Our class devoted to designing ideas for Sauder’s open house on March 1st proved to be another engaging experience. During the beginning of our design process, our group struggled to agree on a number of ideas. This was mostly due to the fact that our group was highly focused on being creative and captivating with our idea. However, in Beckman and Barry’s article “Innovation as a Learning Process: Embedding Design Thinking,” the authors map out the innovation process as moving from observations to frameworks (insights), to imperatives (or ideas), and finally to solutions. Our group started our design process simply churning out ideas, beginning the process in the imperatives phase. Our group failed to make any observations about the context our idea would be used in and did not analyze these observations to create useful insights. The article by Beckman and Barry explains that one of the fundamental building blocks of the innovation process is a thorough understanding of the context of the engagement and use of a solution or idea. The article communicates that to innovate and design, one must understand who is using the idea, what the end users are looking for, and what the situation that these end users will be in when they experience the idea. When our group began systematically looking at the requirements and objectives that the project was attempting to fulfill, and the context that our idea would be in, our design process began to build momentum.
Our group began focusing on the users of our idea. In particular, these users would be the visitors of Sauder’s open house. Our group defined the context that our idea would be shown in using the objectives of the project. Sauder’s open house visitors want know more about what we do in the D-Studio, what we have learned, and how we are embracing different philosophies and cultures. Moreover, Sauder’s open house night is designed to be a fun, entertaining evening into the world of UBC’s business students. Hence, our idea for the D-Studio had to reflect this. So our group began brainstorming ideas, keeping the end user in mind and also considering that our idea must fulfill the objectives previously mentioned.
Our group came up with the idea of putting a large scale box outside the D-Studio doorway, to convey the philosophy of “thinking outside the box,” and to show that when you step into the D-Studio from the box, you are instantly operating outside the confines of conventionality. Moreover, we came up with an idea to have the large screen television in the studio interact with visitors, providing them with a comprehensive understanding of the ins and outs of the D-Studio as well as keeping them entertained and actively participating.
Ultimately, I agree with Beckman and Barry’s depiction of the design process. More importantly, I think to be innovative and creative and design something that can actually be used, one must truly understand who will be affected by their idea and what context the end user will be in. When our group began to understand this “OBSERVATIONS” phase of the innovation process, our design process really took off!