2019 International Competition of Design Thinking

Design Thinking is simply a method for creative problem solving. According the Interaction Design Foundation (IDF),“Design Thinking is an iterative process in which we seek to understand the user, challenge assumptions, and redefine problems in an attempt to identify alternative strategies and solutions…”

By using this design concept there are still many type of model and method for creative problem solving one of the famous one should be the Nigel Cross Design Process Model but every field has its master Nigel Cross model might not sultable for my Visual community range but the rough idea still works, so me and my lecture in 2018 come out with a Visual Communication Design process Model which fit in our art and design problem solving method. In 2019 ICODT (2019 International Competition of Design Thinking) they used the model runs with five big step.

The 5 Steps

There are 5 distinct phases of Design Thinking:

Empathize — with users

Define — users’ needs, their problem, and your insights

Ideate — challenge assumptions and produce ideas for innovative solutions

Prototype — begin creating solutions

Test — solutions

Empathize

It’s important to recognize that these steps are non-linear. They can occur in parallel and are often repeated. However, “empathize” is typically the first step. The first step is getting to know your users.

Just like in 2019 ICODT they first used in the activity of introduction they let use to get to know each other’s using a small games and roughly show us how many people and what people are there. After the activity they having a Introduction to Design Thinking to help us getting more data about what’s competition is going about.

When you have a sense of empathy for the people you’re designing for, you will gather insight into their needs, wants, behaviour, and thoughts. As we make observations, it’s best to keep our judgments aside. You want to avoid having your assumptions or experiences create any sort of bias. Make sure to ask questions and truly listen to what the user says.

Other than having an empathy on the project we work on, another most important subject we should know about, is our groupmate, get to know well of them so that we can work easier, know each other strength and having a good teamwork to solve problem. I have 8 people in my group which included me inside, we came from difference place which are, Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam. 8 of us also come in different background and institute, Visual Communication, Food Processing, Business management, Vehicle, Civil Engineering and even Early Childhood education.

Back to the Competition, conducting interviews is a useful method for connecting with customers. Before the interview, it’s productive to generate themes and questions you want to highlight in your conversations. This ensures you are staying on topic and getting at the heart of what you want to learn from these interviews. So on the first the tutor teach us how to ask question by using the type A and B method which can deep down to know more about the interviewer. We have to use the method to get information on our subject topic interviewer.

On second day we went to Kenting Fuhua Hotel on unfortunately on the weather condition our 2019 ICODT have to change the big topic from solving the Kenting tourist attractive problem’s to Fuhua Hotel management problem solving. Here is where the things starts a bit confuse. We having a weird time without stick on the time table we have and we don’t have any clear instruction what to do for the interview, at the end we still managed to get interviews from our Fuhua Hotel workers but the times still in limits we fail to get more information for a deep interview.

Defining the Problem

Once we have a solid understanding of the people we’re designing for, we begin to define the problem. Now that you have expert knowledge of how to empathize, you should create a human-centered solution. During this part of the process, you need to synthesize all of your insights from the interviews and observations. Once that is done, you can create a clear problem statement, which will help you produce a relevant solution.

With the interview we have from the interviewee so separate our words in to 4 parts which is SWOT- strength weakness opportunities and threat. From that we get to know about an insight which is the weather condition is always a thread to Fuhua’s Hotel, we plan to turn this threads in to a opportunity to make FuHua Hotel better. We also come out with a guy profile to fit in our problems statements.

This stage is about analyzing and synthesizing. According to the IDF, analysis “is about breaking down complex concepts and problems into smaller, easier-to-understand constituents.” While, synthesizing “involves creatively piecing the puzzle together to form whole ideas.”

Ideation Time

After having our problem statement let the brainstorming begin. It’s time to start generating potential solutions based on the all the prior research and synthesizing we have done. It’s important to still keep in mind the human-centered approach. Our solutions should reflect the user research and key themes you have pulled from the information you gathered in the previous phases.

During this stage, we start by generating as many ideas as possible. Later on, we narrow down these ideas to just a few. For now, use this as our chance to think outside the box and be as creative as possible. 8 of use generated 5-6 ideas and these ideas also can merge with others.

Sketch as much as you can to create an environment where ideas can grow and flourish. This will help you produce innovative solutions that may not be obvious at first. Ideation allows you to challenge assumptions and deepen your understanding of the user and their needs. Ask questions and re-evaluate beliefs. As Don Norman describes, so-called “stupid questions” are exactly how you acquire the necessary knowledge to build a great product.

Prototype

Now it’s time to bring our ideas to life. This is an exciting stage, as we start designing potential solutions that we eventually test with users.

It’s important to note that you aren’t producing a finished product just yet. In this phase, you should focus on a more scaled-down version of the product. The IDF discusses the use of prototypes, “Prototypes are built so that designers can think about their solutions in a different way (tangible product rather than abstract ideas), as well as to fail quickly and cheaply, so that less time and money is invested in an idea that turns out to be a bad one.”

We used very limited source to create our prototype and we used our own creative way to work on it such as reuse a drinking bottle, use sticky note pad as our waves form and so on the here we also shows our teamwork different people working in their strength part.

The key takeaway here is to fail quickly and cheaply. Before you invest too much time and resources into the product, you first collect feedback from users with a less robust version. As you gain insights, you can go back to the drawing board and iterate on your prototype. Test and iterate until you feel confident in your solution. Start with low-fidelity prototypes and move onto high-fidelity once you test and analyze the results. Most importantly, remember to build the prototype with the user in mind.

Test Your Solution

Use this stage as an opportunity to redefine any problems, and learn more about how your users feel, think, and behave. The testing phase allows you to form a deeper understanding of the customers and how they interact with the product.

It’s crucial to seek feedback as much as possible. Observe how the users interact with the prototype and ask them to speak their thoughts aloud. Try to avoid over-explaining the prototype or showing them how it works. This is your opportunity to see their reactions and detect usability issues. However, you should ask follow up questions and get clarification if you are unsure of what the user means.

Unfortunately we don’t have much on our test in 2019 ICODT because the prototype is still not stable to run a real test. But we do have a Gallery Walk to let our tutor observe about our prototype and giving use some suggestion and in the end having a vote on different team’s prototype to choose the winner.

Conclusion

Design Thinking is about iterating and improving, as you move fluidly through each step. You might find yourself cycling through each one several times before landing on the right solution. Think of the process as a general framework, and allow yourself to repeat steps or move in whichever order you see fit. Regardless of the path you take to get there, implementing a Design Thinking methodology will set you and your users up for success. Although at the end my team didn’t won a prize but what we won is the relation between us and the knowledge we have learn in this competition.