WHAT I DID
User research
Information architecture
Content strategy
Tea With Strangers is a global movement that is… well… exactly what it sounds like. This non-profit brings on “Hosts” to meet up with four strangers and sit down for two hours of no strings attached conversation over a cup of something warm. The core of their mission — though it wasn’t succinctly stated in any one place — spoke to me: it’s important to look up from our phones, meet new people, and have conversations with them. It’s good for us and it’s good for our world.
I reached out to Ankit Shah, the organization’s founder, to talk about how my experience in UX might be of service to this grassroots movement. He was on board to let me design a strategy that would allow TWS to scale while shining a spotlight on its mission. I intended to strengthen the community by putting the TWS mission front and center in their (nearly nonexistent) online presence and by unifying individuals around the shared value that “everyone is interesting.”
HOW I DID IT
SURVEYING THE LANDSCAPE
After a stakeholder interview, I dove into host interviews with as many individuals as I could speak with. I also went through host onboarding myself and hosted three tea times to learn about the challenges first hand.
DEFINING AND REDEFINING THE PROBLEM
The most effective design process, and the one most true to the values of human centered design is one that continually refines the problem we’re working to solve. Through this project, I learned that our initial hypothesis about the problem to be solved was wrong. This realization saved months of time as Ankit and I refocused our efforts on the most impactful changes that could be made.
A FRESH ROADMAP
At the end of this phase of the project I had a clear roadmap to share with Ankit and the team. My roadmap, on which work has already begun, has allowed us all to focus on a crystal clear objective as we begin creating a marketing strategy, creating new assets, and standing the whole thing up in a website to test.