Volunteers

Leeds GovJam is run entirely by volunteers. Some volunteers help to plan, market and manage the event. Others support and mentor jammers with their service design and design thinking expertise. We’re always looking for new volunteers. If you think you could be one of them, please tweet @LeedsGovJam or email leedsgovjam@gmail.com

Leeds GovJam 2019 team

Saul Cozens

I have worked in ‘digital’ since 1996, when I was a Webmaster for a Sheffield software company. Since then I have worked in digital agencies, government departments, charities and even gaming companies.

I have always been driven to help people understand digital technology and and be able to apply it to make things better or make better things. Service Jams help us learn to put the question of “what should we do?” first and then identify where different tools and mediums (including technology) can help achieve that. It’s also great fun.  @saulcozens on twitter (and most other places)

Simon Wilson

I’ve 20 years’ experience designing and making things, and many years leading and managing teams and departments. I’ve been lucky through my career to work a whole slew of good stuff, most recently at HMRC and NHS Digital. I am currently helping DWP design people-centred digital services. I think jams are a great opportunity for people to try designing, learning about needs, designing services, making something that tests those thoughts – and getting out to speak to potential users of the service. The safe space of the jams where participants are encouraged to not worry, to learn, to have a go, and to get out and explore their ideas is a great opportunity, one I love helping facilitate with my fellow volunteers. @ermlikeyeah

Sharon Dale

I am a consultant specialising in learning, teams and change. I am interested in self-organising and empowered teams, being agile in non-software environments (note the lower case a), networked organisations and motivation. My background is in service support, project and service management. The work I am currently doing is focused on service design and service management in Government. I love working with people as individuals and teams so I volunteer for things like Global GovJam, Global Service Jam, Good for Nothing and GovCamp. I am also a volunteer for the Stroke Association and co-ordinate @LeedsJelly – Monthly free co-working. Personal – Music: 70s soul, reggae, ska & 80s electronic, I’m a new blogger and a Nana. @pixlz

Lisa Jeffery

I am passionate about learning and helping people collaborate and innovate for social good. Having worked in a wide range of digital, marketing and communications roles across various different sectors, I believe design is a superpower that connects people, to deliver better experiences for everyone. I started jamming in 2014, at Leeds Service Jam and Leeds GovJam, and my first Global JamJam was in 2016. Jamming is a super-effective way to ‘learn by doing’ and the outcomes can be transformational. @lisajjeffery

Karen Thornton

I am a business analyst working at DLA Piper UK LLP. I spent 23 years working in local government , formerly in the library service and latterly in a business change team working on transformation projects and service improvement. I first discovered human-centred design in 2014 on the Design Council’s ‘Design in the Public Sector’ programme, and I’ve been hooked ever since. I brought this approach into the way of working at the council, running a project-related jam in 2016. I attended Leeds GovJam in 2017 and am now setting my sights on bringing design thinking to the legal sector! #whyijam is that I firmly believe that service and business should make it easy for their customers to use their products and services – and that this can only be achieved by engaging with the customers and understanding their experience. When I’m not working you might find me dancing or sewing. @fabdancinguk

Ewan Muirhead

I work with Charities and Social Enterprises, helping Boards and CEO’s to navigate challenges around sustainability, change management and communications strategy. My background is in community lead economic development and enterprise coaching – I now use mostly Solution Focused coaching and Service Design tools (thanks to attending Service Jam in 2017!) as I’m passionate about ‘learning through doing’ and leaving clients with a more effective toolkit.

#whyijam – Service Jam opened my eyes to a much more human-centred approach to working with teams to achieve better outcomes for their service users. It’s a privilege to be able to give something back and hopefully help bring more voluntary sector innovators into the Service Design world, as the experience and tools you can learn at Service Jam are invaluable given the current climate around funding/commissioning!  @ewanthrivelab

Salma Azfal

I’m a civil servant and passionate about improving public services.  My first experience of Jams as a participant was last year  at the Leeds Service Design and Leeds Gov Jam 2018.  I also helped to organise the Leeds Service Design Jam 2019, loved it so much that I’m back again helping out at Leeds GovJam!  I can’t imagine life without being part of  the Jamming community!

I love to Jam as the jam ethos is #doingnottalking. It’s a hands on practical way of how I can be more human focused in my work by applying design thinking tools and techniques, continuously improving and refreshing my skills to work in new ways.

By jamming, I feel part of a global Jam community, always collaborating, sharing ideas, innovating and learning from each other in a creative way to improve public sector services. It doesn’t matter what job you do, or what your background is, I’d encourage everyone to Jam. You get to work on community issues, make new connections, meet loads of lovely people, play with lego and have lots of fun. It’s great to be part of a global experience.

@SalmaAfzal_

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Leeds GovJam 2018 team alumni

Marie Cheung

I am a Service Designer currently working at the Department for Work and Pensions. I am passionate about designing engaging and meaningful experiences for people. While specific user experiences in products are important, I also believe that the overall holistic experience that people encounter in a service affects their whole outlook on a company or brand. It’s not just about the end product, but the journey that people go through when using products and services. I help organisations design for digital through a service design lens. @mariecheungsays

Matt Edgar

I’m head of design for NHS Digital. My focus is with services for citizens, while also developing the design profession across the whole organisation. Before that, I spent 5 years as a service designer, digital coach, and founder of service design and innovation consultancy Stick People. I developed the GDS Service Manager Programme, and coached in the DWP Digital Academy. My service design clients included the Co-op, NHS organisations, and local government. In 2016, I was on the worldwide organising team for the Global GovJam. mattedgar.com  | @mattedgar

Emma Harvey

I fell into digital in ’98 after being tempted by an agency job ad that listed flower arranging as one of the responsibilities. I’ve been privileged to work as Client Services Director at one of the north’s largest digital agencies, and as Managing Director at Numiko, a respected boutique agency. I’ve had many different job roles but the core theme has always been translating user and organisational needs into a solution. I now run Hozho, working as a consultant offering support for organisations building digital services, helping with both the ‘what’ and ‘how’; and am currently helping NHS Digital to build an experience design function within their Digital Delivery Centre. @em606

Kirsty Marson

I’m a Service Designer currently working at HMRC. I’ve worked across different industries in both public and private sectors in lots of different roles. I’m really passionate about enabling and empowering anyone in an organisation to contribute and collaborate on designing and delivering great experiences. I’m also especially interested in the non-digital experiences people have. @KirstyLMarson

Rebecca Mendoza

I am Californian born and raised but I’ve been living and working in York for over 5 years. I’m currently the digital inclusion officer for a charity and most of my work involves helping people get to grips with the digital world. I got my first taste of jams last year and went to both Leeds Service Jam and Leeds GovJam. Since then I’ve done as much as I can to apply my jam skills and human-centred design principles into my work. Outside of work I play rugby, study languages and am a member of the Rotary Club of York but my greatest passions are travel, food and the great outdoors. @RebeccaAMendoza

Paul Rawson

After spending 20 years working with large-scale IT systems in a variety of roles, including strategy, architecture, design, build, delivery, product management, governance and so on, I had an epiphany during a week-long design thinking boot camp. Whilst we were good at architecting and engineering systems, often they did not meet the real needs of the users and we often simply built the wrong thing. So I pivoted. I now work as a service designer at NHS Digital trying to design systems and services that wow our users. @nozzynoo

Beverley Smith

I am a career civil servant with a long background in delivery, strategy and policy. Moved into digital four years ago because I wanted to make a difference and this seemed to be the place where it was happening. I work for GDS as a facilitator in the London Academy, developing and delivering products to embrace agile ways of working. Can’t wait to get involved with Leeds GovJam. @BevvySmith

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Leeds GovJam 2017 team alumni

Tim Frenneaux

Tim is passionate about ensuring services meet people’s real needs and has spent much of his career shaping public services to do just that, often drawing on the talents of the Leeds GovJam founders and the likes of the Design Council. Tim has fingers in many pies and is currently Head of Business at a Local Enterprise Partnership, Chair of the Yorkshire Digital Catapult and founder of the innovative startup Gather Outdoors. @timineaux

Kathryn Grace

I work in the fields of Health and Public Services. I am interested in BIG ideas, innovation, collaboration, people-centred design and using digital technologies well. With 22 years of experience across design, digital and communications. After working at Orange and EE as a Service Design manager, I am now focusing on today’s digital healthcare services challenge. Current projects include: the creation of HealthSpark | York, an online conversation space for health and care; enabling service design and people centred design to be introduced in local/national public and health services and an ongoing design research project as an Alzheimer’s family caregiver. I am a SDNetwork Professional Member, co-organiser of Service Design Leeds and annual Leeds Global Service Jams 2010-2015.  www.kathryngrace.co.uk | @IamKathrynGrace | @SDLeeds | @wecaredesign

Matthew Lund

I’ve worked for Leeds City Council for the last 7 years, and before that with many public sector and not-for-profit organisations as a consultant. My focus has always been consultation and community engagement – how we put people’s voices at the heart of services and, vitally right now, at the heart of change. I’ve come to design thinking quite recently through the Design Council’s Design in Public Services programme. I’m excited at the integration of engagement, insight, change and delivery disciplines it offers, and I’m encouraging more public sector colleagues to take up the opportunity GovJam presents. At home in Huddersfield we look after each other, our garden, and Jo’s growing culture blog, enjoying the challenge of growing veg on a 1 in 4 slope and finding new ways to store too many books.

Tero Väänänen

I’m a service designer, photographer and artist, with the mind of an engineer. My background is in computer engineering, and I started as a programmer using Perl and early HTML building websites. Since then my career spans from working as a interaction designer and usability specialist at Orange, managing the design team responsible for the Internet Banking at HSBC Bank, Head of UX for an agency, and now as a Service Designer designing health services for clinicians and the public. @teropsv

Liz Whitefield

I am so proud that I have been able to support Leeds GovJam over the last few years. In my current role I support businesses to design and deliver great services for their customers. My public sector experience in both frontline services and improvement projects was always about looking at ways to improve how customers interact with the services they depend on and I have always enjoyed finding new tools and techniques to improve how I do a great job.  I always learn new things but what’s great is seeing how the event can shape and influence all the people who decide to take part no matter what their background and experience. This year I really wanted to get more people involved from organisations that could benefit from the experience and connection and it’s great that we are sponsoring local charities to take part. @Lizziew68

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Leeds GovJam 2015 team alumni

Nick Jackson

I started work at the University of Lincoln whilst completing my degree, working with the Online Services team to build, deliver and improve systems to improve the staff and student experience. During this time I both worked on existing and new services, as well as taking part in research projects around the use of open data. I currently work for mySociety, the charity behind websites such as TheyWorkForYou and FixMyStreet, helping use technology to empower citizens. I still love open data and open system design, and enjoy tinkering and hacking using technology to make life easier and leave the world a better place.

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Leeds GovJam 2014 team alumni

Georgiana Mannion

I am a Consultant Business Analyst, Coach, Mentor and Trainer working at private and public sector organisations. I help to deliver change and process improvement using facilitative, investigative and playful techniques. I have a varied career history including Mental Health Nursing, HR, Project Management, Software Implementation which I draw experience from in my consulting. I am always researching the use of playfulness, the dynamics of groups and empathic learning. I volunteer for the IIBA and represent the North of England. I have lived in Leeds for almost 12 years, I adore living here and started the Leeds City Centre Women’s Institute (Buns & Roses) in 2009, volunteered as a School Governor, play in some bands, teach crafts and make wedding cakes! Work: @processincolour | Fun: @MrsWomannion

Valentina Vezzani

I am a visiting research fellow at the School of Design of University of Leeds in colour and design, but also one of the co-founders of the PACO Design Collaborative. After a MSc in Product and Service Design, I got a PhD in design, in colour education, both at the School of Design of Politecnico di Milano (Italy). I am interested in interdisciplinary and collaborative learning processes, in design thinking in education at all levels and disciplinary areas, and in the contemporary phenomena of creative society and social creativity.