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Design space exploration
Final prototype
Critical function
prototype
Dark horse
prototype
D I V E R G I N G C O N V E R G I N G
Funky prototype Functional
prototypeX-is
finished prototype
Design Thinking Phases
Design Thinking Process(Re) define the problem
Design never ends
Needfinding & SynthesisUnderstand the
users & the design
space
Ideate Brainstorm
PrototypeBuild
TestLearn
(Re)Define
(Re)-Defining the problem asks you to simplify the visionary
challenge into a more differentiated problem statement. By
(Re)defining the problem statement from the users perspec-
tive, you are able to focus on unanswered and specific areas
during the needfinding phase. Framing what your team seeks
to ‘understand’ enables you to generate interview questions
and to come up with places for observations that seem prom-
ising to understand the problem statement. Through constant
and critical reflection, the problem statement needs to be
redefined as insights provide new directions.
Needfinding
Ask, listen, observe and engage! Understanding the people
you are designing for is the foundation of human-centered
innovation. By observing and directly engaging with users, your
team learns about the way people think and the values they
hold. Gaining empathy enables you to discover the emotions
that guide peoples behavior and helps to capture physical
manifestations of experiences. This allows to sense intangible
meanings of user experiences and define latent needs. These
insights evoke user-centered inspirations for ideation and
prototyping.
Ideate
Ideation is the mode of generating a large quantity of diverse
ideas. Mentally, it represents the process of “going wide” which
enables to explore a broad solution space. Brainstorming is a
renowned method to come up with a lot of ideas. It leverages
collective thinking of your team by engaging with each other,
listening, and building on each others ideas. Generating ideas
based on specific user needs and insights provides the fuel
and source material for building rapid prototypes in order to
get relevant innovations into the hands of your users.
Prototype
Build to think! Prototypes are tools to have a conversation
around. Prototyping gets ideas and explorations out of your
head into the physical world. A prototype can be anything that
takes an experienceable form – a role play activity, a paper
wireframe or even a sketch or storyboard. Creating quick,
low-resolution prototypes allow your team to test assumptions
early and learn without investing a lot of time and money. Rap-
id prototypes also enable to refine ideas together with the user
and gain deeper empathy, by allowing people to interact with a
tangible version of your vision.
Test
Testing is the chance to refine solutions together with the user.
It is another opportunity to gain empathy through observa-
tion and engagement and often yields unexpected insights.
Testing is the mode in which the low-resolution artifacts are
put into practice by placing the prototype in the appropriate
user context. Handing over a prototype into the users’ hands,
observing how they interact with it and listening to what they
say, allows your team to discover new insights and gain deeper
understanding of hidden user needs.
Synthesize
After user engagements and the team share of collected
materials, it’s time to look for insights within your data. It is a
difficult mental task to work out what connects to what, which
ideas are more outliers on their own, and which concepts tie
to the core of the design challenge. By looking at your findings,
try to link similarities, contradictions, exceptions or patterns.
Common themes provide inspirations for new, improved
prototypes which solve uncovered user needs. The process
of focusing your needfinding and testing data enables you to
create shared understanding and team knowledge.
Design Space Map
» Establish a common understanding of your challenge
» Formulate key questions and discuss important aspects
» Keep modifying and expanding your map throughout your project
» Treat your map as a visual record of how your projects evolves
» Revisit this map from time to time, so your team stays aligned
Challenge
(RE-)D
EFINE
Stakeholder Map
Think ofExperts | Skeptics | Fans | Extreme Users | Lead Users | Non-Users |
Mis-Users | Early Adopters | Innovators | Followers | Laggards |
Customers | Partner Organizations | Competitors | Suppliers
Who should we talk to?
Who can we learn from?
Where can we find them?
(RE-)D
EFINE/
NEEDFINDIN
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How To Interview
Shortly introduce yourself. Tell the interviewee that you are interested in
their experiences regarding your topic.
What do you like about coffee (example topic)?
Have you had coffee today? How was your experience? How did you buy it?
How was the provided service?
Can you describe your most memorable coffee experience? What happened?
If you would design the ultimate coffee experience, what would that be like?
Intro
Kick-offBuild rapport
Grand tourReflection
NEEDFINDIN
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Intro Kick-Off
Build rapport
Grand tour
Explore emotions
Reflections
Wrap up
Choose one who is leading the interview while the other is documenting
Encourage storytelling: use open-ended questions like “Tell me about…”
Always ask why! (“5 Whys”)
Do not skip to a new topic before you’ve exhausted the current one
Capture memorable quotes to illustrate your findings
Look for inconsistencies and non-verbal clues (body-language, tone)
Expand your notes as soon as possible after each interview
Keep in mind: there might be a gap between what people say and what
they do!
1. 2.3.4.5.6.7.8.
8 Interview Tips
NEEDFINDIN
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How To Engage
Self Test and Self Documentation » make first-hand experiences and walk in
the shoes of your customers
» engage in things and activities that people
normally do
» do typical activities of your stakeholders
» use empathy tools
Tips Don’t lose the balance between objectivity and subjectivity.
You are still the design team and not the target group
Empathize without judgement!
1.
2.
NEEDFINDIN
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» Do desk research to get a first deep dive into your challenge
(read articles, blogs, forums regarding your topic and look at
your company’s website, …)
» Identify sources of inspiration
» Explore emerging trends and market opportunities
» Constantly share your research with the team (Diigo.com)
» Print out important numbers, quotes, and findings to share
your desk research within the team
» Update your Design Space Map accordingly
How To Become An
Expert Instantly
INSTA
NT
EXPERTISIN
G
What To
Observe I
What do people
do? What are
the specific
activities they
go through?
Activities Environment Interactions Objects User
What is the
character and
function of the
space?
What is the
nature of inter-
actions between
people, objects,
and across
distances?
What are the
objects and
devices people
have in their
environments?
Who is there?
What is their
role and
behavior?
NEEDFINDIN
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A E I O U
Distinguish interpretation from observation
Don’t let your expectations affect your observations
Look for anything that surprises you, that you may find irrational, that
makes you question your assumptions, that prompts shifts in (routine)
behaviors
Take field notes, photos, videos, audio recordings
Try to picture the scene from different perspectives
Capture everything (notes) you experience, see, hear, feel, and taste
After the observation - print pictures and put quotes on post-its
Share the observations with your team
1. 2.3.
4.5.6.7.8.
8 Observation Tips
NEEDFINDIN
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What To Observe II
Confusion Watch the users’ facial expressions. A confused look
signals an opportunity to make the experience more intuitive.
Exhaustion Notice moments when people must work too hard
(even if they don’t realize it) as they seek to solve their problem.
Pain Points Look for moments that are actualy unpleasant or
annoying. You will see it in the users’ facial expressions and body
language.
Appropriation + Workarounds Pay attention to adaptations and
the use of a product for a new/different purpose.
Skipped Steps If users skip a step, it might signal that they don’t
need, want, or understand the value of that step.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
NEEDFINDIN
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What to look for during observations
Team Share
Share your findings with your team! Which
stories/behaviours are most intriguing?
Look for patterns, repetitions, exceptions.
Group notes together that form a theme.
Find titles for each cluster.
NEEDFINDIN
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Storytelling
Clustering
Think & FeelWhat really counts, Major preoccupations,
Worries and aspirations
Say & DoAttitude in public, Appearance, Behaviour towards others
HearWhat friends, boss, or
influencers say
SeeEnvironment, Friends, What the
market offers
PainFears, Frustrations, Obstacles
GainWants/needs, Measures of success
Empathy Map Who‘s your user...
NEEDFINDIN
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Persona
demographics like age, education
needs and tasks
goals and aspirations
behavoiour, bugs and likes
NEEDFINDIN
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Name & Picture
typical statements
Need Classification
NEEDFINDIN
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I need to...
Common needs …feel respected
Context needs …confirm the validity of my work
Activity needs …get feedback at the end of a project
Qualifier needs …talk to my project supervisorHow?
Why?
How To Structure Insights
cheap
expensive
organic conventional
NEEDFINDIN
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Venn Diagram 2x2 Matrix
Coffee Sugar
Cream Heaven
How To Generate a
Point of View (POV)
NEEDFINDIN
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User + Need + insight = Persona
Problem POV
How To Generate Insights
interviews,
observations,
articles
life experience,
intuition values, morals
learning about your
user that you wouldn’t
have assumed before
observations
NEEDFINDIN
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I saw I know Insight+ =
Brainstorming Tips
IDEATE
Define goals & state the problem. Start by defining a clear, concise
statement that explains the purpose of the session. Make sure the
problem statement isn’t too specific as this can limit creativity.
Ideate individually. Instead of immediately shouting out ideas in a
group setting, allow to generate ideas individually for a fixed amount
of time. Then come together, share and build on each others ideas.
Categorize and synthesize. It’s crucial to move forward with the
ideas that you generate. Categorize common themes and decide on
evaluation criteria that allow you to identify the most promising ideas
for prototyping and testing.
Go for quantity
Defer judgement
Encourage wild ideas
Be visual
Build on the ideas of others (Yes, AND...)
Stay focused on user need
1. 2.3.4.5.6.
Brainstorming Rules
IDEATE
Prototyp Tips
PROTOTYPE
One question, one prototype
Build fast, before overthinking your idea
Stop before it’s perfect
Cannibalize as much ideas as possible
Don’t fall in love with your prototype
Always build and share more than one prototype
Create to provoke and persuade
Break rules, laws and facts
1. 2.3.4.5.6.7.8.
Prototypes
PROTOTYPE
» Right Perfection is a waste of time. Just
build it good enough to figure out what
works and what doesn’t.
» Rapid Allow yourself to learn quickly and
investigate a lot of different possibilities.
» Rough Get things built fast and cheap, a
scribble or artefact not looking pretty, to
see what people think by testing your idea.
Principles Versions
» Form Suntorporrum nitiatiunt, optatem.
Solorem niminitaque.
» Action Suntorporrum nitiatiunt, optatem.
Solorem niminitaque.
» Behavoir the prototype encourages to
consciously change behaviors.
» Content Suntorporrum nitiatiunt, optatem.
Solorem niminitaque.
Prototypes
Prototyping is a tool to deepen your understanding of the design space and your
user, even at a pre-solution phase of your project. By identifying a variable to explore
encourages you to break a large problem down into smaller, testable chunks.
» Paper prototypes
» Customer Journey
» Storyboards
» Graphics and interface moc-ups
» Role Play
» Videos
» And many more
PROTOTYPE
Testing Tips
TEST
Show don’t tell Communicate your vision in an impactful and
meaningful way by creating experiences, using illustrative visuals,
and telling good stories.
Collaborate to innovate Bring together innovators with varied
backgrounds and viewpoints. Enable breakthrough testing insights
in order to allow solutions and inspirations to emerge from the
diversity.
Embrace feedback Testing is not simply a way to validate your
idea. We test to learn. Not only do we not get the solution right,
but we sometimes also fail to frame the problem correctly. Testing
inspires to reframe and focus the POV.
Arrange your feedback and draw a mini-synthesis in order to decide what to take
further into your next iteration.
USER WONDERS
USER CRITISIZES
USER IDEATES
Feedback Capture Grid
TEST
USER LIKES