Think Zebras is a design studio for people who want to change the world — and who believe that changing the world means changing how we do research and design.
We support every stage of the inclusive design lifecycle, from asking the right research questions to get to the root of a problem, to building the accessible solutions that address those root causes and create real-world impact, to crafting the right evaluation strategy so you can show your impact.
Our Philosophy
At Think Zebras, we believe in people. We believe that people make the best choices they can with the knowledge and resources they have. We believe that when people make ‘bad’ choices, it’s usually because they’re dealing with constraints no one else has noticed. And we believe those constraints are the things researchers and designers should be targeting if they want to change the world.
There is a saying in medicine: when you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras.
It means that when you’re trying to find the cause of something, you should look for the most obvious answer — the one that shows up most frequently.
The problem with this approach is that, of course, sometimes the hoofbeats are coming from zebras. And if you never bother to check for zebras because they’re probably going to be horses anyway, you might end up thinking zebras are a lot less common than they are. So you end up treating a bunch of zebras like they’re horses, and then wondering why they’re not doing so well.
Think Zebras centers the needs and experiences of users who are underserved by existing products, services and systems. In doing so, it not only creates experiences that work well for everyone, but uncovers opportunities for radical innovation, by surfacing design challenges that require us to rethink the social infrastructure we take for granted.
