DNDA26 Award Guidelines
Award Guidelines
General Guidelines
DNDA offers three different forms of recognitions:
Projects. An Award contest for groups of Early-Career individuals who have a project and evidence of its effectiveness for societal work.
Education for HCD+. Recognition to educational groups that train individuals and groups to do the kind of HCD+ societal work that is recognized by DNDA. The educational group does not have to be an officially recognized educational institution. It could be a bootcamp or training group. Although we ask for information about the instructors and methods of instruction as well as the curriculum, the best evidence is the graduates who are now doing HCD+ societal work.
Note that the Education for HCD+ category is only for groups that train people to do HCD+ work. All other educational activities, the ones that fit the UN SDG 4, are considered to be projects.
Organizations. Recognition awards for all organizations whose missions support the kind of HCD+ societal work that is recognized by DNDA. Eligible support may include the organization’s activities, encouraging employee participation in such work, or assistance to external groups undertaking societal projects. Applicants must provide evidence demonstrating their contribution to societal benefit.
PROJECTS
The goal of the DNDA project awards is to reward groups early in their experience of developing projects for societal needs, with a focus upon the people in communities. The projects can already be completed or in the early stages of development, but all must have built and tested sufficient amounts of the project to test its effectiveness and provide solid evidence that it has the potential for meaningful outcomes. Projects that are purely technological do not fit into the DNDA program because they fail to meet the requirement for an emphasis on people. We recognize that technological projects can be extremely important, well-executed, and address important issues (for example, a project for technology to sanitize water or remove CO2 from the atmosphere), but both Human-Centered and Humanity-Centered Design emphasizes the importance of people.
Part of the process of reviewing your submission includes how well you are able to describe the key components of a meaningful contribution to society using the principles of Humanity Centered Design.
Projects must be aimed at societal needs, such as described in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDG). Don Norman’s book, Design for a Better World, provides one framework but we are open to any of the many similar frameworks that exist under numerous names, for example, ecological design, life-centered design, community-centered design, planet-centered design, society-centered design, etc. We only ask that the spirit of Humanity-Centered Design (HCD+) be followed, and that you describe the framework being followed. Projects must fit at least one of the UN SDG.
The Application Process for Projects
Projects have a two-phase application process: Qualifying and Full. First, we ask for a Qualifying Application. The preliminary applications will be reviewed by our team of advisors. Groups whose applications are deemed to be of high relevance and potential will be asked to submit a full proposal. The reason for the two phases is to be able to tell groups before they have spent too much effort on the application whether they are eligible to compete.
The Full Application asks for the names of all the group members and their roles, names of mentors, and funding sources. Evidence about the success of the project (comparing the activities before the project with that as a result of the project) is critical. In addition, submit a description of the Humanity-Centered Design process that was used, with special attention to the role of the community for whom the work is intended. Some of this can be described in essay format (no more than 500 words), photos, and a short video.
Measurement of Project Impact
Use both qualitative and quantitative information
The evidence confirming the project’s success must be reliable, comparing the community’s condition before the project to its condition after the project. The evidence must use a standard set of metrics (quantitative and qualitative), collected in ways that minimize bias. We prefer an independent assessment of impact, but we realize that this may not always be possible. Note that the most effective measures combine numerical quantitative assessments with qualitative statements. Numbers make it easy to reveal impact, but once observations are made, they are reduced to abstractions. Qualitative data make the quantitative numbers more meaningful, providing context and understanding. Moreover, many of the most important results are qualitative, such as personal growth, self-esteem, happiness, and quality of life. Psychologists and other social scientists do measure these attributes.
We do not require the project to be finished, but we require evidence of its great promise.
The application should discuss major challenges, failures, and setbacks (challenges and failures are expected). An honest, open appraisal of the path you followed, including failed steps, will be judged positively.
Levels of Impact
Explain how your project improves the lived experience of individuals who are impacted by your work. Quite often, even a simple set of actions has an impact far beyond the immediate action. We would like to be able to assess that impact.
For example, examine the impact not just on the people who are the main focus, but also on every group affected: families, other activities or groups, etc.
Projects can have an impact at three different levels:
- Impact upon individuals
- Impact upon Community and the local Ecological System
- Impact upon Public Policies at the Government, City, State, or National Level
We expect that every project will have an impact on both levels 1 and 2. However, only a few projects affect the levels of organization or government responsible for policy. Evidence of impact at Level 3 is important, so please let us know if you have had an impact. If not, you can ignore this component.
Group Requirements
Definition of Early-Career
Every team member must qualify as an Early-Career individual. We define “early-career” as individuals who have participated in no more than one other societal project with communities. The ages and educational training of team members are not relevant. We only care that, regardless of age and past experience, this is their first or second time doing HCD+ projects with communities.
Other groups are encouraged to apply for “Organization” or “Education” recognition.
Project Requirements
The project must have a direct benefit to individuals or communities.
A purely technological approach is not appropriate for this program, even if it addresses an SDG issue. For example, a system for removing carbon from the atmosphere is critical to sustainability but would not qualify for DNDA. There must be an immediate, direct benefit to individuals or communities.
The project must be aimed at one of the many topics and subtopics of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).
The project must follow the principles of Humanity-Centered Design (HCD+)
HCD+ principles are built upon those of Human-Centered Design (HCD). The principles added by the + are important. An excellent project that is pure human factors, or pure HCD, will be commended, but it will not qualify for DNDA. For us, the + is critical. See https://dnda.design/award/#5-principles
Not all projects must follow Principle 5 of the HCD+ guidelines (Design with or by the Community)
When designing for large populations, it is difficult or impossible to do co-design as described in Principle 5. Nevertheless, the project must work closely with the target audience. At times, this may seem more like traditional Human-Centered Design, but the emphasis on societal good and consideration of the relevant larger system can still qualify the project.
The Project must be implemented, with evidence about its effectiveness
Concepts, ideas, or early-stage work are not yet ready for submission. Awards are only given to projects that are implemented and working in the communities for which they were designed. There should be evidence about its effectiveness. If you do not have an implementation or sufficient evidence, consider applying in future years when you have fulfilled these requirements.
Cautions
Most student projects will fail to meet our requirements
Projects completed for courses or dissertations are seldom implemented in practice long enough to provide evidence of their success. In addition, for most projects, we require that the target population be part of the design team. Unless the project is for students, this can be difficult. Teachers can serve as mentors and advisors, but not as project members.
Most projects take a few years, which is difficult to achieve in the academic environment.
If you feel that you have avoided these pitfalls, then yes, submit. Otherwise, please do not waste your time – or our time. Wait until you have completed your education. There may be exceptions. We will not disqualify a project just because it is done by students.
Projects by Single Individuals
Projects that can make a real difference require more skills, knowledge, and work than most individuals can handle. Although a single person may submit an application, we are concerned that a single person may not be able to meet the project’s requirements.
Project Examples
Look at the groups that won awards in previous years. See the Award page for past DNDA Laureates (https://dnda.design/award/2025-laureates/). These projects provide examples of the kinds of projects we consider. These examples do not show all possible areas of work. Many other projects will fit our requirements of being beneficial to society.
EDUCATION
Educational awards are for organizations that excel at providing students with the tools and techniques to perform effective humanity-centered projects of societal benefit. The award is given to the specific units of the organization that delivered the training for working on projects of societal needs. These groups do not need to have any formal recognition or status: We only care about the effectiveness of the resulting training. Eventually, we hope to honor every educational group that is doing this work. There are no geographical conditions for these awards.
Classification of Education
Education projects can be divided into two categories:
- Education for HCD+: A group that teaches HCD+ principles and whose graduates are active in doing societal work using principles from HCD+, either as practitioners or as educators. Groups providing HCD+ education should apply for the Education for HCD+ recognition.
- All other educational projects: If the activity is to enhance educational prospects for everyone, in line with the United Nations SDG 4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all, we classify this as a PROJECT. Use the “Early Career Projects” Application.
- Note the restriction of this category to “Early-Career” groups: Read the section Group Requirements” in the PROJECT section of this document for more information.
(https://dnda.design/award/#project-group) - If your work qualifies as work for an organization, then you can apply in the name of the organization and the restriction on Early Career does not apply. To learn more, go to the Organization section of this document.
(https://dnda.design/award/#organization)
- Note the restriction of this category to “Early-Career” groups: Read the section Group Requirements” in the PROJECT section of this document for more information.
The Application Process for Education
Educational applicants have a one-pass application process: the Full Application. We encourage award recipients to attend our annual Summit later this year. More detail to follow. (A limited amount of travel stipends will be available for groups that have been recognized, but do not have sufficient funds for travel.)
Required conditions
The educational group may be formal or informal. Formal institutions are established universities, colleges, or other certified educational institutions offering degrees, usually accredited by a national organization. Informal groups may offer workshops, boot camps, online courses, or self-directed courses, usually providing certificates or micro-credentials. In all cases, the institution must provide evidence of effectiveness in teaching Humanity-Centered Design for societal benefit.
Educational institutions must provide information about their curriculum and course structure plus the names of graduates now pursuing relevant projects or teaching about how to accomplish them. Note that the most important criterion is the number of graduates that have been involved in HCD+ projects of societal benefit, either as a member or leader of an HCD+ project or through relevant educational activities. Statements from graduates will be useful. We ask for the names of three to five graduates.
Permanent recognition (as long as the activities continue)
Recognition for an educational organization applies as long as the group is maintaining the appropriate activities. No further applications are required after the group has been recognized. Every few years we will send a simple form to each organization asking them to certify that they are doing the same kind of activities that led to the recognition.
ORGANIZATION
Many established organizations are doing excellent societal work that meets all of our goals. Our goal is to establish the principles of Humanity-Centered Design across the World, and Educational Institutions and for-profit commercial organizations are important ways of spreading the word, the philosophy, and the activities.
This award is designed to honor any organization that officially supports HCD+ societal projects. The organization’s primary activities don’t need to be solely focused on societal good; what matters is genuine support for projects that advance societal well-being. Any officially recognized organization is eligible, including for-profit- and not-for-profit organizations, NGO, Foundations, and private companies and industries, regardless of size, as long as they are truly supporting societal projects.
Note that projects that are purely technological do not fit into the DNDA program because they fail to meet the requirement for an emphasis on people. We do recognize that technological projects can be extremely important, well-executed, and address important issues (for example, a project for technology to sanitize water or remove CO2 from the atmosphere). In 2027, we plan to introduce a new category of award: Technology for Humanity, which encourages any group, regardless of experience and funding, to submit technological projects that address at least one of the UN’s SDGs, and that, as a result, indirectly enhance the lives of people.
Permanent recognition (as long as the activities continue)
Recognition for an organization applies as long as the group is maintaining the appropriate activities. No further applications are required after the group has been recognized. Every few years we will send a simple form to each organization asking them to certify that they are doing the same kind of activities that led to the recognition.
HCD+ Principles
Note that Principle 5 must be modified when designing for large groups of people, for example a product to be used by thousand or even billions of people. Obviously, it is then difficult, if not impossible, to have continual close contact with such a large group. Instead, Design Researchers should work with sample populations to understand the needs and capabilities of the target group in order to guide the design team. It is desirable to have a few members of the population also be part of the design team. In addition, through repeated applications of Principle 4, testing the ideas, prototypes, and even completed products on samples from the targeted population, the spirit of Principle 5 is maintained.
Section V of Norman’s book, Design for a Better World, discusses the principles of Humanity-Centered Design (HCD+) and the ways in which it builds upon Human-Centered Design (HCD): It is the + that makes the difference. The entire section can be found at DBW-Book.-IV-Humanity-Centered-Design.pdf as an excerpt from the book. The first chapter (Chapter 22) describes the principles of HCD and HCD+. The entire section is included for more context.
USEFUL REFERENCES
Websites:
United Nations Sustainable Development Goals
https://sdgs.un.org/goals
Principles of Humanity-Centered Design
https://jnd.org/books/design-for-a-better-world/
Humanity-Centered Design: Innovation Playbook
User Experience Centre, Singapore Polytechnic, 2025.
https://dnda25.sp.edu.sg/humanity-centred-design/playbook/
The Aga Khan Foundation’s Guides to Human-Centered Design
(It is actually Humanity-Centered, but that term was not in use when they wrote this).
https://www.akfusa.org/our-stories/human-centered-design-approach-to-community-engagement/
https://schools2030.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/PPT_Schools-2030-FacilitatorGuide_PagetoPage.pdf
The Aga Khan Foundation’s Learning Hub
https://akflearninghub.org/
https://akflearninghub.org/story-category/hcd/
Applying the Five Principles of Humanity-Centered Design: Suggested Operating Procedures
https://dnda.design/suggested-operating-procedures/
A blog by Raghu Roy in the blog section of this website
This is a useful guide for applying the principles, written by the winner of the 2024 Excellence award at DNDA24 (and, although early-career in societal projects, an experienced expert in Operations Research).
Books:
Norman, D. (2023) Design for a Better World: Meaningful, Sustainable, Humanity Centered. Cambridge, MA: London, UK: MIT Press. 2023. https://jnd.org/books/design-for-a-better-world/
Chang, A. M. (2019). Lean impact: How to innovate for radically greater social good. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. https://www.annmei.com/book
An excellent guidebook for projects. It discusses what kind of evidence is useful, how to do the work by thinking big but starting small, testing each small component as you move forward, and how to deal with the difficulties of funding.
Submission of Proposals
After you have reviewed the General Requirements, download the Full ODT Application form. This will allow you to study the questions and draft your answers in advance. The application must be completed and submitted online in order to be added to our database. You can simply copy and paste the answers into the computer system.
We use ODT instead of other formats (such as PDF) because this is an international format accessible worldwide. It can be opened by a wide variety of programs, apps, and computer or phone operating systems. Just download the file and open it with your favorite word processor.
All application questions must be answered. The system will not allow an incomplete application to be submitted.
Some answer fields allow multiple lines. You will see a number at the bottom-right of these fields, such as 0/50, 0/100, or 0/150. The first number represents the number of words you’ve entered, and the second number shows the maximum word limit for that field.
To view the applications in ODT format, please click the link labelled ODT for the application you care about.
APPLY
To view the applications in ODT, please click the following links:
Download Project Application (ODT)
After the judges review submissions, selected applicants will be invited to complete a Full Application.
- Qualifying Project Application: Deadline: September 15, 2026 (Pacific Daylight Time)
Applicants will be notified if they will be advanced to the next stage on a rolling basis - Full Project Application: Deadline: September 30, 2026 (Pacific Daylight Time)
Download Education for HCD+ Application (ODT)
- Deadline: September 30, 2026 (Pacific Daylight Time)
Download Organizational Application (ODT)
- Deadline: September 30, 2026 (Pacific Daylight Time)
Download General Guidelines (this document) (PDF)
THE JUDGING PROCESS
Early-Career projects
This is a contest. We offer several types of recognition.
Projects have a two-phase application process: Qualifying and Full.
Judging the Qualifying Application
The Qualifying Application is reviewed by our Advisory Board. Groups whose applications are deemed to be of high relevance and potential will be asked to submit a full proposal. The two-phase process exists so groups can find out early in the process whether they are eligible to participate, before investing significant effort. This initial review primarily screens for fulfillment of all of the required qualifications plus consideration of whether the project is too early in its life span to get significant results. Project groups are notified if they have passed the requirements test and may proceed to a full review. Alternatively, we may recommend placing the application in a different category or suggest waiting one or two years until enough data is available to evaluate outcomes.
Judging the Full Application
All Full Applications are judged by our international Advisory Board members. The applications that are award-worthy are labelled Finalists. Then a second phase of judging reviews the Finalists and the best of these are selected for a Short List. Finally, the Short List candidates receive a further review, resulting in the two highest awards: Excellence and Promising. Both categories receive a monetary prize, trophy and certificate. The number of awards in each category is determined by the quality of the projects. All Short List and Finalists receive a certificate.
Education for HCD+
We require that the program has produced graduates who are now involved in HCD+ activities, either as a member of a project group or as an instructor of HCD+. This information demonstrates that the program is successful and is therefore the primary qualifying information.
The Program does not need to have the name “humanity-centered” or the acronym HCD+ as long as the basic spirit of the HCD+ Principles are being taught (see https://dnda.design/award/#5-principles).
Qualified programs then receive recognition based upon their curriculum and the other questions in this proposal. All educational groups are judged by our international Advisory Board, plus a final review by the executive committee of DNDA. Qualified groups receive recognition based upon type and quality of their work for societal good and the other questions in this proposal.
Recognition is not a contest. Any educational group that meets our standards receives recognition. This recognition continues for as long as the group certifies each year that they are still doing the same kind of work for which they received the recognition.
Dates
Applications for HCD+ Education Recognition must be submitted by September 30, 2026. We hope to have final results available in October.
Organization
Recognition for an Organization’s HCD+ activities is not a contest. Any organization that meets our standards receives recognition. This recognition continues as long as the group keeps doing the same kind of work for which they received it.
Judging for Organizations
Applications from organizations are reviewed by members of our Advisory Board, who have a special interest in organizations and business in general. Their job is to decide whether the activities are notable examples of HCD+ and are likely to be continued.
The work does not need to have the name “humanity-centered” or the acronym HCD+ as long as the basic spirit of the HCD+ Principles is being taught (see https://dnda.design/award/#5-principles).
We expect that the HCD+ activities of the corporation reflect the stated and actual policies of the organization and not “Greenwashing,” featuring societal projects for public relations purposes without changing corporate behavior. This means that in addition to judging the submitted projects, judges will also consider the overall behavior of the organization. Does it continue to cause harm to the environment or society?
We recognize that what is today harmful was once acceptable. As a result, it takes time to undo the past, and the judges are asked to consider these aspects. In particular, is the organization working to curtail negative activities while increasing positive ones?
All organization submissions are judged by our international Advisory Board, with a final review by the executive committee of DNDA. Qualified groups receive recognition based upon type and quality of their work for societal good and the other questions in this proposal.
