Plan International
Plan International is an independent development and humanitarian organization that advances children’s rights and equality for girls around the world. Their challenge and opportunity was to design with and for the Indian diaspora community in the US to prototype a new model for better engaging existing and acquiring new members to support their global mission.
Design Challenge
How might we design meaningful giving engagements for the Indian diaspora in the US?
Understanding the job-to-be-done for philanthropic members of the Indian diaspora helped Plan International innovate in service of new donor experiences, new ways to deliver value to current and potential donors, and new revenue generating strategies in order to more effectively engage members of this community with Plan International’s global work.
Approach
Utilizing human-centered research methods, BIF team members interviewed over 30 individuals of Indian origin or descent residing in the US in order to understand their current ties to India, motivations for charitable giving, and current and future desired donor experiences. We then synthesized our findings into a set of key customer insights that served as a foundation for driving innovation with Plan International USA and India staff. Over the course of a two day design studio, project stakeholders worked collaboratively to create a new engagement strategy and plan for prototyping, testing, commercializing, and scaling new models for donor engagement. At the conclusion of the project, BIF delivered a set of strategic recommendations for moving these plans from the white board to the real world, and provided on-call strategic advising to Plan leadership for driving their prototypes forward.
Impact Statement
Through human-centered research and co-design, BIF helped Plan International develop new strategies for community engagement that led to scaleable next practices based in a deeper understanding and capacity for innovation leveraging human-centered design, cross-cultural understanding, and technology.
