Log in or create a free Rosenverse account to watch this video.
Log in Create free account100s of community videos are available to free members. Conference talks are generally available to Gold members.
Summary
The public relies on government services during critical and meaningful events throughout their lives—from birth, travel, education, and healthcare to retirement and death. The global COVID-19 pandemic inevitably impacted these critical functions of our lives, and underscored the need for increased government technology and communications. Digital platforms have proved to be key and effective agents in delivering critical and urgent information or services in the event of a public crisis, as opposed to physical infrastructure (imagine Dr. Fauci posting a paper bulletin to convey the latest national statistics for COVID-related data!). On the other hand, both private and public entities rallied around open data initiatives to inform critical policy decisions, share information, and work together to develop critical digital infrastructure that provided testing sites, kits, and results (e.g., call centers vs websites; office visits vs telemedicine). To fully scale solutions such as these, we must first consider how we: Use data to inform our technology in solving problems; Provide assistance in a timely and approachable manner for end users; and How we use data to invest in critical features and to quickly deliver information.
Key Insights
-
•
COVID-19 response at HHS involved rapid data sharing across agencies, enabled by emergency MOUs, that would typically take years.
-
•
The vast majority of COVID tests were non-laboratory based, requiring novel federal infrastructure to ingest and harmonize diverse data sources.
-
•
Leadership vacuum in early 2020 at HHS complicated the crisis response but led to agile cross-agency collaboration.
-
•
Human-centered design and user research were largely missing in the initial COVID response, despite their critical importance.
-
•
Long COVID and other complex post-infection syndromes highlight gaps in medical diagnostics and the need to validate patient experiences.
-
•
Kristen's personal struggle with late-stage Lyme disease fuels her advocacy for open, patient-driven research and diagnostic innovation.
-
•
Innovating outside conventional academic and government structures can create new pathways to system change.
-
•
Crowdsourcing solutions during COVID with designathons engaged hundreds of innovators and produced multiple actionable projects.
-
•
Smashing silos in government is a nonlinear, challenging process that requires patience, persistence, and a support community.
-
•
The conference and community emphasize global diversity, inclusion, and cross-government levels to foster civic design innovation.
Notable Quotes
"I got my PhD so I could get a seat at the table."
"We had to build the plane while we were flying it."
"Data is only as good as insights that come out of it and action."
"If you can’t measure it, it doesn’t exist is hubris in medicine and science."
"Long COVID will teach us so much about invisible illnesses that are common but overlooked."
"We put out a global challenge and engaged over 700 solvers and got 30 projects that blew us away."
"It’s easier to create a better system that makes your old system obsolete than to change what is baked in."
"When you’re smashing silos, the first wall you try to break through always gets bloody."
"Innovators need a tribe to recharge their batteries because you get no from every direction."
"The peer review process is slow and gatekeeps change, so innovating from the margins is strategic."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Our code of conduct is not window dressing; it’s the front end of a process to keep everyone safe."
Louis RosenfeldWelcome / Housekeeping
June 6, 2023
"We design with our biases and subjectivities, so we must work with diverse stakeholders to avoid tunnel vision."
Paul Pangaro, PhDSystems Disciplines: Table Stakes for 21st Century Organizations
June 6, 2023
"Service design has a critical role in mapping human and agent interactions in an AI and automation world."
Dharani PereraThe mandala of service design: unlocking alignment and action through service design
November 20, 2025
"Developers just needed a general outline; they didn’t require every detail to start their work."
Tiffany ChengDesigning in a Pandemic: Integrating Speed and Rigor
June 9, 2022
"Conjoint analysis was used by Apple and Samsung to determine the financial value of specific product features."
Ricardo MartinsUnlocking the power of advanced quantitative methods
March 12, 2025
"Blue sky projects should have no gating metrics and no short-term metrics because their value is long-term."
William Newton Jenny ChangHow to Lead With Data, and Without Data
June 7, 2023
"Does communal proximity guarantee the right to engage in research? This is a complicated question without easy answers."
Sahibzada MayedThe Politics of Radical Research: A Manifesto
March 27, 2023
"Design research—they need each other. They are much, much better together."
Prayag NarulaHow to Empower Your Designers to Do Good Research – And Why You Want To
June 10, 2022
"You can’t just break apart these components and type; instead, you change their properties to adjust labels, colors, or icons."
Jack BeharHow to Build Prototypes that Behave like an End-Product
December 6, 2022
Latest Books All books
Dig deeper with the Rosenbot
What strategies help build collaboration across research silos in large organizations?
In what ways can organizations use scaffolding to overcome bureaucratic constraints in service design?
How can designers identify which parts of a system they can influence or should monitor using affordance mapping?