Vulnerable Challenges

Vulnerable challenges require care, not just speed

Co-creating sustainable solutions that honour human experiences.

There's no such thing as "moving fast to break things" when mental health is on the line and systemic challenges stand in the way.

Tackling increasingly complex challenges with pressure to create solutions fast often conflicts with the responsibility to move forward safely. This is especially true when services and digital interactions are intended to improve vulnerable experiences such as mental health, cancer care navigation, student wellness, Veterans' benefits, social isolation, and unemployment or up-skilling.

If we get it wrong, we can do more harm than good, especially for those from historically underserved and marginalized communities.

We specialize in co-creating solutions in environments where the stakes for people are high and the effective use of resources is critical.

To achieve this, we put people at the centre to understand diverse experiences through genuine collaboration and shared creation — this includes those engaging with services and digital experiences, those on the front line of service delivery, and those tasked with delivering on organizational strategic goals.

The results are actionable. Implementation paths become clear. Most importantly, your team and community know they truly matter, creating solutions that are sustainable over time.

How we work together

Everything we do results in action.

When you're working in a high stakes environment, you don't get a break, and taking time away from managing your day-to-day has to be worthwhile. Your challenges are our challenges and our work together won't sit on the shelf.

The results are actionable.
Implementation paths become clear.

We design with people, not for them.

Surveys and focus groups have their place but often fall short when understanding diverse experiences, especially when systemic challenges get in the way.

To ensure solutions are designed to meet people's increasingly diverse needs, we adopt a co-creation approach and use participatory practices so people are active contributors throughout our projects, centring their voices and lived expertise.

We use a relational approach to engagement.

Critical to our approach is embedding people with lived experience on our teams and as co-facilitators, building relationships with communities, and applying trauma-informed practices to our research and design practice.

Using a relational approach to engagement, we work with your team to foster ongoing ways of connecting to continuously improve your services.

Achieve meaningful outcomes through co-creation.

Reflect diverse needs

Inclusive service experiences that integrate digital supports and reflect diverse community needs.

Improve reach

A future delivery model that reaches the people who need the services the most, reduces waitlists and rebalances delivery of services.

Embed feedback

An implementation and feedback approach that keeps your services relevant over time.

“It’s time to flip the script because the traditional models of engagement aren't cutting it! Surveys, joint committees, feedback sessions – these often feel like empty gestures.” - Asra Khan, Student Leader

Why design with care?

People with lived and living expertise need to be engaged with care and thoughtfulness to meaningfully co-create solutions to life's toughest challenges.

Reducing barriers to participation: offering flexible drop-in sessions and accessible participatory activities hosted by people with lived experience
Developing prototypes with service recipients & providers: engage with communities and staff to bring concepts to life and gather authentic feedback
Exploring and testing future state service delivery models: engage staff to generate and test service models, building on their strengths and identifying implementation blockers to ensure sustainable change.

Our work in action

FEATURE STORY

Building Thriving Workplaces Together

In Nova Scotia, small businesses often face challenges in attracting and retaining the right talent, especially within Indigenous, Black, and other equity-deserving communities. To help shift this dynamic, The Moment conducted in-depth field research with both employers and workers to uncover the root causes of employee turnover and misalignment. By engaging directly with these communities, we co-created innovative service models that emphasize mutual growth and satisfaction in the workplace.

This work laid the foundation for the Thriving Workplaces program, led by MixtMode in partnership with the Canadian Career Development Foundation. Funded by the Government of Canada through the Future Skills Centre and overseen by Blueprint, the program is now being piloted across Nova Scotia to test targeted interventions that help both employers and workers thrive.

PROJECT STORY

From Backlog to Flow: Making Disability Benefits Easier to Access

The Government needed to reduce delays in processing hearing loss and tinnitus applications—without sacrificing care or quality. We worked closely with veterans, frontline staff, and internal teams to co-create solutions that balanced empathy with efficiency. By designing and testing prototypes together, we identified ways to fast-track simpler applications and reduce paperwork through automation. The result was a practical roadmap to scale improvements and a testing plan to measure real-world impact over time.

PROJECT STORY

Evidence-Informed Cancer Care: How Interactive Pathway Maps Improve Patient Outcomes

Getting the right care at the right time shouldn’t be a guessing game. That’s why we partnered with Cancer Care Ontario to rethink how cancer care pathways are designed. We took confusing, hard-to-navigate PDFs and turned them into clear, interactive maps that actually make sense to the healthcare providers using them. Through testing and iteration, we produced a tool that helps doctors and nurses find the best evidence-informed care faster—so patients get better outcomes, every time.

GET IN TOUCH

Not sure where to start?
Book a Sounding Board Session to kick-start your work

Sounding Board Sessions are informal conversations to help you think through your next steps in co-creating services that improve vulnerable experiences. We'll collaborate with you to explore approaches for meaningfully working with the people most impacted by your services.

Whether you're just beginning, refining, or scaling your engagement strategy, we're here to listen and explore possibilities with you.

Schedule a Sounding Board Session

Project story

Transforming mental health through authentic student partnership

Service Design

Co-Design

Participatory Engagement

Prioritizing student support in challenging times.

Accessing student mental health services that match your needs and reflect your culture should be a fundamental part of university life. Yet for thousands across Canada, resource-constrained post-secondary systems make this challenging.

OCAD U's Student Wellness Centre sought a partner to fulfil their deep commitment to truly understand and meaningfully engage with students to better support their needs while getting an education.

Creating service transformation with care.

The team recognized they weren't reaching all the students they could within the context of increasingly complex mental health and wellness needs, growing demand, and downward pressures on spending. They were looking for a trauma-informed, inclusion-led design partner to develop a future service delivery model that was meaningfully informed by diverse student experiences and perspectives.

Designing with students, not for them.

To uncover innovative ways to meet students' needs and rethink SWC's physical space, we engaged diverse communities—including BIPOC, 2SLGBTQIA+, students with disabilities, and international students particularly those who were not actively providing feedback through conventional methods like surveys.

We took a student-led approach, partnering with student community leaders. Recent OCAD U graduates on our team helped navigate the campus context, build relationships, and refine engagement materials for greater relevance and impact.

250+

Students shared their perspectives and co-created solutions.

Shifting from consultation to co-creation.

To co-create solutions we worked with students to understand what a student-centered experience would feel like, what it would look like and what they are looking for to support their wellness journey.

Reduced barriers to participation: created drop-in sessions and participatory activities hosted by student leaders so students could participate on own time
Created feedback loops: shared ongoing project learnings within the community
Prototype development with students & staff: engaged student leaders and staff to bring concepts to life and gather feedback
Explored and tested future service delivery models: engaged staff to generate and test service models building on their strengths and identifying blockers to implementation.

Achieving meaningful outcomes through continuous engagement.

The SWC Student Living Room, a hub to support student community and hosts regular student drop-ins, that is inclusive and reflects diverse student needs.

An ongoing culture of co-creation led by Peer Health Promoters that engages the student community to shape the services keeping them continuously relevant.

Reshaping the future service delivery model to rebalance professional support, self-care and social support contributing significantly to reducing the counselling waitlist.

See more of the amazing things the OCAD U Student Wellness Centre’s is implementing on their Instagram page