School of Design - Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design
- BIOGRAPHY
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Liz Sanders is a pioneer in the use of participatory research methods for the design of products, systems, services and spaces. She divides her time between teaching and practice. Liz teaches human-centered design to students, clients and colleagues around the world. She has an Honorary Professorship in the School of Design at the University of Dundee and serves as an Advisory Board Member for the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University. Liz teaches the required design research courses to all the design students at The Ohio State University. Liz is the founder of MakeTools, a company that explores generative tools for collective creativity. Her clients have included 3M, AT&T, Apple, Baxter, Becton Dickinson, Coca Cola, Compaq, IBM, Intel, Iomega, Johnson Controls, Kodak, Microsoft, Motorola, Philips, Procter & Gamble, Siemens Medical Systems, Steelcase, Texas Instruments, Thermos, Thomson Consumer Electronics, Toro, and Xerox. This work is generally confidential. Liz was educated as a social scientist and has undergraduate degrees from Miami University (Oxford, Ohio) in both psychology and anthropology. She earned a Ph.D. in Experimental and Quantitative Psychology from The Ohio State University. In the early 1980’s she was hired by a design consulting firm, today called Fitch, as an “experiment” to see what a social scientist might contribute to the design process. Liz introduced information design, user-centered design, applied ethnography and interaction design to the emerging interdisciplinary design practice at Fitch over 18 years. Liz then went on to co-found SonicRim and served as the President there for five years. Today the experiment with regard to what a social scientist might contribute to the design process is ongoing. Liz’s current focus, as President of MakeTools, is on bringing human-centered design research to planning and architecture.
- OUTPUTS
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