About us
PDT is a community of creative problem solvers advancing human-centered design literacy through high-quality events, lively conversation, and practice-based development.
We're made up of all kinds of people: practitioners who use human-centered design methods and mindsets every day, designers and researchers, design strategists, Agile scrum leaders, urban planners, and many more who use or appreciate Design Thinking.
One way to define design thinking is that it is a mindset, approach, and set of tools and techniques for problem-solving and innovation anchored around human-centered design. Design thinking is different from other innovation and ideation processes in that it’s solution-based and user-centric rather than problem-based. This means it focuses on the solution to a problem instead of the problem itself. Design thinking is the essential ability to combine empathy, creativity, and rationality to meet human needs and drive business success.
Typically, we meet monthly, mostly virtually, and occasionally in person. Our monthly meetings, announced through MeetUp, may be webinar-style, or interactive and focus on some topic of interest to our community.
But we're about more than just meetup events.
You can find information about our upcoming events as well as links to recordings of past events on our website [PortlandDesignThinkers.com](portlanddesignthinkers.com).
We have an active, private Slack workspace – it is a thriving online discussion space for all things design thinking. Please join us there --[ https://bit.ly/2JuQ2V6](https://bit.ly/2JuQ2V6).
We also have a private LinkedIn group. Please join us there as well – https://www.linkedin.com/groups/13997019/.
PDT is a volunteer-run organization. We rely on sponsors and donations to help us offset these costs. If you or your organization is interested in sponsorship opportunities, please contact Deb Mrazek (debmrazek@gmail.com ).
Upcoming events
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AI Conversations We Aren't Having
·OnlineOnlinePortland Design Thinkers are thrilled to announce our next event: AI Conversations We Aren't Having with Elise Keith
AI is reshaping design work, but the narrative often loops around hype, fear, and sweeping claims. We often react instead of clarifying assumptions, comparing perspectives, or questioning whether these are the conversations we need now.
In this interactive session, we’ll use 5D Thinking to map your experience with AI as a design thinker, surface where we’re talking past each other, and identify the dimensions today’s noise ignores. We’ll also experiment with prototype Seeing Otherwise cards to open new conversational paths. While we'll center our conversation around AI, these techniques can be applied to any complex topic.Designed for practitioners who want clearer thinking, visible options, and conversations that expand design space.
About our Speaker:
Elise Keith is the founder and CEO of Lucid Teams, the New Rules for Work Labs, and the open Ways of Working initiative, where she helps teams elevate their meetings, decision making, and ways of working. With over 20 years of experience merging research with practice, she’s the author of Where the Action Is: The Meetings That Make or Break Your Organizationand a frequent guest on media and event stages. She works with clients from across sectors and regions, including IKEA, Under Armour, Intel, City of Portland, Logitech, ICANN, Calendly, Conservation Colorado, WorkDay, and more.***
If you have any questions or would like to connect with other members of PDT, join our Slack community.PDT is a volunteer-run Oregon nonprofit organization, and as you can imagine, organizing events can be expensive. We rely on sponsors and donations to help us offset these costs. If you would like to help, we accept donations through Venmo @PortlandDesignThinkers.
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