
Senior Design Thinking and Process Improvement Consultant
Required skills
- human-centered design
- process improvement
- service design
- operational excellence
- organizational transformation
- consulting
- government
- public sector
- user interviews
- journey mapping
Nice to have
- federal agencies
- state agencies
- municipal agencies
- CCMP
- APMG Change Management
- constituent-facing services
Role summary
Seeking a Senior Design Thinking and Process Improvement Consultant for temporary, part-time projects (3-6 months) focused on optimizing government and commercial services. This remote role requires up to 50% travel to Atlanta/Northeast Atlanta. Responsibilities include applying human-centered design and process improvement methodologies (Lean, Six Sigma) to identify and resolve inefficiencies, mapping and redesigning workflows, conducting user research, and leading change management initiatives. A Bachelor's degree and 5+ years of relevant experience are required, along with certifications in design thinking and process improvement. The role emphasizes collaboration, stakeholder engagement, and improving accessibility, efficiency, and customer experience within public sector environments.
Key Responsibilities
- Utilize both human-centered design and business process improvement methodologies to identify bottlenecks, pain points, service gaps, inefficiencies, and root causes across public-facing and internal government processes.
- Lead current-state and future-state process mapping efforts for programs, services, and operational workflows, including handoffs, approvals, decision points, dependencies, and failure points.
- Conduct stakeholder interviews, workshops, journey mapping, service blueprinting, and user research to understand how policies, processes, systems, and organizational structures affect the people who use and deliver services.
- Develop practical recommendations that improve accessibility, efficiency, transparency, customer experience, and service outcomes while aligning with agency mission, compliance obligations, and policy requirements.
- Facilitate cross-functional collaboration among program, operations, policy, IT, digital, and leadership teams to move improvements from discovery through implementation.
- Define success metrics and support agencies in measuring, sustaining, and continuously improving redesigned services and operational processes.
- Lead or support organizational change initiatives associated with service redesign, process improvement, and transformation efforts, including stakeholder engagement, communications, training support, and adoption planning.
- This role is remote, with up to 50% travel to customer sites in the Atlanta/Northeast Atlanta area for onsite design/process improvement, organizational change management and training activities.
- Bachelor’s degree in public administration, public policy, business, organizational development, industrial engineering, operations management, design, human factors, or a related field.
- Five or more years of professional experience in human-centered design, process improvement, service design, operational excellence, organizational transformation, or consulting, preferably in government, public sector, or other highly regulated environments.
- Demonstrated experience applying human-centered design methods such as user interviews, journey mapping, service blueprinting, co-design, synthesis, prototyping, and iterative testing to improve services and operations.
- Demonstrated experience with business process mapping, workflow analysis, process redesign, and optimization using structured improvement methods such as Lean, Six Sigma, BPM, or related frameworks.
- Certification in human-centered design, design thinking, service design, or a comparable discipline from a recognized program.
- Certification or formal training in business process mapping, Lean, Six Sigma, BPMN, business process management, or related continuous improvement methodologies.
- Experience leading organizational change initiatives tied to process redesign, service modernization, digital transformation, operating model change, or enterprise improvement efforts.
- Experience developing and executing change management strategies that support stakeholder alignment, communications, training, adoption, resistance management, and sustainment.
- Strong facilitation, communication, and stakeholder engagement skills, with the ability to work effectively across executive leadership, program teams, frontline staff, policy owners, and technical teams.
- Ability to translate complex workflows, research findings, and operational issues into clear recommendations, visual artifacts, and implementation plans.
- Knowledge of accessibility, equity, and inclusive service delivery principles relevant to public sector environments.
- Ability to operate effectively in environments with multiple approval layers, competing priorities, policy constraints, and legacy systems common in government settings.
- Master’s degree in public administration, public policy, business administration, organizational leadership, systems design, or a related field.
- Experience supporting federal, state, county, municipal, or quasi-government agencies on service delivery, customer experience, business transformation, or operational improvement initiatives.
- Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, Black Belt, or equivalent advanced certification in operational excellence, quality, or process improvement.
- Prosci Certified Change Practitioner, CCMP, APMG Change Management Foundation/Practitioner, or similar organizational change management certification.
- Additional public-sector or federal change management training or certification is preferred, particularly for candidates supporting agency-wide transformation initiatives.
- Experience improving constituent-facing services such as benefits, licensing, permitting, case management, workforce, digital services, health and human services, or other public programs.
- Familiarity with government customer experience, service modernization, and digital transformation initiatives, including discovery, iterative testing, and service improvement practices.
- Experience aligning recommendations with policy, compliance, privacy, records, procurement, risk, accessibility, and security requirements.
- Proficiency with tools such as Mural, Miro, Lucidchart, Visio, Figma, Microsoft 365, or similar platforms used for facilitation, process documentation, research synthesis, and collaboration.
- Experience developing implementation roadmaps, performance measures, dashboards, and change adoption plans to support sustained outcomes.
- Systems thinking and process analysis.
- Human-centered and empathetic problem solving.
- Process mapping and service design.
- Facilitation and stakeholder engagement.
- Organizational change leadership.
- Analytical thinking and decision-making.
- Communication and influence.
- Accessibility, equity, and public service orientation.
- Continuous improvement mindset.
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