Participatory Program & Systems Designer
I help organizations, institutions, and community initiatives turn lived experience, complex needs, and meaningful work into practical systems people can use, sustain, and improve.
My work sits between participation and implementation: program and proposal design, participatory inquiry, learning systems, governance, facilitation, operations, and adaptation — with attention to the roles, decisions, resources, relationships, and learning that shape what becomes possible.
What shaped my work
I came to this work through many fields. I came to it through engineering, international development, documentary storytelling, climate innovation, contemplative practice, and neighbourhood initiatives.
Along the way, I have designed international programs, built operational and learning systems, conducted field research, co-developed major funding proposals, co-created media projects with young people, and organized neighbourhood gatherings.
Each context taught me to look beneath the visible project.
Structure shapes what becomes possible. A program, service, or initiative has to be grounded in the everyday realities of the people who take part in it, carry it, or live with its effects. Its quality depends not only on the idea, but on whether roles are clear, trust can grow, decisions can be made, learning can move into practice, and responsibility is shared.
These experiences drew my attention to the less visible infrastructure of collective work: how roles are shared, decisions are made, resources and information move, learning is carried into practice, and people keep showing up.
That is the work beneath the work.
How I work
I begin with attention before intervention.
I start by understanding the need or potential for the work and what already exists to build on. I pay attention to the people who may shape the work, take part in it, or live with its effects, as well as the surrounding context and pressures. Four recurring movements guide my approach, though I often move back and forth between them:
Begin with context
Understand what matters, who is involved, what already exists, and what could support or constrain the work.
I listen for how different people understand the situation, what they hope might become possible, what has already been tried, and the constraints they are navigating.
Make the system visible
Clarify how the parts connect — or need to connect — for the work to move forward.
Together, we map the purpose, relationships, roles, decisions, resources, assumptions, and conditions shaping the work. This helps reveal what is clear, what is missing, and where attention could make the greatest difference.
Co-create practical structures
Translate insight into forms the work can actually use.
This may mean shaping a program or pilot, clarifying roles and decisions, developing a work plan and budget, structuring a proposal, creating a governance process, or building research, learning, and coordination systems.
Implement, learn, and adapt
Test assumptions, notice what happens, and adjust as the work develops.
As the work unfolds, I pay attention to what changes, what remains difficult, whose perspective may be missing, and what unintended effects emerge. The goal is to revise the work through learning rather than treating a plan as finished too early.
The aim is not to impose a perfect system. It is to help people build enough shared understanding and practical structure to move forward, share responsibility, learn from what happens, and sustain what works.
What I’m exploring now
Alongside my professional work, I’m developing a research-practice inquiry into needs, relationships, and the conditions that help people and communities thrive.
I’m interested in how people come to understand what is actually needed, how those needs are named or ignored, and how systems can be designed to respond with more care, accountability, and learning over time.
This inquiry is still forming through writing, conversation, practice, and small experiments. Over time, I hope it becomes a public home for tools, stories, living experiments, and shared learning about how systems can become more responsive, accountable, and supportive of wellbeing over time.
You can explore how this has shown up in past work, read my Field Notes, or reach out to be in conversation.