Design Convo LLC

Our last day in Costa Rica was incredible! Not only did we finish up an incredible 3-day design kick-off and got wonderful feedback on our facilitation and activities…but we got to spend the day exploring! We visited the Hacienda Alsacia #Starbucks Coffee Farm and took a coffee tour learning about the entire coffee process (and having the BEST cup of coffee EVER might I add…) We also got to visit an active volcano, play around a gorgeous waterfall, eat authentic food at restaurant on a hill, and make wonderful memories with an incredible group of people. We cannot wait to come back to Costa Rica 🇨🇷 And cannot wait to see what other travels this incredible consulting life has in store for us! #consulting #faciltiation #design #international #semiconductors #engineering #business #entrepreneurship #travel #fun #yesand #puravida Cary Lopez, PhD Anca Castillo

The first 2 days of the International Technology and Security Innovation (#ITSI) program in #CostaRica have been absolutely brilliant! Through a methodical design and structured process, we have taken these brilliant leaders through multiple human centered design activities focused on: 💡building a comprehensive and share understanding of the current landscape 💡identifying opportunities and challenge that they can collaborative tackle 💡use a creative matrix to come up with BIG IDEAS 💡assessing the potential impact of the emerging ideas 💡use concept posters to build out fully formed ideas A few of the comments we overheard from the participants as we walked around were “this is the most productive thing”, “it’s so good to not just talk about things but to actually work on things and write them down”, and my favorite “I am feeling really hopeful!” 🎉 As Cary Lopez, PhD has said….never underestimate the power of the humble sticky note and the impact of a good process! Cannot wait to hear more about these wonderful ideas as we wrap up the kick-off and see the significant impact they will have on the semiconductor industry in Costa Rica and beyond! #collaboration #international #academia #industry #government #impact #consulting #facilitation #humancentereddesign #ideas #fun #memorable #hopeful Cary Lopez, PhD Anca Castillo

Where are we going? ✅To Costca Rica! What are we doing there? ✅We are helping facilitate a multi-day discussion around workforce development for the semiconductor industry. How are we feeling? ✅Beyond excited! #consulting #faciltiation #international #travel #dreams #momentrepreneurs #learning #semiconductor #workforce #collaboration #fun Cary Lopez, PhD Anca Castillo

We survived summer 2024! That’s right, all the kids are officially back in school as of this weekend we have our days, time, and attention back! Which is much needed because this fall is shaping up to be rather incredible!! ✅Facilitating a multi-day design session for the Arizona Innovation Alliance next week ✅Facilitating an incredible session for the Front Range Community Colleges in Colorado next week in partnership with the brilliant Samantha Adams Becker ✅Helping Kick-off an executive leadership program with the Wellbeing Collaborative of Arizona ✅Collaborating with the Phoenix Legal Action Network to elevate immigrant stories for a wonderful story showcase ✅Bringing story+applied improv to ASU Embark Students to help them prepare for their poster presentations in collaboration with my wonderful improv coach Johhny Kalita ✅Traveling to Missouri to facilitate a LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® design session for the University of Missouri ✅Collaborating with Gail Montgomery Bruce Montgomery and Renee Bhatti-Klug, Ed.D. to bring Leadership Intelligence workshops to the Colorado Judicial Department And these are just some of the confirmed engagements! We have 7+ others that are in the works! Can you believe it?! 🤩 You know, we have moments when we look back and remember how afraid and nervous we were was when we took the leap and started Design Convo LLC. “Would we get any work?” “Is this just a pipe dream?” “Have we made the biggest mistakes of our lives?” And then we look at all that we have done and all that we are so excited to do…and can confidently say “best decision ever!” 🎉 Cheers to an exciting and productive Fall season! 🥂 #consulting #entrepreneurs #humancentered #partnerships #collaborating #yesand #storytelling #appliedimprovisation #stategy #collaboration #thankful #productives #moms Cary Lopez, PhD Anca Castillo

So thankful and honored for these kind words of feedback! ⭐️ #storytelling #leadershipdevelopment #appliedskills #teambuilding #retreat

Last week, we had the pleasure of designing and facilitating a team retreat of the Office of Inclusive Excellence at ASU. The theme? Collaboration! This team of brilliant and passionate professionals wanted to come together not because there was a fire, an emergency, or a "thing" that needed to be done. No, they wanted to come together to learn more about each other and create productive ways of working to enhance their collaboration and ultimately, their impact! So, what did we do with them? Take a peak at some of our proven collaboration activities: ✅ VTS (Visual Thinking Strategies): to help enhance listening skills and learn about the different perspectives and lenses people use ✅ Guide to Me: an activity we came up with to help people better understand their working styles, preferences, and needs ✅ Ikigai: a Japanese framework we love to use to help discover shared values, motivations, and drivers which we then use to create "values in action" statements ✅ Ways of Working Scenarios: an activity we crafted blending a few different methods that focuses on creating communication norms for decisions, ideas, and feedback, rooted in different priority levels Of course, at the end, we always like to ask: What resonated with you from this experience? And one of our favorite feedback comments was "Other team retreats I have been to have been rather boring, but this one was so engaging, fantastic, and a great use of our time!" 😍 Anytime someone tells us that they have "fun" and that they believed what we did with them was a "great use of time", we call that a BIG WIN! 🥇 #collaboration #leadership #retreat #highereducation #inclusive #consulting #teamwork #waysofworking #connection #learning #humancentered Anca Castillo Cary Lopez, PhD

We are so honored and to have been brought in as guest speakers and facilitators for the Banner Rising program with Banner Health to help train their leaders in strategic storytelling with the The Storytelling Leader program. It was such an engaging and inspiring group with such incredible stories! We asked the group….”what resonated most with you in this workshop” and one of the participants said… “I learned that we ALL have stories to tell, and now I know HOW to tell my stories” 😍 If you have a team or leadership retreat coming up and want to add a dynamics and impactful activity to the agenda, let us know! We have quite a few options and that are both group favorites and highly impactful! #storytelling #leadership #development #applied #skills #learning #dynamic #strategic #stories #share #engage #healthcare #consulting #facilitating Anca Castillo Cary Lopez, PhD

Because learning something new is one of the best way to stay curious, stay agile, stay humble, and stay connected…we took a Glutten Free Sourdough Bread Baking class today! It was so lovely and I learned so much about the chemistry of yeast! Not to mention, we are adding to the bucket of incredible memories we have together! The team that bakes together, stays together! 💪 #learning #growing #baking #bread #leadership #women #empowering #healthiswealth #memories #skills #fun Cary Lopez, PhD Anca Castillo

These past few weeks has been busy! ✅ We traveled to London, Colorado, and Alaska to connect with a clients and visit family. ✅We submitted a proposal response to a RFP focused on human centered design that we are very excited about. ✅We facilitated a storytelling workshop for the STRAD Divison at Rio Salado Community College which was so empowering and inspirational. ✅We traveled up to Flagstaff to facilitated a strategic retreat for the Wellbeing Collaborative and got to spend quality time with brilliant health executives and support them as they developed a strategic vision and plan. ✅We collaborated with a university in Missouri to plan a VTS and LEGO workshop for the fall. ✅We connected with 4 new higher education units across Arizona, Utah, and Colorado, and are excited to explore how we can collaborate and support their efforts. So what did we learn? 💡Traveling is so fun but sooo exhausting! 💡Stories are the fastest way to build authentic connections with others. 💡Relationships are incredibly important to us, so we invest in them. One of our favorite comments came in an email that said “I want something unique, hands-on, and dynamic. Naturally, I thought of Design Convo to facilitate this event” 😍 #storytelling #consulting #collaboration #design #connection #learning #leadership #vision #strategy #busy #dynamic #handson #thankful Cary Lopez, PhD Anca Castillo

Over the past 2 years, we’ve had the pleasure of running our Strategic Storytelling Workshop for over 500+ executive health and education leaders across Arizona. The results speak for themselves: participants have reported a 65% increase in their capability to find, develop, and share strategic stories that inspire and influence action in just 2-4 hours! If you’re looking for an impactful leadership retreat or a team-building activity that enhances communication skills, we invite you to connect with us. Curious about what past participants have said? Take a peak! “Participating in the workshop was educational, inspiring, and just plain fun. Anca knows how to bring the best out of participants, pushing us out of our comfort zone but positively supporting us all the way. I left the workshop with two strategically crafted stories that I can directly use in my line of work to make an impact on others. I would recommend this workshop to any team that wants to increase the effectiveness of the way it communicates to their stakeholders.” “I was able to integrate storytelling concepts learned during a keynote presentation I gave the day after the workshop. Infusing storytelling tools helped elevate the keynote to invite deeper engagement and inspire people to act. Thank you to Anca for her excellent leadership.” “This workshop was a truly amazing opportunity to learn and get comfortable with storytelling. It was such a safe and supportive environment to try new things and to grow. I would HIGHLY recommend this workshop to all of my colleagues and friends.” “I found this workshop valuable with powerful tips and tools that I can immediately apply to my work. It gave me the framework to customize my story in different settings and Anca’s patient but leader-style coaching accelerated my learnings.” “The workshop was engaging and fun and I am now confident in writing stories and have a path forward. I love this tool! The feedback was so helpful for me in improving how I tell my story! Thank you, DesignConvo! Ready to elevate your team’s storytelling skills? Connect with us today to learn more about our workshops and how we can help you achieve your communication goals. 🌟 #Leadership #TeamBuilding #StrategicStorytelling #DesignConvo #retreat #strategic #skilldevelopment