Dr. Rob Phillips is a Senior Tutor at the Royal College of Art (RCA), Design Futures Programme. Their research seeks to ‘Engage Design’, decreasing people’s impact, gaining insight into what people really do… and comprehending how we can be FutureKind to PlanetKind. Their PhD informed a relationship between Open Design and Citizen Science, resulting in methods taught in MIT Media Lab, Stanford, Cornell, the BBC and more. Dr. Phillips is a specialist in user-orientated proposals, sustainable strategies and holistic perspectives whilst researching and Teaching. They utilise design for engagement and co-curation for commercial and research situations. Their work seeks to Engage Design as a means to catalyse more sustainable futures. In 2024 Dr. Phillips was appointed to the Design Councils Expert Network, as an advocate for the design discipline. Dr. Phillips has published in, Computer Human Interaction (CHI), Design Issues Journal (MIT Press), The Design Journal (Routledge), Business & Society (Intellect Press) and Book (FutureKind) with Thames & Hudson. An (Industrial) Product Designer with 20 years+ of practice, working commercially with broad experience including five international patents. Their work has been reproduced through large scale manufacture with 3 million+ products in international retail. Created user orientated proposals and involvement in design work for team GB (Olympics). Dr. Phillips created revolutionary designs including lifesaving fire & ballistics geometries. Work featured in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, BMX freeride & Women’s BMX racing, achieving two gold medals for GB.