Crafting an agile tool to design with ethics

Diagnosis

Context

The digital sector already accounts for 3 to 4% of global greenhouse gas emissions, an impact growing by roughly 6% per year (The Shift Project, 2021). This context triggered a conscious approach for the CDC. As a key financial institution, the CDC, through its Design Studio, launched a shift from a 'techno-vorous' approach to 'Thoughtful Digital.'

Problem

How to do better with less? How can we create a cohesive, adaptive, and engaging methodological tool to harmonize ethical, eco-design, and inclusive principles across diverse projects. How to effectively translate abstract concepts into tangible, actionable steps? The main barrier was a critical lack of a common, shared vocabulary across teams.

Context visualization

Role

I was part of a 2 to 5 person team for 8 months, handling the full spectrum: deep research, strategic concept, testing, and prototyping the final solution. The client, Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations, selected our project for subsequent development.

Key insights

  • Strategic Alignment: Overcoming the lack of a shared vocabulary and securing formal decision-making.
  • Frugal & Scalable Design: The solution had to ensure scalability to save time, money, and energy.
  • Tangible Learning: Physical manipulation was required in addition to digital support, to encourage knowledge retention and interactions during team meetings.
Role visualization

Conception

Methodology

We adopted a structured, double diamond approach: 1. Research & definition: Identified problems and solutions across Eco-Design, Inclusive Design, and Ethical Design pillars. 2. Concept alignment: Formalised a vision focused on 'Architecture and Information Structure' to create a centralized, scalable synthesized reference model. 3. Refining: Developed three concepts, ultimately selecting the modular 'Archipel' design tiles for their potential to facilitate collaborative, hands-on learning.

Design conception

The retained concept, 'Archipel,' is a set of tangible project construction tiles. It functions as a simple, adaptive aid for cross-functional project conception, in this specific case covering sustainability, ethics, and inclusivity. The tool's physical map can be digitized and synced with planning platforms (e.g., Jira, Trello). Each tile is color-coded by category (ethics/inclusive/eco), carries a role attribution, and includes a neutral space for custom details to help managers frame and monitor their projects.
  • The specific Notion and Task to perform.
  • The Responsible Stakeholder (Project Manager, Designer, or Developer).
  • The Priority and Timeline for implementation.
Conception visualization

Results

Delivery

The concept was selected by the CDC and green-lit for subsequent internal development. I presented the study at the Nantes Digital Week and we led a dedicated development workshop with the CDC's internal design team in Paris. Delivered a reference database of 50 potential cards ready for printing, plus a final physical prototype of 36 of these cards (laser-cut tiles, graphic overlays, and magnetic backing) ready for scaling.

Metrics

  • Won an award from the CDC and was published in EDNA magazine.
  • Successfully delivered the prototype, including 36 ready-to-use cards and a scalable database of 50 cards.
  • User Satisfaction: achieved a Net Promoter Score of 7/10 or higher during the workshop at the Digital Factory.
Results visualization