What Is Design For Social Impact?

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Design for social good is not a new concept—but human creativity is taking on a fresh meaning. Design is employed to make a difference. While designers play a critical role in society, we have the opportunity to magnify our impact at every level through research, collaboration, and a deep understanding of the challenges human beings face. 

The first step to designing for social impact is to understand its importance, so we can refocus our skills and efforts in areas that have the biggest impact now—and in the years to come. 

 Defining Design for Social Impact

If social impact is the effect designers have on people and communities—whether by action or inaction—designing for social impact is using design to create positive change. Designers can help people physically and digitally, including promoting equity and protecting those in disadvantaged situations or addressing environmental issues with an eco-conscious and future-centered mentality. 

The concept of social design goes beyond commercial goals to focus on benefitting underserved communities, creating meaningful change, and enriching lives. At its core, social impact design is human-centered and collaborative, aiming to improve accessibility, sustainability, economic empowerment, health education, social justice, and many other elements of the human experience. 

Design by itself has the power to marginalize people, and designing for social impact addresses these gaps. As social impact design exists to enrich lives, meeting this goal stems from the ability to improve human vitality. This type of design is often measured by its usefulness instead of its aesthetic appeal. Instead of augmenting people's lives, social impact design makes them livable at fundamental levels. 

Key Principles and Approaches

All good design should create an impact. Design for social impact goes beyond impact. Instead, design for social impact’s success is primarily based on feedback from the end user. The most effective way to gather this feedback is through community involvement at every stage of the project.

Some of the fundamental principles of social impact design include: 

  • Human-centeredness and co-design: Designers must place the needs and aspirations of the community at the center of the design process to identify their actual needs. One of the core principles of social impact design is to co-design with end users instead of designing for them in a vacuum. To achieve human-centeredness, designers must implement collaborative design principles, conduct thorough research, and engage with target audiences to learn more about their behaviors and experiences. 

  • Systems thinking: Adopting a systems thinking approach—one that includes the impact of political, economic, cultural, and environmental systems—allows designers to identify the root causes of a problem and find the most significant areas for intervention. 

  • Sustainability and ethics: Social impact design is multifaceted, moving beyond a direct level of influence and considering the broader impact of the product's interactions with the environment—like eco-friendly materials, circular design principles, and energy efficiency in the design and production. In addition, it involves ethical considerations, like respecting cultural diversity and challenging social inequality. 

  • Activism and advocacy: This type of design provides designers are granted the privilege of using their platform to spread awareness and advocate for change.  In this way, their designs double as vehicles for activism and advocacy. 

  • Measurable impact and thoughtfulness: Results often define success in social impact design. Designers must set measurable objectives to assess the impact of their innovations, engage the community, and source feedback. Thoughtful design is essential to avoid harmful or unintended consequences. 

  • Sharing: Designing for social impact necessitates sharing. Designers must be willing to share their results to spread the positive impact on society and develop scalable, replicable solutions. 

Empowering Tomorrow: The Trailblazing Reach of Social Impact Design

Social impact design delves beyond what can be accomplished in the present and instead considers the future impact. Our present reality is a product of past design. For this reason, our DSI is essential in creating a world that is more inclusive, accessible, and sustainable. 

To create this future, designers must work within three key areas—the economy, the environment, and society. Social impact designers are uniquely positioned to tackle this challenge, moving design away from consumerism and pushing toward lasting social change. Perhaps the most exciting element of designing for social impact is creating a compelling narrative that resonates with the target audience, intensifying cultural empathy while simultaneously reaching marginalized communities. 

Now more than ever, the ability to leave a lasting impact matters. Using design to address complex social problems requires a unique viewpoint. It also allows designers to reach communities positively—understanding how their products affect people, infrastructure, and society. 

Originality in the Field: Example of Designing for Social Good

Social impact design studios are paving the way to a more conscious design by using their creativity to drive change. They exemplify the philosophy of social impact design and have significantly changed many lives. Within the field of social impact, designers have unlimited scope to exercise their creativity and drive change. Many are partnering with brands that focus on solving societal problems and creating the most meaningful impact.

Examples of social impact projects include: 

  • ORA: An intuitive redesign of the menstrual cup and applicator: MFA Product Design at SVA students Nihaarika Arora, Xinyue Wu, and Cheryl Zhang created a self-care product duo to create an exceptionally intuitive and user-friendly menstrual cup that also mitigates waste. In 2023, their project was honored with Student Winner in the Design for Social Impact Category.

  • A Toolkit for the Times by Studio O+A: In March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic changed people's lives. Studio O+A worked with their community to assess the effects of the pandemic in the workplace. The result is close to 200 pages of guidelines for office design and actionable protocols to make the workplace safer. 

  • Ballard Food Bank by Studio Matthews: The Ballard Food Bank has been providing food and support services to its Seattle community since 1970. As the initiative grew, it moved to  “Hub for Hope” designed by Graham Baba Architects and Studio Mathews who helped broaden their reach through intentional branding. As a result, they were able to benefit more people in the community with uplifting, actionable information and creating a brand that spoke to their mission to provide critical services beyond food. 

Looking Ahead: The Future of Design for Social Impact

The future of design is bright and exciting but requires a level of self-assessment to truly flourish. We must choose to focus on community impact and involvement in order to produce products that truly change lives. If we try to learn about the experiences people face and use that knowledge to power what we do, the results will be staggering—taking design efforts from helpful to transformational and solving complex social problems that surround us every day. 

The many changes we'll experience include the growth of human-centered social design programs in higher education. The role of designers is likely to change as people realize the potential of design at the systems level to address societal challenges. Design for the public good is critical to a sustainable and rewarding future and is reflected in the growth of specialized programs in higher education. As our collective consciousness shifts to become more accountable, we can expect social impact design to come to the forefront in multiple contexts. 

Design for Social Impact: An Evolving Space

There's not only a deep need for social impact design—there's also much potential. Designing for social impact is a symbiotic process that benefits designers as much as the communities they serve. For every problem we address, new opportunities and challenges will arise as society and its needs evolve. This changing landscape is one of the many elements that makes social impact design such an exciting sphere, and a space to watch closely in the years to come.

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