When designing products, it's easy to neglect the data protection features of a product, such as privacy statements and consent requests. Yet these features greatly impact the perception and experience of trust, transparency and control. Product and design decisions around these topics rarely involve policy advisors or data regulators.

During Design Jams, product makers, policy advisors and data regulators work together to solve real-world design problems. Through hands-on prototyping, they come to understand the realities of designing for transparency, trust and control. They develop concrete solutions that can be implemented in their projects.

Foster discussions about crucial data use and privacy topics.

A Design Jam is an opportunity to enlist the thinking of a diverse range of participants. By running your own Design Jam, you'll discover the benefits of co-designing user experiences, deepen your understanding of data protection policies, and equip yourself with the tools to design for these topics in your own work. Through hands-on prototyping, you'll understand the give-and-take needed to get data privacy solutions off the ground.

Your Design Jam should aim to include a range of viewpoints and expertise.

You should invite attendees whose expertise and experience complements your own.

If you're a product manager, designer or developer, invite team members and partners that can speak to the legal and regulatory constraints your business faces. Make sure their voices are heard by the wider organization.

If you're a policy advisor, data regulator or industry body, invite product makers to get practical insights on designing for data protection. You'll also need one or more product designers who can bring your ideas to life in the prototyping phase.

If you're a student, lecturer or academic hosting a Design Jam, make sure that both product designers and policy experts are present. You may need to team up with other departments at your school or invite industry or regulatory representatives from outside.

Our Design Toolkit was developed and refined through global Design Jams on the topics of trust, transparency and control. It contains over 20 guided activities and supporting materials (including downloadable worksheets) covering everything you need to plan and run your own event.

The toolkit is divided into four sections: Plan, Discover, Ideate and Prototype. You can run your Design Jam as a full-day event covering all sections or break it down into a series of shorter sessions focusing on one section at a time. Pick the approach which works best for your team.

Our plan a jam section suggests themed agendas that will help you getting started!

Introduce participants to the Design Jam format, agree on goals for the session, and set context through short interactive exercises.

The Plan section includes materials to start your Design Jam off on the right foot.

It also includes tips on managing logistics and setting a brief for the day — so you can make your Design Jam a success.

Note that for full-day workshops, we at TTC Labs typically kick off the planning process 3 months in advance. This provides enough time to determine logistics, book collaboration space and ensure participants can attend.

Learn something new, share expertise and break free from the confines of day-to-day roles and responsibilities.

The Discover section includes inspiring panels, group ideation and individual reflection through hands-on exercises.

During this phase, participants will break into teams of 6-8 people, which will continue through the end of the Design Jam.

Put your shared understanding to work on real-world privacy and data issues.

The Ideate section uses guided activities, exercises ad design tools to help participants brainstorm and sketch in a group setting.

This section requires workshop materials for each of the participants. You can find these materials in the Toolkit.