Mia Ipsen

Design Thinking Consultant

2016- now: Design Thinking Consultant

2016- now: Assisant Teacher, Design at

Aarhus University

2017: Presenter at SiDER’17 conference in Delft

Master student Information StudiesBachelor in Information Studies

Mia is always focused on the wholeness of the project, while at the same time being a little geeky about the details. This means that one of her core skills is to navigate complicated processes and make the best choice for both users and customers. Another aspect of design which Mia as a Design Thinking Consultant believes to be vital, is empathy. To be able to emphasize with the users’ lives and mindset is extremely important for her, because this is how Mia can identify key insights and relate them to a greater context. So if nobody understands you, go talk to Mia!

With a ser ies of 100 books Danmarkshistor ien .dk wanted to te l l a d i f ferent h istor y of Denmark by focus ing on the events . To accompany the book

ser ies we des igned a t imel ine v isual ized as growth r ings in a t ree t runk .

Danmarks

Historien

WHAT I DID

Concept development based on analysis and insights

Rethought the classic timeline into a different visualization

Made an interactive prototype ready for the developers

Wireframes

Syddjurs munic ipal took the i in i t iat ive to create a mult i munic ipal p lat form across Denmark so they a l l wi l l be able to share d ig i ta l agents and ideas . We fac i l i tated and held two workshops to gather inds ights and f ind the key e lements for a cross munic ipal p lat form to work for ever yone. The workshops have resulted in mockups for test ing .

Municipal workshops

WHAT I DID

Facilitated workshop for 9 municipals

Collected and graded insights

Syddjurs munic ipal i ty took the in i t iat ive to createa plat form for the munic ipal i t ies in Denmarkto support knowledge shar ing about workprocesses andsolut ions for automatizat ion . I t supports the ent i re proces f rom idea to implementat ion a l lows for easy documentat ion of sav ing re levant regulat ions and integrat ion , and lets users rev iew f in ished and current projects . Ul t imately , the plat form shares ideas , exper iences and solut ions between munic ipal i t ies to enable col laborat ion and synergies .

AutoProces

Held two workshops with participation of over 25 employess

Conceptdevelopment in a co-creation proces

User Experience consulting

WHAT I DID

Danmarkshistor ien .dk had a great base product : an interact ive map that descr ibes the history of

the Danish empire . But i t had some usabi l i ty i ssues . We helped them to des ign a better user exper ience and update thei r des ign to work on

a l l p lat forms .

Historical map

of Denmark

WHAT I DID

Optimized the overall user experience

Redesigned to both mobile and desktop

Updated the visual identity to a more modern look

BetBuddy

feature for bet25

Bet25 had an idea on how to make thei r bett ing plat form more socia l , but they didn ’ t know how to des ign i t . We helped them to v isual ize thei r in i t ia l idea in sketches and mockups in order to end up with an interact ive wiref rame ready for the developers .

WHAT I DID

Research

Designing the information architecture

Made an interactive prototype

The r ight food and the r ight exerc ise play a huge part of e lder ly peoples wel lbeing . As part of a large EU fonded project , we helped MTIC and

the companys involved by conduct ing research to a cross sect ional p lat form to support e lder ly ’ s

wel lbeing . In col laborat ion with Aarhus Univer-s i ty we conducted the int ia l research at nurs ing homes and hospita ls in order to know the users

and thei r needs .

MTIC

Research

WHAT I DID

Research at nursing homes and hospitals

Framing user insights

Wireframes

Final design

Bet25 couldn’ t quite reach young people with thei r cas ino products . We helped them to rethink thei r ex ist ing products into a whole new concept a imed at the younger audience . The whole process was based on ins ights f rom the target group achieved through f ie ld studies and workshops .

Casino

Go

Developed a new product to a new audience

Field studies and workshops with the target group

Designed the entire information architecture

WHAT I DID

Even though a websi te has a lot informat ion i t can st i l l be user f r iendly . We gave Randers

munic ipal i ty the tools for opt imiz ing thei r informat ion architecture on Randers .dk . Focus was on improving the menu st ructure to make

an extens ive s i te easy to nav igate .

Randers

Municipality

WHAT I DID

Had a dialogue on what to focus on when improving the site

Designed a process for optimizing the menus on Randers.dk

Wrote a five-step guide on how to run an optimizing workshop

1 2 3 4 5

Many students are unsure when i t comes to thei r port fo l io . So , we arranged a port fo l io workshop to g ive them some conf idence , t ips and t r icks . The core of the workshop was a 3-hour des ign spr int which ensured that every part ic ipant le f t with one more project for thei r port fo l io .

Portfolio

workshop

WHAT I DID

Gave our best tips and tricks to the students

Created the frameworks for a design sprint

Main presenter

Global

Timber

Global T imber i s a wholesale suppl ier of wood to B2B corporat ions f rom Denmark to As ia that needed a

new website to match thei r g lobal prof i le . Inspi red by thei r product ’ s natura l e lement and thei r great

l ine of procucts we redes igned thei r new dig i ta l and global universe .

WHAT I DID

Wireframes and user experienceRethought their digital universe with their product’s natural element in mind.

Wireframes

Final design

“Actually, I don’t think i know what a studyportal

really is?”

“I think it is a little bit boring. It’s not very inspiring”

“I hate being thrown around”

5/5 request a menubar

4/5 do not use their AU mail Inbox

5/5 expect an overview of their courses. 3/5 confuse it with another function

Aarhus

Universitet

With more than 40 .000 students there ’s many things to cons ider when des igning Aarhus Univers i ty ’ s s tudy porta l . We conducted a ser ies of tests with representat ives f rom al l facult ies to make thorough evaluat ion of the des ign before launch.

WHAT I DID

Recruited students from all faculties for testing

Facilitated user tests in a series of workshops

Wrote a report with our findings and suggestions

SimpleSite

Many of our ins ights or ig ins f rom interv iews with the users . So , when S impleSite asked

us on how to make a good user interv iew i t came natural to us to pour out t ips and t r icks .

Through a workshop we taught them what quest ions to ask , how to make an interv iew

guide and gave them a handout for future use . I have held th is workshop with

s imples i te two t imes .

WHAT I DID

Made two workshops about the good interview Taught SimpleSite theories and tools for interviewing

Gave a step-by-step handout on the good interview guide

Mia and Helena f rom /et a l . gave us a crash course

in making customer inter v iews and did a fabulous

job of i t . Not only d id they manage to cram a lot of

mater ia l into just a few hours , they a lso made i t fun

and engaging with exerc ises and ro le-play to test

out our f i r s t prototyped inter v iew-guides . Af ter the

workshop, we were happy , conf ident , ready to jump

into i t and equipped to cont inue on our own. And

we real ly d id have some ver y good inter v iews fo l low-

ing this : - ) So warm recommendat ions a l l over !

- Morten Elk / CEO SimpleSite

Kære Krop,

Svære Krop

The Science Museum had a wel l v i s i ted exhibi t ion about the way we perceive our bodies . But they wanted to reach out to many more . We helped them to go f rom exhibit ion to a d ig i ta l learning plat form aimed at a l l ages in school .

Followed schools through the exhibition to gain insight

Build a wireframe based on insights from teachers and kids

Tested the prototype on young students

WHAT I DID

Bet25 HackatonDuring our partnership with Bet25 we decid-

ed to have an internal hackaton , where we would spend the ent i re weekend coming up

with ideas and prototyping them based on the theme was ‘ soc ia l bett ing ’ . The end result

were two conceptual ized prototypes . A few months later one of Bet25 ’s compet i tors ac-

tual ly announced a concept as one of the two ideas .

WHAT I DID

Researched the topic and structured a hackaton for our coworkers Challenged the norms of betting by generating various ideas and concepts Prototyped and delivered two concepts to Bet25

Bet25 wanted to expand thei r l ine of prod-ucts and create a phys ical s i te for bet-t ing and watching sport . In th is proces , we helped them with researching the f ie ld by gather ing informat ion about s imi lar con-cepts , researching how users current ly bet of f l ine and watch sport , and f inal ly we helped ideate on the new concept .

Bet Café

Gathered inspiration by researching similar concepts online

Did field studies researching the user and current sports/betting locations

Ideated on the concept with Bet25

WHAT I DID