Cultivating Design Ecologies of Care, Community, and Collaboration
Summary
“How we are at the small scale is how we are at the large scale” (Adrienne Maree Brown). To truly put humans in “human-centered design,” we must be care-centered. And how we practice care in our own teams or the “small scale” will influence the downstream impacts of our design work. This session is an invitation to explore how we practice and build ecologies of care, community, and collaboration to shift towards mutual power and symbiotic relationships throughout the design process. Drawing from a perspective of trauma-centeredness and harm reduction, we will all engage in deep (sometimes complex) reflection about what it means to care for yourself, with others, and develop an ethics of care to guide design teams. If the purpose of DesignOps is to build systems, processes and tools to support stronger design teams and individuals, this is the case for care: to show up as humans first, before we are designers, researchers, employers/the employed, technologists, or however you define your role.
Key Insights
-
•
Viewing an organization as an ecology reveals fluid, interdependent relationships beyond rigid hierarchical charts.
-
•
Decentralizing power is essential to foster genuine care and collaboration within organizations.
-
•
Care is a relational and reciprocal practice that moves beyond transactional exchanges.
-
•
Collective care and interdependence are crucial for the health and wellbeing of any organizational ecology.
-
•
Care looks different for every individual, making autonomy and self-determination foundational to inclusive workplace cultures.
-
•
Small-scale behaviors and relational practices can scale up to systemic change by following the principles of fractals of change.
-
•
Pod mapping helps individuals and teams visualize and reflect on their care networks and relational needs.
-
•
Implementing care practices in corporate settings requires intentional conversations and sometimes challenging established power hierarchies.
-
•
Practicing anti-urgency and setting boundaries are acts of care that improve wellbeing and productivity.
-
•
Care-centered relationships enable safer, more accountable, and more just workplace communities.
Notable Quotes
"What would a personal cheer team that wants you to grow and blossom look and feel like? Is that the future of design ops?"
"An ecology is about examining relationships among humans, more than humans, and the environment."
"Decentralization of power is really important because power impacts how we practice care and collaborate."
"Knowing that you love the earth activates you to defend and protect, but feeling that the earth loves you transforms it into a sacred bond."
"How we are at the small scale is how we are at the large scale—our personal care practices scale to community care."
"Care is a relational practice, a form of reciprocity, and a way of being in community and kinship."
"Care can go in multiple pathways; it’s not always one-way. There’s multiplicity and duality in how care is practiced."
"In corporate settings you have to get buy-in for care—it’s strange to think about, but that’s part of decentralizing power."
"We practice care by being anti-urgency—questioning if things really need to happen when we think they do."
"You need to show up as humans first before we show up as employees."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Screen readers have two modes: browse mode for navigating content and focus mode to interact with form fields or apps."
Sam ProulxEverything You Ever Wanted to Know About Screen Readers
June 11, 2021
"If you are a cohort participant and don’t see your private Slack channel, please let us know so we can guide you."
Bria AlexanderOpening Remarks
November 17, 2022
"This is a moment to rethink identity beyond UX and get creative with income streams and career paths."
Corey Nelson Amy SanteeLayoffs
November 15, 2022
"Experience is one of three inseparable facets of an enterprise: identity (purpose), architecture (operations), and experience (value to people)."
Milan GuentherA Shared Language for Co-Creating Ambitious Endeavours
June 6, 2023
"Being involved early in product planning lets us bring the art and science of research to where it can be most helpful."
Erin May Roberta Dombrowski Laura Oxenfeld Brooke HintonDistributed, Democratized, Decentralized: Finding a Research Model to Support Your Org
March 10, 2022
"The most important thing you can do is listen and watch and put assumptions aside about what is easy or hard."
Sam ProulxUnderstanding Screen Readers on Mobile: How And Why to Learn from Native Users
June 6, 2023
"When clients join us in the field and experience research deeply, they often become advocates who come back for more."
Mujtaba HameedThe new horizon of ethnography: using AI to unlock the full potential of in-person research
March 11, 2026
"Whoever has been and might continue to be the most negatively impacted absolutely needs to be centered and have their voices at the table."
Ilana LipsettAnticipating Risk, Regulating Tech: A Playbook for Ethical Technology Governance
December 10, 2021
"You own the design system, which gives you the unique ability to integrate that accessibility thinking into all of your components."
Samuel ProulxFrom Standards to Innovation: Why Inclusive Design Wins
September 10, 2025
