In brief
My name is Francesco Cagnola, I'm a designer willing to contribute to a fairer and more sustainable society. I like to define myself as a system thinker for the good. I've recently graduated in Service Design (MA) and I have a past life in videomaking, photography and graphic design!
Contacts
If you liked my profile and would fancy have a chat or simply say hello... Well, drop me a line!
fran.cagnola@gmail.com
IN DETAIL
Capabilities
I'm a professional with a horizontal skillset and experience in designing services, processes and business strategies but also a craftman that draws communication assets and strategies. I aim to help you and your company/institution to innovate by bringing new ways and creativity to frame problems but also to test and reiterate possible solutions for them.
I'm curious when researching problems and empathetic when developing solutions. Using various qualitative and quantitative research tool I obtain insights to be synthetised by creating logic frameworks. This makes them digestable for other members of the team and the client when it comes to elaborate them in solutions which I test soon and constantly in order to understand mistakes early-on and produce the best possible solution in the end.
Human Centred Design. If we are building services and processes to be used by humans, where else would you start from? Understanding problems with ethnographic methods is crucial to understand what the real problems and needs are.
System Design. If humans must be at the core of a human-led service, taking into consideration how a given service/process relates to the economic system and the impact it has on the natural ecosystem must be high in the priority list to create solutions sustainable over time.
Assumption-driven design. "What are very really trying to test?" is the key question in a design project. Starting off from research, assumption-development is like a lighthouse when going deeper and deeper into the problem or when testing solutions.
Participatory design. Designer provide the bird-eye view of things but what about the details that compose them? Involving directly and early on users and clients is the way to go to not deliver solutions that are alien to the current context but, instead, rooted deeply in them.
Communication design. I'm both a visual craftman and stategist. I able to quickly create static or moving visuals that can work as prototypes as well as final results. I understand the importance and the art of storytelling to properly engage audiences and make what I'm saying important to them.
Interests
I'm a curious human being and my ambition to be of true and positive impact on our world imposes me to keep on researching and studying to keep being relevant and to keep being innovative. My interests are various but coherent with my aims, usually, I try to unpack concepts by writing blog posts.
Food systems. Food systems are broken or, as IDEO suggests, they are working exactly how they are designed to be: wrongly (if we expand their mission from feeding the rich to feeding everyone in harmony with the planetary boundaries). The food we eat and the way it is produced are deeply disconnected from real economies (both the human and natural ones) and that's at the basis of what's wrong with it
Prosumerism. I consider people as agents to be empowered rather than ends to be served. Outsourcing to the private market skills and products that could be performed locally and even by people themselves makes these last very less resilient and their understanding of what's good or wrong with the world fades out.
Circular economy. Linear economies don't take responsibility for what they produce at its end-use, they don't even make sure that the system behind is able to regenerate itself and last on the long-term. Circularity means taking in consideration and respecting the law of conservation of mass: "Nothing is lost, nothing is created, everything is transformed".
Business modelling. Business models are deeply intertwined with how users experience product and services but also with how a company relates to the wider human and natural ecosystem. For example, car-sharing models brought completely different experiences for users renting vehicles by the minute and, furthermore, they influence the business and natural environment by bringing fleet maintenance high on the priority list.
City design. If cities will be the place where 75% of people will leave by 2050 then designing how we live in them is a fundamental aspect to support human and natural life over time. For example, the pandemic brought under the spotlight the importance played by green areas and the potential that approaches like Nature-Based solutions and the 15-minute cities have.
WORK EXPERIENCE
Permanent 2021-22 (1 year)
EY Seren
At Seren, I have used journey maps to support DHSC policy deployment at borders during the pandemic. My work helped stakeholders (ranging from comms, health, policy, service improvement and vulnerable users) to be aligned on user needs and on risks/unanswered questions that needed addressing to deploy effective operations. Furthermore, I have performed and synthesised research to obtain user requirements for an investment platform for BP and for an account management tool internal to EY.
Contract 2020-21 (4 months)
Policy Lab (part of DfE)
After collaborating during my Master, I joined Policy Lab to support the National Food Strategy Team. I liaised directly with the client’s senior stakeholders, leading the design side of a project aiming to create a vision to inspire the review of most of the legislation related to the English food system. To do so, I user
various SD and storytelling tools, designed a series of senior stakeholder workshops and others to get citizens’ input.
various SD and storytelling tools, designed a series of senior stakeholder workshops and others to get citizens’ input.
Contract 2019 (5 months)
Fjord London
This summer, I got the privilege to join this worldwide company.
The learning experience has been immense: I'd the possibility to look at and participate on a wide range of projects: from strategy, pitches preparation and a big piece of work on a digital product for the public sector. This experience gave me the possibility to explore how design can address social ad environmental challenges of our age as well as being challenged by a work environment well established in the commercial reality of the industry.
The learning experience has been immense: I'd the possibility to look at and participate on a wide range of projects: from strategy, pitches preparation and a big piece of work on a digital product for the public sector. This experience gave me the possibility to explore how design can address social ad environmental challenges of our age as well as being challenged by a work environment well established in the commercial reality of the industry.
The internship was supposed to last three months. I managed to get an extension until the end of the end of the project we were working during my last month and half at the studio. It was a extremely nice recognition from the senior management which I appreciated a lot!
Internship 2017-18 (4 months)
Wrong studio
For 6 months, I've been working as an assistant director at this Milanese creative studio. Having as a main task, video production and postproduction, I've been shadowing "master" Giacomo Costa, the main filmmaker of the house!
Internship 2017 (6 months)
Lab Immagine
During my last year at PoliMi, I worked within the campus-based photo-video studio. Here, the chance to work on projects from the very beginning all the way to their delivery. I helped with student support activities and in preparing pitches to get new projects in.
EDUCATION
Royal College of Art
Service Design MA
In London, I'm learning a lot. About myself, about how to be professionally independent, about how to be a system thinker, about how to relate to team-mates from all over the world.
I joined the course because I consider the human-centered approach the only possible to deliver effective outcomes in our society. Transitioning toward a more sustainable and fairer economy requires centering design projects around people and the ecosystem of the planet that hosts us.
Politecnico di Milano
Communication Design BSc
At Politecnico, I developed my design skills from scratch. Rigorous approach and importance of research are the major takeaways from this experience. There, I also developed my technical skills by using the majority of the Adobe CC programs related to graphics, videomaking and photography. I'm a passionate image creator and I'm amazed by the power of stories!