capabilities
Our services are divided into four categories. Whatever your project, we are here to support your team in collaboration, ideation, co-creation, and more. If you’re not sure exactly what you or your team need, contact us to start a conversation!
exploration & ideation
consulting & facilitation
education & training
trends & insights
exploration & ideations
We use design to explore opportunity areas, identify insights, generate solution areas and test ideas with users for many different projects ranging from existing campaign issues to new areas of opportunity. We can be brought in for a full sprint, a single session or a series of workshops.
Past projects: Autism awareness, Teen Bullying Prevention, Retirement (in partnership with AARP’s innovation practice), Unemployment Benefits and Social Isolation (in partnership with the New Business Team) to land on pitch concepts.
consulting & facilitation
Leverage Spark to facilitate working sessions, discussions, team offsites, retrospectives, pre-mortems, and co-creations!
Past projects: working sessions for the lab, media and the test and learn workstreams, the DEI Council, co-creation and retrospective for the Digital Product Management Team, and design and facilitation for a media team offsite. Spark also facilitated a session to help name the Ad Council consultancy, the co-creation where our staff shaped our ERGs and several DEI commitment co-creations.
innovation training
We’ve trained 80% of the organization on design innovation through 2 day design innovation trainings, where they learned design thinking and test and learn methods along with mindsets that nurture innovation.
We're updating the curriculum to include more inclusive design and equity practices in support of our DEI commitments. Keep an eye out for upcoming trainings!
trends & insights
We provide analysis of the latest trends, and signals by leveraging desk research and partnerships with Canvas 8, a trends and whitepaper platform as well as Sparks & Honey and the Q Platform. We'll be producing bi-annual trend reports in addition to a monthly newsletter.
We also bring in guest speakers to share their expertise and insights. Past speakers include: Fura Johannestidir, the CDO of HUGE, Derrick Feldman, managing partner of EDGE, as well as trend shareouts by Sparks & Honey, OMD Innovation Team and Edelman.
Reach out to join our team or request trends research!
what others have to say
“Ariba was instrumental in partnering with Kelly Apostolidis and me to set the strategy and agenda for the transformation workstream focused on the media model evolution. She brought organization, objectivity, and inspiration to our work creating safe, interactive and creative space to the effort. We also leaned into Ariba’s strategic and facilitation expertise for a Team Media leadership offsite to help establish priorities and focus for FY 20.” - Kathy Kayse, Chief Media Strategy and Partnership
"So often, it’s easy to approach our work the way we know how - after all, we have lived and breathed our campaigns for (for many of us) years. It doesn’t have to be that way though, and it shouldn’t - Spark Design Innovation Training gave me the tools I needed to think strategically big and differently. I learned to question assumptions, to put the user first, and to never be afraid of testing something. Even if I don’t apply the full Splashbox framework every day, I try to have these principles drive the decisions I make on a campaign." - Allie Palmer, VP & Campaign Director
"Spark Design Innovation Training is a great way to learn how to harness the power of collaboration and stretch the bounds of creativity. Ariba is a gifted facilitator who makes learning fun and accessible. She naturally and gracefully fosters inclusion and engagement. I have been able to apply the principles for the benefit of our whole department. I highly recommend it!" - Carol Hilson, Art Director
“Ariba has helped the Studio to really think differently about ideating and the design process, which I believe has contributed to the quality of creative we are producing.“ - Danielle Linet, VP of Marketing & Brand
"I tend toward linear thinking in my approach to business solutions. Ariba--through creative exercises and visualization tools-- challenges me to address some opportunities in an abstract, visual way. I'm often surprised at the outcome, because it feels simple and organic"- Katherine Pastre, SVP of Media
