Spark Innovation Lab
This project highlights the research, strategy, and workshop facilitation designed and carried out for SPARK Innovation Lab in Auburn Ave., Atlanta, to help identify and develop brand awareness solutions for organizational growth and reach.
The client
SPARK Innovation Lab operates within Sweet Auburn Works providing technical assistance and funding for retailers and entrepreneurs with storefronts in the Sweet Auburn District or those looking to set up a retail space in the locale.
opportunity
To identify areas for growth and expansion within SPARK Innovation Lab's current operations to ensure future brand reach that can be sustained independently.
solution
Two workshops were designed and facilitated: a diagnostics workshop geared towards problem mapping and a co-creation workshop to identify solution areas and implementation methods for the client.
Outcome
A set of frameworks were created to communicate the on-boarding journey of SPARK Innovation Lab to its incoming clients, through workshop tools uniquely developed and designed to gather relevant insights regarding brand reach.
My roles
Researcher, Strategist and Facilitator
I researched and designed strategy for the framing of each client workshop to better curate the content to the client's engagement type. I was also a workshop host and facilitator where I guided the client through the workshop flow.
Brand Diagnostics Workshop
The Brand Diagnostics Workshop (BDW), curated by Prof. John Storey, comprises a toolkit of activities structured towards helping a brand owner or stakeholder understand their brand better and identify potential opportunity areas.
Workshop Synthesis
From the synthesis of the Brand Diagnostics Workshop, a series of recommendations were built to create a list of actionable points that SPARK could take action on, both immediately and long-term.
CO-CREATION WORKSHOP
Different activities were discussed and ideated for the Co-Creation Workshop (CCW), based on the BDW data synthesis. Each of these activities catered towards deriving the solution or the starting point for one of the intervention recommendations that were provided to the client.
Outcome development
The key activity of the CCW was the “Ideal SPARK Entrepreneur Journey”. The journey was modified into a two-part framework with seven stages that tracked both SPARK’s and the entrepreneur’s experiences and actions at every stage.
Different areas for the awareness-engagement map were ideated using the insights from the CCW, including potential opportunities to increase tourist footfall for the different storefronts of Sweet Auburn.
Measuring impact
The prototype, developed from the workshop insights, was presented to the client as a model to onboard their incoming business clients.
Recommendations were framed and provided to the client for implementation at different time-based intervals, based on an analysis of data from both the workshops, including factors such as access to resources, funding, and availability of personnel.
In the months following this workshop series, SPARK Innovation Labs implemented proposals derived from the activities, including the allocation of a dedicated space for executing future workshops as well as the onboarding of dedicated personnel for client management.
OTHER PROJECTS
enhancing education
spatium
