Better for All: Bringing Diversity to Design with Eglantina Hasaj and Manpreet Kaur
Samsung Developer
When you design with diversity, equity and inclusion in mind you're not only doing the right thing, but you're also creating more opportunities for growth. Through better design you can improve inclusivity and make diversity the standard.
In this installment of our 'Better for All' series, Eglantina Hasaj from Cogul Planet and Manpreet Kaur from Themes Digital share how they've been able to create more inclusive designs that speak to more people.
What does diversity, equity and inclusion mean to you?
Eglantina: It's part of a well-geared machine. Incorporating these principles into your work and environment makes the process pleasant; it also as opens new opportunities for your business.
Manpreet: It means to include and respect people with different ethnicity, geography, culture, and beliefs to have a more inclusive society.
How do you incorporate inclusive design into your work?
Eglantina: Our store provides content globally. Therefore, we study and have concept meetings to develop the most appropriate, inclusive designs that fit the national, racial, and religious cultures of our audiences. We always try not to offend or hurt anyone.
Manpreet: There are two approaches. First is to not design stuff which promotes non-equality and the second is to create designs that promote inclusiveness. When designing new Themes, we make sure not to design anything which would offend any groups of people or individual beliefs. We also create multiple Themes with diversity in mind.
What inspired you to start making inclusive designs?
Eglantina: We've always thought about how to make our Themes more inclusive for our audiences. When we see a group of people embracing what is right for them, it inspires us to create more inclusive designs and makes us feel part of the group.
Manpreet: Being conscious about our surroundings and society at large, we saw a lot of bias towards certain sets of people. This inspired us to do what we could to create inclusivity. Just because a person believes in a particular way of living or comes from a different background, should not be criteria to exclude them.
What are some of your inclusion-focused designs for sale in the Galaxy Store?
Eglantina: The "Black Lives Matter: Rainbow" Theme was created last year in response to the BLM movement that was happening in the US. We saw a very positive response from that inclusive design.
Manpreet: A couple of examples are our Themes "Black History" for Black History Month and "Rainbow" for Pride.
Where do you source best practices and resources for inclusive design work?
Eglantina: We stay up-to-date with news, trends, movements, etc. through social media and news channels that provide information from around the world. Another source we take into consideration are comments and messages from Samsung Galaxy users.
How has designing with DE&I in mind influenced your career?
Eglantina: It makes you a more creative designer, since you are exposed to endless inspiration.
Manpreet: It makes your work as a designer more satisfying and fulfilling.
Do you have any advice on how others can design with DE&I in mind?
Eglantina: Understanding and keeping an open mind about other peoples' ideas and views in your workspace or even among your audience will help you develop a strong presence as a designer.
Manpreet: Make it about the greater good. When we all work to promote DE&I, we can make this world a better place.
Thanks to Eglantina and Manpreet for sharing their insights on designing for DE&I. Considering diversity in your design is an important step towards building a world where we all feel welcome.
We hope you found our 'Better for All' series helpful in shaping a more diverse and inclusive space. Stay tuned for the final blog post in our series on improving accessibility in design to create an experience that's better for all.
Follow us on Twitter at @samsung_dev for more tips on designing and developing for Samsung.
