Progress Design Labs
For Teams & LeadersDesigning joy & resilience for high performers.
Progress Design Labs builds workshops and offsites that help leadership teams calm the nervous system, sharpen focus, and design work that feels sustainable — and actually joyful.
Quinn O'Briant Heller
Stanford MLA · Oxford AI Ethics · MFA
Featured Offerings
Practical experiences for teams under real pressure.
Joy by Design
A signature experience for high-performing teams ready to work more brilliantly, creatively, and joyfully. Cultivate sustainable joy, personal and creative growth, and resilient performance.
Learn more →02Innovation + Focus
Strengthen creativity and focus through the human side of innovation. Teams leave with systems that keep them generative long-term — maximizing great ideas, minimizing burnout.
Learn more →03Nervous System Reset
Shift the room from stressed and chaotic to calm and focused. A practical, embodied workshop that gives teams nervous system tools to manage stress, recover faster, and perform sustainably under pressure.
Learn more →About the Studio
Executive experience, grounded practice.
Progress Design Labs is led by Quinn O'Briant Heller. We know corporate culture from the inside out — we've run a design company serving Fortune 500 CIOs and VPs of Innovation, led billion-user projects at Google, and shaped AI design for millions of users at a major US bank.
We bring executive-level credibility together with embodied nervous system tools: a Stanford Master of Liberal Arts, an MFA, published books, an ethical AI certification from Oxford, a Registered Yoga Teacher credential, and a somatic coaching certification.
Based near Amsterdam, available online worldwide — designing practices for bright, creative people to find inspiration, calm, focus, and joy at work.
- STANFORD MLA
- Oxford AI Ethics
- MFA
- RYT-200
Places I've taught, worked & learned
Years of work in design, education, and leadership inform everything I teach.
What Clients Say
Trusted by leaders at top companies and universities.
Quinn stands out as a truly exceptional professional whose contributions, particularly in public speaking and strategic (and designed) thinking, set a benchmark for excellence in the field. Quinn possesses a rare blend of intellectual depth and communicative finesse, making her an indispensable voice in any strategic discussion.
Kevin Hodges
Regional Manager, Google for Education
Quinn combines high-level strategic thinking with deep empathy and fast tactical action.
Ben Garrett
Director, The Hatchery at Emory University
Quinn doesn't just understand innovation, she embodies it. She is a living and vital experiment in empathizing and defining, ideating and prototyping, testing and pivoting, and delivering what end users need. We turned to her as a key partner in establishing the teaching curriculum in a new R1 university innovation center, and she delivered both great courses and thought partnership. And…she was always an absolute joy to work with!
Shannon Clute, Ph.D.
Emory University
Progress Design Labs
Let's design something joyful for your team.
Schedule a complimentary 20-minute call. We'll talk about what your team needs and shape a workshop or offsite around it.