Optimistic Design

A practical, positive look at the future of design, ethical innovation, and technology.

Optimistic Design is a practical, positive look at the future of design, ethical innovation, and technology. Tune in each month with Wilma Lam, Substantial’s Strategy Director, as she is joined by creatives, makers, and thinkers to talk about what it means to design with hope for our ever changing world.

Episode 01

E.01

Surya Vanka

Founder + Creator
Authentic Design + Design Swarms

Surya is an educator, speaker, and founder with over 25 years of experience as a transdisciplinary design practitioner working at the leading edge of physical and digital design.

Episode 02

E.02

Courtney Song

Brand & Experience Design Manager
Sonder

Courtney leads Brand and Experience Design at Sonder. Leveraging her deep experience in multidisciplinary design and strategy, she is redefining the future of hospitality and living.

Episode 03

E.03

Ariam Mogos

K12 Lab Futurist Fellow
Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford

Ariam Mogos is a futurist fellow in the Stanford d.school K12 Lab, where she designs prototypes with K-12 educators around how to engage, evaluate, and create with emerging technologies, grounded in ethics and digital agency.

Episode 04

E.04

Andy Leong

Product Design Lead
Karat

Andy is a Product Design Lead at Karat, a company on a mission to unlock opportunity for both hiring companies and candidates by re-engineering the interview process.

Episode 05

E.05

Fred Kukelhaus & Ben Young

Co-Founders
Hugo & Hoby

Fred and Ben are co-founders of Hugo + Hoby which they founded with the simple mission to make beautiful, locally crafted, and sustainable furniture more widely accessible.

Episode 06

E.06

Mary Quandt

Director, Experience Strategy
Johnson & Johnson

Mary is a leader of design strategy at Johnson & Johnson, focusing on health and wellbeing, end-to-end experience design, and bringing behavioral science into the design process.

Episode 07

E.07

Jennifer McFadden

Associate Director of Entrepreneurship & Lecturer in the Practice of Management
Yale Som

Over the last nine years, Jennifer has played an integral part in developing and fostering entrepreneurial culture both at Yale and in the broader industry.

Episode 01

E.01

Todd Diemer

User Research Lead, Khan Academy

Todd Diemer is the User Research Lead at Khan Academy, the non-profit educational organization created in 2006 to provide free, world-class education for students nationally and internationally.

Episode 02

E.02

Michelle Lee

Managing Director, Play Lab at IDEO

Michelle Lee, Managing Director at IDEO, leads their Design for Play team. She has made it her mission to use the principles of play to create impactful products for a diverse range of industries, from healthcare to food and beverage. Michelle is an award-winning designer driven by a desire to bring thoughtful solutions to fruition through user-centered design.

Episode 03

E.03

Katie Silvers

Director of Design and UX, Salesforce

Katie Silvers is the Director of Design and UX at Salesforce and is an expert in aligning business needs and communication with core leadership. Before joining Salesforce, Katie was a manager of Corporate Strategy and Innovation at the Arielle X Group and LexisNexis. She specializes in Design Thinking tools and Agile methodologies and believes product and process innovation is an indispensable element in business growth.

Episode 04

E.04

Beth Kolko

Design Professor at UW, Co-Founder at Shift Labs, and Venture Partner at Pack VC

Beth is a humanities-turned-engineering academic turned entrepreneur turned venture capitalist who has worked at the forefront of multiple technology-driven cultural shifts.

Episode 05

E.05

Jennifer Gaze

Director, High Alpha Innovation

Jennifer Gaze is a director at High Alpha Innovation, where she partners with global leading organizations to launch new ventures and build venture studios.

Episode 06

E.06

Ken Tanabe

Founder, Loving Day

Ken is the Founder of Loving Day, a holiday he created as a design-driven social change project.

Episode 07

E.07

Ijeoma Azodo

Associate Director, Clinical and Health Service Design

Dr. Ijeoma Azodo is the Associate Director of Clinical and Health Service Design at NES Technology Service.

Episode 08

E.08

Adha Mengis

Project Director, Community Collaboration + Design

Adha currently serves as the project director for community and design at Digital Promise, where he designs learning experiences for educators rooted in equity and metacognition.

Episode 09

E.09

Jaymes Hanna

Senior Program Officer of K-12 Market Dynamics, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Jaymes Hanna, Senior Program Officer of Market Dynamics on the K-12 Education team, supports the work on improving the design, awareness, and adoption of evidence-based programs, products and services that support teachers and increase student success.

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About Our Host

Wilma Lam

As Strategy Director at Substantial, Wilma leads projects to create better digital products for a better tomorrow. She partners with organizations across sectors to identify new opportunities and bring them to market. Projects include emerging brands/platforms, connected devices, digital services, and new CPG business models. Prior to Substantial, Wilma led business innovation and design strategy initiatives at Johnson & Johnson's design group, launched the digital platform Rememory Stories, and worked at LumenLab, MetLife's Innovation Center in Singapore.