What we’re about
Sydney Design Thinking (SydDT) is a diverse community of 9,500+ members. We've been meeting monthly since 2015 to explore the world of design thinking as a human-centred design and living systems approach to innovation and solving complex problems – to help create positive outcomes for people, our planet, and business. We're one of the top design thinking meetups globally.
The vision for the SydDT meetup from the get go was to build a connected community and ecosystem of people from a diverse range of design and business practices, industries, contexts, and roles… to learn and share. To get exposed to what others are doing and see what's possible.
We’re proud to see this in our community – our members are experience designers, researchers, service designers, startup founders, product people, consultants, academics, anthropologists, architects, software engineers, project managers, medicos, engineers, and many other roles.
We keep it pretty casual with plenty of time for networking before jumping into talks, panels, and workshops on a broad range of topics - with a healthy Q&A that often turns into a group discussion. You can read a bit about the history and journey of our community and events here.
New members are welcome! If you’re not already a member, feel free to join our community. Each meetup audience is curated to a degree to make sure we have a mix of new people, as well as the committed regulars.
We’d love to hear from you if you’re keen to speak – or if there’s someone you think we should invite to speak.
Thanks
Ben Pecotich, Kylie Mageropoulos, Kate Linton & Lucas Mara
Sydney Design Thinking (SydDT) Organising Team
Upcoming events (4+)
See all- SydDT #104: Inclusive Design with Manisha Amin, Shaheen & Mariane PowerAtlassian Sydney office, SydneyA$10.00
We're lucky to have Manisha Amin, Shaheen, and Mariane Power leading a conversation on what inclusive design is – and isn’t – and the business case for designing for everyone.
Come join us for some fun conversations with interesting people in and around the design community. New members are welcome!
More details soon...
SPEAKERS
Dr Manisha Amin
CEO, Inclusive Design Collective (IDCo.)
Manisha is an innovation leader and cultural and social change champion, focused on helping organisations harness the power of thinking from the edge. She's the founder of Inclusive Design Collective (IDCo.), a social enterprise bringing together leaders in inclusive design for greater good. IDCo. specialises in co-designed facilitation, systems change, and tech for good.Prior to creating Inclusive Design Collective, she was the presenter of podcast With, Not For and CEO of the Centre for Inclusive Design (CfID), Australia’s first inclusive design focused charity helping companies to build and design products, services, and policies that are inclusive, valuable, and usable for as many people as possible.
Manisha is passionate about social justice and business growth, and believes that when we combine the two, we get gold.
Manisha worked in innovation, design, environmental advocacy, and non-profits including Barnardos, Cancer Council, and Guide Dogs Australia. She's on the Board of Diversity Council Australia, Bambuddha, Nautanki Theatre, and is a published novelist and an Adjunct Professor at Curtin University with a focus on Inclusive Design. She identifies as a neurospicy person of colour.
Shaheen
Founder and Learning Designer, Ta'leem Consulting
Shaheen has over 13 years experience in designing learning and leadership programs, with a focus on inclusion. With an academic background in learning design, design thinking, and social impact, she brings all her expertise together in creating safe spaces to drive impact and change.Her work is the winner of several prestigious awards like Brandon Hall. Ta'leem Consulting leverages this expertise to create accessible and inclusive change for equitable impact.
Mariane Power
Co-Founder and CEO, The Posify Group
Mariane is a clinical psychologist and neurodiversity specialist committed to advancing the personal and professional capabilities of neurodivergent individuals.Her clinical expertise alongside her lived-experience of ADHD makes her a sought after speaker for organisations looking to integrate inclusive design principles with neuroscience and performance psychology to uncover and develop the potential of their diverse teams.
Awarded WorldClass Education Top Innovator by Uplink and Deloitte Global, Mariane is also author of The IMPACT Mindset Theory, co-founder of The Posify Group - a social enterprise supporting positive youth development, and host of Classroom 5.0, a podcast exploring the future of work, learning, and leadership.
EVENT SPONSORS
This event is brought to you by Atlassian, Sh8peshifters, and Dynamic4. - SydDT #105: Meetup @ SXSW SydneyTumbalong Park, Sydney
We're stoked SydDT is part of SXSW Sydney again this year. Great news... you DON'T need a SXSW Sydney badge to attend this event.
This will be a casual and interactive meetup for anyone interested in design thinking and design in general. A great chance to meet some people in and around the Sydney design community and beyond... catch up with old friends and make some new ones.
We'll be in the Ideas Dome in the middle of Tumbalong Park. Come and hang out 😃
Why not come for the whole week of SXSW Sydney? Contact Ben for a 10% discount on your badge.
SPEAKER/FACILITATOR
Ben Pecotich
Design & Innovation Director/Founder at Dynamic4
Ben is a designer, coach, and founder of Dynamic4 – a social enterprise and B Corp focused on leadership, design, and innovation for happier communities.He coaches, trains, and works alongside leaders to solve problems that matter in more empathic and innovative ways – to create great outcomes for people and our planet while being financially successful and increasing wellbeing – to help accelerate the transition to more regenerative ways of living and doing business.
Over the past 30+ years, Ben has led, designed, and delivered strategic change in financial services working in Australia, NZ, Asia, the UK, and Europe. He’s focused on taking a human-centred design and living systems approach to bring together strategy, design, and tech. During this time he’s also been a founder of over 20 startups/social enterprises.
Ben's also the author of Solve Problems That Matter: Design, Build & Launch Your Social Enterprise Idea and co-founder of the Sydney Design Thinking meetup.
Sydney Design Thinking
Sydney Design Thinking (SydDT) is a diverse community of 9,500+ members. We’ve been meeting monthly since 2015 to explore the world of design thinking as a human-centred design and living systems approach to innovation and solving complex problems – to help create positive outcomes for people, our planet, and business.We’re one of the top design thinking meetups globally. You can watch some of our meetups here.
SydDT is all about helping build a connected community of people from a diverse range of design and business practices, industries, contexts, and roles… to learn and share. To get exposed to what others are doing and be inspired. New members are welcome!
EVENT SPONSOR
Hosted by SXSW Sydney and sponsored by Dynamic4. - SydDT #106: State of the Design Nation with Ben Crothers & Rachel ZhangILUMINA at Macquarie Group, Sydney
RSVPs ARE OPEN BUT NOT ON THIS PAGE. REGISTER HERE!
We're lucky to have Ben Crothers & Rachel Zhang sharing their reflections as a couple of the judges for the 2024 Good Design Awards. Since 2018, this has become an annual SydDT tradition and a time to reflect on the state of the design nation...
Come join us for some fun conversations with interesting people in and around the design community.
Good Design Australia has a proud history that dates back to 1958 and they're passionately committed to recognising, rewarding, and promoting the importance of design to business, industry, government and the general public... and the critical role it plays in creating a better, safer, and a more sustainable and prosperous future.
SPEAKERS
Ben Crothers
Principal Facilitator, Bright Pilots. Good Design Ambassador
Ben has been a designer since before Netscape ruled the www, and is currently a facilitator and design strategist at Bright Pilots (his online training and facilitation business), where he teaches teams of all sorts about design and facilitation methods, running strategic workshops, and generally helping teams get un-stuck. Previous to Bright Pilots, Ben was Principal Designer at Atlassian, a Design Director at Second Road (a strategic innovation consultancy), plus some assorted startups, agencies, and government departments.Above all, Ben wants everyone to be just as good at the whiteboard as they are at the keyboard, to be better at thinking, communicating, and solving problems together visually. He's the author of a few books, including Presto Sketching: Simple Drawing for Brilliant Product Thinking and Design.
Rachel Zhang
Co-founder, The Elements Kit. Good Design Ambassador
Rach is the co-founder of The Elements Kit and a seasoned experience design leader with 15+ experience in some of Australia and UK’s foremost digital enterprises including Google, Telstra, Fjord, Accenture and AKQA.She's co-founded and ran experience design agencies. Her focus is on profit-for-purpose projects that make a social impact, including the transformative re-design of the Parliament of Victoria digital experience.
As a design leader, she's passionate about creating safe spaces, cultivating a growth mindset, and challenging the idea of imposter syndrome as individuals' issue. Her passion extends to mentoring at Academy Xi and General Academy to help nurture the next generation of digital innovators.
Steve Packham
Chief Design Officer, Corporate Operations Group, Macquarie Group
Steve is the Chief Design Officer for the Corporate Operations Group at Macquarie and has worked in financial services for 15+ years across New York, London, and now Sydney.He's an advocate for equipping people from all backgrounds and skillsets with everyday design skills. His passion for leveraging design practices across Macquarie has seen teams amplify their impact and elevated the role of design in digital experiences.
DESIGN CONNECTION
Design Connection #3 is another in our design megameetup series.Design Connection is a collective of three Sydney design meetups... Ben Pecotich from Sydney Design Thinking (SydDT), Adam Faulkner from Enterprise UX (EUX), and Kevin Wilkins from Creative Customer Experience (CCX), with Susan Wolfe and Vera Chan being the backbone of Design Connection 😃
EVENT SPONSORS
This event is brought to you by Macquarie Group, Sh8peshifters, and Dynamic4.