'service design' posts
“Co-design” means different things to different people. To me, it’s about the clients, the end-users, the designers, and the developers all collaborating on a design project. Sounds easy, right?
Getting all these different people to input into a design should feel natural, but there are many pitfalls. For example, many people simply don’t have time. And if it’s not done in a structured way it can be difficult to get value from the outputs. There are a lot of reasons not to do it, but the main reason to DO co-design is more compelling: you’ll save time and money in the long run by seeking feedback on the designs up-front.
So how do you make sure you’re getting bang for your buck? Here are a few tips…
1. Clearly define your design problem
Co-design activities are often structured to encourage ‘out of the box’ thinking, but at some point you probably need real, practical solutions. Clearly defining the problem you’re trying to solve will help keep people on track.
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Thursday August 9, 2012 – Thursday August 9, 2012
Odlins Square, Taranaki St Wharf
Map and Directions | Register
Description:
In this briefing, Lauren Tan will present her PhD research findings on the seven roles of the designer as Co-creator, Researcher, Facilitator, Capability Builder, Social Entrepreneur, Provocateur and Strategist.
In 2007, the UK Design Council established a series of social design projects as part of a design innovation program called Dott 07 (Designs of the Time). Its vision was to use design to tackle some of modern society’s most challenging issues. For example in the areas of health, education, energy, mobility and food. In these projects designers used design in new and different ways, and in new contexts. They defined new and different roles of the designer.
Lauren will discuss a select number of roles and their corresponding Dott projects. She will show how investigating designer roles leads to a better understanding of what designers do, and better articulation of the designer’s value when they participate in multi-stakeholder environments to address and respond to our society’s most complex social challenges.
This free session will be held in Wellington on Thursday the 9th August at 7:30am at the Wharewaka – and breakfast is on us! If you are in Auckland, don’t worry, it’s your turn two days earlier on Tuesday the 7th of August 2012 at 7:30am at the Sub Rosa Café.
RSVP below!
Date: Thursday 9th August
Time: 7.30 – 9.00am
Venue: Te Raukura, Odlins Square, Taranaki St Wharf, Wellington Waterfront.
Cost: FREE. Breakfast will be provided
Speaker: Lauren Tan
Register
By Leif Roy and Trent Mankelow
In April and May, we spoke at and attended two conferences on opposite sides of the globe – UX London 2012 in London and Service Design 2012 in Melbourne. Here are our highlights.
Service Design 2012
Attended by Trent Mankelow
I liked the intimate feel of this conference. With only 120-ish people it made the whole thing feel really friendly. The local case studies and content (there was nary a mention of Apple) helped to create a “we can do this” attitude. Read more »
By Kris Nygren
If someone had told me last year that the most innovative initiative we would be involved with in 2012 would be conceived by ACC, I would probably have laughed it off. Yet, for the past four months we’ve been involved with ACC’s Idea Nation initiative and it’s shaping up to be one of the most courageous and creative approaches to a big, hairy problem I have ever seen. Read more »
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I recently relocated to the US of A so watched the All Blacks win the Rugby World Cup from afar. It was not only nerve-racking but a good reminder about the importance of not just having a game plan, but a plan for the entire tournament.
This is not just a necessity for rugby but also for conducting research and design. Reflecting on my experiences, I am often asked to come up with an approach to “win a game” but not to “win the tournament”. This can result in tactical approaches which may not always be the best for a product or service in the long term.
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People are creatures of habit and this can introduce challenges should you want them to adopt a new behaviour. We all start forming and evolving our behaviours from the time we are born, and each of us will respond to different stimuli in our own unique way. Some of us can’t start their day without our morning coffee whereas others will reach for a cigarette as a first port of call. Some can’t fall asleep without a book in their hands and others like to leave their T.V. switched on. These behavioural differences are a big part of what makes us human.
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Here’s something that may surprise you - user testing doesn’t help you innovate. For example, it’s unlikely that in the middle of a user test a participant is going to leap out their seat and shout “I’ve got it! This iPhone app is answering the wrong question! What you need to design is this!” Nope, participants are more likely to tell you about what they don’t understand or what they don’t like. Read more »
The deeper we get into the service design world the more methods we are finding that improve our ability to empathise with (and then create for) our target audiences. Service design, in a nutshell, is intentionally designing a customer’s experience to be wonderful no matter how they interact with your organisation. It is as much about designing great customer facing interactions as it is about the internal processes that enable that experience to be replicable and adaptable. Read more »
In the mid-80s, a new radiation therapy machine called the Therac-25 was introduced to treat people with cancer. During treatment the machine would often show cryptic error messages like “malfunction 47″ and “vtilt”. These messages would occur up to 40 times a day, and they rarely involved patient safety.
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