Over the past two months, coincidentally, I’ve been involved in different projects and topics related to the co-creation of services and improving user experience.

First of all, I was invited to join the COMA team for the ProBadiaLab project (websites in Spanish and Catalan), leading co-creation sessions to empower users in different areas.

Then, I was invited to give a course on Social Innovation through “Techniques for analyzing trends and designing social-change projects” (presentation in Catalan) at the Association of Sociologists and Political Scientists of Catalonia and, finally, came the opportunity to give a conference as an expert in user experience at the second bootcamp of the FICHe_EU program.

All of this made me think that various stakeholders in the socio-economic environment are beginning to see the importance of the following elements:

• Analyzing trends and the impact they have on large groups of users and clients;
• Generating solutions with direct participation from clients and users regarding decisions as to the design and development of products and services, and
• Approaching issues related with innovation from a new, broader, more multidisciplinary perspective.

This can be seen in the feedback received from the participants in the ProBadiaLab project, the interest in the classes on Techniques for analyzing trends and designing social-change projects and the warm reception for topics related to user experience from the startups in the FICHe program.

On one hand, designing an approach to user research from a holistic starting point and, on the other, opening up the strategy and allowing clients and users to become part of the creative process, are becoming key ingredients for change and leading to real, tangible, direct innovation.

There’s no stopping this now.