Become part of a global network of creative changemakers.
Are you a designer in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, or South Asia? Join our vetted community of HCD professionals and collaborate with peers from across the Global South. Strengthen your skills, connect with new opportunities, and help shape solutions for low-income communities worldwide.
Three reasons our members stick around.
Inspiration, paid project work and personal growth in a peer network of practitioners doing the same kind of work in very different contexts.
Get inspired & connected.
Expand your international network and share insights with peers from all contexts across Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and South Asia.
New clients & projects.
Get the opportunity to be on paid consultancy projects for international and national clients, and work with multidisciplinary teams.
Personal development.
Access webinars, toolkits and peer learning events, while accelerating your growth through mentorship and structured feedback from senior practitioners.
Designers in 62 countries across the Global South.
A working network of practitioners who live and work in the regions we serve. We don’t fly anyone in.
Enrol on our social platform.
All Proportion Global members are part of our private group on the Innovators Team platform, where the day-to-day of the community happens.
Community hub
Connect with peers through the group feed and direct messages.
Resource library
Upload and access reports, toolkits, case studies and learning materials.
Challenge tools
Join or host design challenges, co-create solutions and test prototypes with diverse stakeholders.
Learning modules
Access structured training in HCD, systems thinking and entrepreneurship.
Mobile app
Use all features on the go and download content for offline access in low-connectivity areas.
Hosted on innovators.team · Private group · Members only
Four steps to becoming a member.
Membership is by application. We’re looking for practitioners who live and work in the regions we serve and have real HCD work to show for it. Vetting is real, and the community is stronger because of it.
Info pack
Read the info pack first. It tells you how we work and what we expect from members. Available in English, French and Spanish.
Apply online
Send us your motivation, a link to your CV and your LinkedIn profile. A portfolio helps, but it is optional.
Assessment
We look at three things: HCD work you can show, HCD that is visible in your professional profile, and no conflict of interest with the community. You hear from us within a few working days, whatever the outcome.
Join the platform
Approved? You receive a welcome mail with your route onto Innovators Team and a short intro video. You land straight in the Proportion Global group.
Get the info pack.
Read the info pack first. It tells you how we work and what we expect from members. Leave your details and we email it to you in English, French or Spanish.
You design with people, not for them, and you can show it: research, co-creation, prototyping, in the places where you live. You can be independent, or work for an NGO, a university or a company.
One thing doesn’t fit: if you own or run a design or innovation agency that bids for the same work we do, the community would turn into a sourcing channel for your own proposals. That isn’t fair on our members, so we don’t accept those applications.
No. Your CV, your motivation and your LinkedIn profile tell us what we need to know, so make sure they show your HCD work.
A few working days. Every application gets an answer.
We assess every application with the help of AI, against the three criteria above. If you think we got it wrong, write to [email protected] within 30 days and a person will look at it again.
Yes, once you have new HCD work to show.
Hear from fellow designers.
Five practitioners across South Africa, India, Portugal, Nigeria and Kenya on what the community means to them.
