After writing my essay on IDEO and design thinking (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-gv_P_z25DZO_ydrYvvONOSUOXlvSiUETBXtfmGyTqY/edit?usp=sharing) I started thinking about the ways I can implement design thinking habits into my work. I felt the best way to start this was to look at IDEO’s 4 main methods of practicing design thinking and seeing how I could start to consciously add them into my work.
For this step, IDEO recommends getting to know who your target user is. Whilst I’m not designing for clients or a specific target audience yet, I would still like to think of ways to get others involved in my designs so that I’m confident in research and development before I enter a design job. After thinking about how I could implement this so early on, I decided a good way to start would be to get feedback from lecturers, friends and classmates on projects I’m undertaking both for uni and independently to get some outside perspective on what I’m doing right (and, more importantly, what I’m doing wrong). Being more aware that I am not the only person I am designing for is something I want to implement heavily into my work going forward.
This was a surprisingly easy to implement method in my recent projects. For my Web Essay, Baskerville and Crocodiles sites I always started on paper when it came to deciding the layout and imagery of my sites. Without starting on paper, I would have limited myself to what I already knew how to do digitally instead of forcing myself to break out of my comfort zone and learn new skills in order to materialise the ideas I had had on paper. Going forward, I aim to keep this realisation in mind and not be afraid to step away from the screen and quickly sketch something down before committing it to my computer.
I personally am guilty of wanting to give up if I can’t immediately imagine a way to tackle a given task. I like to be able to visualise a solution to a problem after very little thinking, leading to a lot of abandoned projects and frustration. Instead, I should be asking myself questions until I stumble upon an answer instead of assuming every challenge is black and white. I also want to be more aware of the fact that there isn’t always just one correct answer for every problem and that a seemingly good first solution mightn’t materialise to be the holy-grail final stop I hoped for. In my future work, I have resolved to making quick spider diagrams or other types of lists to try and get myself to the root of what a task is really asking of me before I start trying to form a solution.
IDEO outlines three main types of research: Generative, Evaluative and Validating. Generative and Evaluative research focus more on what could happen in the future whereas validating research focuses on what is happening right now. Balancing your research is an important part of conducting actually effective research and sometimes it’s easy to forget the here and now. We can be tempted to rush ahead into the future, especially when things change so quickly, but we need to look at what’s already being done if we’re to develop actually useful (and not repetitive, redundant) solutions to problems.
