Practical tools for inclusive and impactful project design

A Practical Guide to Human-Centered Project Design

What you'll learn
- Learn how to use digital tools for group facilitation and project planning
- Integrate your project design skills into a competitive proposal for funding or approval.
- Understand the root problems you are trying to solve with your project.
- Propose solutions tailored to the problem and end-user needs.
- Apply your learning in a real project design process

Requirements
- Basic use of excel or google sheets

Description
This course, led by Rachael of Earth Empower, a women-owned and women-led consulting firm, provides the tools and knowledge to design impactful projects through aninclusive and participatory approach. It moves beyond traditional project management by emphasizing the importance of solving complex problems with diverse perspectives and approaches. You'll learn why including end-users and a variety of stakeholders from the beginning leads to more innovative, creative, and resilient solutions. This human-centered design method empowers the end-user and shifts power dynamics to be more equitable, ensuring projects are more likely to be successful.

The curriculum guides you through aseven-step process, beginning with identifying the right people to involve and facilitating their effective participation. You'll master techniques like root cause analysis to deeply understand the problem before jumping to solutions. The course uses a recurring, practical example of a community climate resilience project in Kenya to illustrate each step, providing downloadable formats and a parallel private-sector example for a tea company. By the end, you'll be able to move from an idea to a fully validated project design, summarized in a professional concept note or pitch deck. The course also addresses real-world challenges, offering strategies for navigating common pitfalls and working within time and resource constraints.

Who this course is for:
- People in HR, event planning, communications, or PR, who wish to attain skills to improve within their current roles and to offer a needed diversity perspective that is increasingly required within companies wishing to have a positive impact or perceived positive impact. Probably tailored to professionals in male-dominated or conservative fields who are confronting discrimination or witnessing discrimination at work.
- Young and mid-level professionals in non-profits or people in private sector looking to expand their social impact and leadership in their roles "mid-level professionals"
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