Service Design Strategist (Community Co-Design Focus)

Job Description
Salary:
The maximum salary for this role is $95,000.
Position summary:
We are hiring two Service Design Strategists with a focus on community co-design.
Co-design, or collaborative design, is a practice that strives to share power with communities most impacted by design processes and its outcomes. Designing with, not for communities is at the heart of co-design. At SDS, co-design processes build the capacity of those who are most impacted and who bring expertise derived from lived experience to collectively make decisions around issues and service improvements, with a particular focus on communities often marginalized by design.
As a Service Design Strategist with a focus on community co-design, you’ll:
Lead service improvement projects and initiatives.Manage multiple, concurrent projects and priorities, including delegating and coordinating tasks and responsibilities across team members.
Navigate ambiguity and challenges with creative problem-solving, a focus on generating solutions, and grace.
Set and provide a direction and vision for and with a project team.
Provide mentoring, guidance, and support to project team members.
Contribute to the growth of the Community Co-Design Practice within the PHL Service Design Studio and the broader field of design.Report to and be mentored by the Community Co-Design Practice Lead.
Collaborate with colleagues to grow the Community Co-Design Practice Area for long-term sustainability.
Lead skill-share sessions with colleagues to help them apply co-design methods to their work.
In the near-term, you’ll be working with a cross-agency team to deliver projects connected to —ensuring a local government that’s visible, responsive, and effective.
Essential functions:
NOTE:
When we say “co-designers,” we’re referring to the people who are our main collaborators within a project. Co-designers could be community members or direct service staff within a City of Philadelphia department.
Condition-setting
Build awareness and understanding of co-design and required conditions to practice it.
Experience discerning when to pursue co-design and when to recommend a different approach.
Steward collaborative scoping processes, needs assessment, opportunity definition for co-design—that strive to challenge dominant cultural, colonial norms, and cultures of domination.
Experience fostering long-term investment in community collaboration or stewardship (when applicable).
Deep understanding around how to facilitate accessible and inclusive co-design processes with diverse stakeholders.
Engage in regular personal and collective reflection that leads to new practices.
Co-learning (or design research)
Facilitate and/or create the conditions for co-designers to effectively:
Identify research goals, data collection methods, and samples.
Develop research protocol and related materials.
Facilitate research activities and related processes.
Lead or support synthesis and analysis processes.
Generate meaningful insights, opportunities, and narratives.
Co-visioning (or design strategy)
Facilitate and/or create the conditions for co-designers to collectively:
Generate a broad range of solutions and future visions with diverse audiences.
Design tools like blueprints, process flows, systems maps, etc. to communicate current state and future opportunities.
Develop actionable strategies and recommendations for improvement.
Create roadmaps or plans for long- and short-term improvements and initiatives.
Identify and facilitate creative activities for collaborative ideation and creation.
Guide co-designers towards holistic approaches to addressing systemic issues.
Co-creating (or prototyping)
Facilitate and/or create the conditions for co-designers to:
Develop low- and high-fidelity prototypes of service concepts and improvements (or collaborate with technical experts as needed).
Test prototypes for feasibility, usability, accessibility, sustainability, and effectiveness with stakeholders.
Iterate on prototypes with feedback from stakeholders and implementation requirements.
Agree on concept to build and implement.
Implementation
Support service delivery staff/teams in adapting improvements in response to changing requirements and real time feedback.
Facilitate and/or ensure co-designers are involved in building the final concept by creating the conditions for co-design to:
Plan and conduct pilot testing (if relevant).
Develop strategies and plans to support the roll out and implementation of new improvements.
Develop governance plans and accountability strategies to maintain and embed improvements within and beyond the organization.
Ensure stakeholders have time to reflect, celebrate, and receive credit for their contributions.
Project management
Create a project scope of work.
Develop and maintain project plans and timelines.
Ability to manage multiple, concurrent projects and priorities, including by delegating and coordinating tasks and responsibilities across team members.
Lead project partners, project team, and work streams effectively.
Proactively and clearly communicate the status of project work to stakeholders.
Navigate ambiguity and challenges with creative problem-solving, a focus on generating solutions, and grace.
Leadership
Set and provide a direction and vision for and with a project team.
Provide mentoring, guidance and support to project team members.
Contribute thought leadership within the City and to the larger design community.
Understand and negotiate City structures to advocate for people-centered service design.
Standards development
Contribute to the development and maintenance of SDS’s co-design standards, tools, and other resources.
Support other SDS colleagues in applying co-design practice area standards to their projects.
Competencies, knowledge, skills, and abilities:
Values-based practice:
Demonstrate commitment to equitable process and outcomes, prioritize the voices most impacted by change and service challenges, and practice emotional intelligence and cultural humility.
Systems thinking:
Understand and work across the complexity and interconnectedness of systems, issues, organizational structures, and ways of working.
Inclusive facilitation:
Facilitate meetings, workshops, and conversations that encourage active participation, rebalance power asymmetries, practice cultural humility, and help groups build consensus or make decisions collectively.
Communication:
Practice clear, accessible, and honest articulation of complex ideas and approaches through spoken, written, and visual formats.
Collaboration:
Manage conflicts with sensitivity, give and request thoughtful feedback, and practice emergence towards shared goals and agreements.
Relationship building:
Build a culture of mutual care, deep listening, reflection, and celebration.
Continuous learning:
Engage in ongoing reflection and learning as well as be aware of and adapt to current trends and practices in design, government, and analogous fields of practice.