Workshop: design your ideal mobile phone

About the workshop

Public organizations are becoming increasingly vulnerable due to their mobile phones and the apps they use. Municipalities, ministries and executive organisations that use commercial mobile phones are losing control over their own data and over the data of employees and citizens. Fortunately, there is another way. By using open-source operating systems, app stores, cloud storage and communication apps, devices can be adapted to the values ​​and needs of public organizations. If civil servants could design their ideal mobile phone, what would it look like? During the Dutch Design Week we invite civil servants to join this interactive workshop where we design an ideal mobile phone for civil servants. The workshop begins with an introduction of the topic of mobile phone/app governance in public institutions. Afterwards, civil servants will share their experiences using mobile phones for work, what works well for them and what they struggle with. Then, participants ideate their ideal mobile phone for work.

What will you be doing?

Participants will learn a participatory method to discuss shared opportunities and problems with mobile phone use and to come up with solutions that align with the values ​​and missions of the organisation. Public institutions can replicate this workshop in their own institutions. Finally, the input of the session will be used for the Mobifree project by Waag Futurelab to design better open source alternatives for mobile phones that align with the interests of civil servants. The workshop will start at the Natlab at 09:30 with coffee and tea. Around 09:50 we will head to Sint Lucas to start the workshop from 10:00 until 12:30 hrs. After this, a network lunch will be served from 12:30 until 13:30 hrs.

Who can participate:

The workshop invites members of these two groups: Employees in publicly funded organisations (municipalities, ministries, publicly broadcasters, uitvoeringsorganisaties) who use company phones and/or their personal mobile devices for work. We invite open-source hobbyists as well as people who do not use open source applications yet, but would like to test alternatives for their mobile phones. IT administrators who manage devices, apps or data of your employees.