KIVA’S CORE VALUES ICONS DESIGN
PROJECT OVERVIEW
Stakeholders: Chief Community Officer, CFO, CEO
Tools: Adobe Illustrator
Duration: 4 weeks
Kiva’s first set of core values were developed back in 2006 by Kiva's co-founders and served the organization very well until 2010. In 2010, a New York Times article criticized Kiva for a lack of transparency in not making the role of the Field Partner explicit in our lending model. This prompted the first site redesign and a rethink of our original values. A strong set of values works for both internal and external audiences, but prioritizing external audiences doesn’t serve Kiva's current organizational focus in the same way. It was necessary to reverse the order of priority and develop values to guide us internally as Kiva grows. It’s healthy for an organization to revisit values as it grows to ensure people are set up for success and that we stay relevant in a changing market.
RE-ITERATE AND REPEAT
After exploring variations on what imagery and symbols to use for each values, I’ve worked with the CCO to finalized on the designs that resonate the most with Kiva’s values for the. I’ve then gotten feedback from both CFO and CEO to pick the finals ones to re-iterate. Once the symbol and concept was finalized, I’ve continue to re-iterate on the designs, thinking more about the visual elements such as the line weights, balance, visual weight, and scale in order to perfect the icons to look cohesive together.
KIVA’S CORE VALUES IN THE OFFICE
T-shirts
2. ft x 3 ft. Poster
3 ft. x 4 ft. Poster
Coasters
Mugs
FINAL THOUGHTS
Being able to jump right in and help Kiva design their new core value icons was extremely fun and exciting! I was happy to see my designs being printed and used in all of Kiva’s offices across the nation. The most challenging part of this was coming up with a symbol that describes the values that everyone can agree with. As there were many stakeholders involved, all with different opinions and provided different feedback, I was able to include their ideas and feedback quickly by providing different versions. After many rounds of iterations and gathering feedback, this project was a huge success! I am very proud to see it shipped and enjoyed by all the staffs!