Week 3 Reflections
Reading Reflections: The reading ‘Design Problem Statements — What They Are and How to Frame Them’ is a thought-provoking article emphasizing the need to solve problems while designing products. A reference is made to ‘Zune’ the product by Microsoft to compete with the Apple iPod. This product was a failure because it did not solve any new human needs, it was a reiteration of an existing product. Therefore, as design thinkers, it is our responsibility to think from the users’ perspective. The next portion covers how to frame a design challenge and how it is vital in human-centered design. The 4 Ws are critical while framing a design challenge. These being who, what, where and why. In framing a design strategy, it is imperative to have these questions answered so the solution can be tailored and specific. The article also talks about an empathy map where designers empathise with users. This reminded me of the exercise of ‘designing the perfect toothbrush’ where we were made to communicate with our partners and understand their requirements, needs and problems.
Critical Thinking: As mentioned by Professor Durlak, design thinkers often make the mistake of spending more time designing the solution rather than interpreting the problem. The first step to creating a successful product is thoroughly understanding the problem at hand. The problem is what characterises the process as beyond a freely creative venture. Everyone needs a purpose to be motivated, in the case of design, a clearly defined problem is the motivation factor. After clearly defining the issue, research and exploration should uncover probable and feasible solutions. For example — Paytm, a digital payments application in India came up with the technique of transferring money into a digital wallet which then could be used to make payments, Google saw a way to make the inconvenience of first transferring into the app easier. It came up with the Unique Payment Interface (UPI) which connected the ’Google Pay’ application directly to a bank account and removed the effort of transferring money to a wallet.
Personal Reflections: As part of our in-class assignment, we were given the use case of Apple and how it we should help frame a design challenge for a product that Apple could create in the field of either physical or mental health. My team and I chose Apple and mental health.
· What are your reflections on today’s exercise?
My reflections are that there are many unexplored areas in the field of health technology that can be further explored to create products and services that solve problems related to health information, tracking and mental health issues. Apple as a firm has created multiple features on the health application but not gone further deep into mental health. We began framing our design challenge by targeting the problem that we have seen many adults face around us -loneliness. We first looked up statistics of how many people are reported to have mental health problems due to lack of companionship and loneliness to analyse the extent of the problem. We focused on the problem itself before looking for solutions. We then dug deeper into what people most desire when they are in such a state — it is someone to speak to and share problems with.
Once we gained an understanding into the user problem and empathised with what they feel, it led us to think of what technical tools can a firm like Apple use to address this problem. This led us to the proposal of a virtual chatbot that can be used for people to speak to as a ‘virtual companion’ when they are in situations where loneliness is overpowering them. This product can be trained further using machine learning to use the right words, phrases, and methods to calm a person down and be empathetic towards the user. Such a product would require deep resear5ch into human psychology and how machines can affect a person and hence the solution was far-fetched but it was the start of something none-the-less.
· What did you find challenging about this exercise?
The most challenging part of this exercise was compiling the design challenge into a single problem statement. We had to make sure the statement was concise and clearly depicted the issue. Since mental health is a broad spectrum, it was difficult to address all aspects of it with a single solution; this was the main limitation of our product.
The second most challenging part would be to figure out technical aspects and regulatory limitations such as data privacy regulations and health laws.
· What open question do you still have?
The open questions that I still have are ‘how do we prevent misuse of products?’ Many applications and tools that use sensitive data have a high chance of misuse and it would be important to create security around them. ‘How do we get a team to empathise with human needs?’ After the initial step of defining the problem, the team needs to be aligned with the goal and different employees involved would have to have the same understanding. As a design leader and strategist, how will we get everyone on the same page? This is more of a leadership question but related to the design process.
· What inspired you and changed the way you think about ‘design challenges’?
The way the exercise was shaped inspired me. The Figma was created with blanks to be filled with insights and that helped me to find key words and pushed me in the right direction. Design challenges should be addressed the same way research is addressed. You have to find blank spaces, gaps and grey areas that one can address and attempt to solve using the power of innovation.