Communication
• Jobs
• Technology and data
• Financial empowerment

The testament to the effectiveness of the design research was the deep engagement around the opportunities outlined in the report, and the collaborations made between those ideating solutions and those in the community. 

From the significant media exposure, including a feature in The New York Times titled: Applying Cybertechniques to Urban Problems, and the outstanding engagement and results, American Express emerged at the time as a leader for a new creative, bottom-up model of CSR and community-based innovation.

Testimonials

“Lauren led our community outreach efforts for Creative Currency… the outcome, a 20 page community brief that has opened up data about Central Market in a way that has produced outstanding engagement from Creative Currency participants. Many have told us that this work, all conducted in a two month time frame, is unparalleled work that has been needed for decades… Lauren is committed to excellence.” 

– Jonathan Axtell, Partnerships Lead, Creative Currency

Creative Currency “passed my expectations. Just the initial brief made me think that
this was different than other projects. It also exceeded my expectation by tapping
into different groups of people. New audiences have been brought into our work, new
voices to new solutions that may not have been involved or interested in poverty.
We continue to want to be part of the solutions. It has been energizing and inspiring
for the staff to be involved with these new ideas.”

Kristen Growney Yamamoto, Co-Director, Glide