Using design methods in practice: A design research case study

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From the course by The University of Sydney

Innovation Through Design: Think, Make, Break, Repeat

8 ratings

The University of Sydney

Innovation Through Design: Think, Make, Break, Repeat

8 ratings

The evolution of design has seen it become a discipline no longer limited to the concerns of a singular, specific domain and develop to become a pathway for solving complex, nonlinear problems. Design is becoming a capability-enhancing skill, equipping people with the ability to deal with uncertainty, complexity and failure. In this course, we demonstrate how you can use design as a way of thinking to provide strategic and innovative advantage within your profession. Suitable for anyone who is curious about design and translating the processes and tools of design thinking into innovative opportunities, over 5 weeks we explore, apply and practice the design process: think, make, break and repeat. Through introducing theoretical concepts and examining industry case studies with leading Australian design firms, we investigate design as learning about the context (the thinking part), building prototypes as tangible representations (the making part) and testing potential solutions (the breaking part). We build on this by showing the productive value of moving through the process quickly and often (the repeating part), to improve ideas and develop new insights. Throughout the course, you will follow us through three of Australia’s most exciting design offices and learn from practicing designers and leaders in design. This insight into industry will enable you to develop a comprehensive understanding of design and the role it can and does play within the innovation landscape. You will leave this course with a set of practical tools and techniques to apply to situations within your own professional context, to translate problems into opportunities and solutions, and ultimately to innovate through design.

From the lesson

Repeating design

This module focuses on the very important step in the design process of repeating, or iteration, and its role in design innovation. We also provide a summary of all the topics covered in the course and take you through the design process with a design research project. Industry experts share their insights and tips about working in the design industry.

Recap of all modules - Why? Where? How?2:56

Using design methods in practice: A design research case study6:39

Industry expert tips on design and innovation5:18

Meet the Instructors

Martin Tomitsch
Associate Professor and Head of Design
School of Architecture, Design and Planning
Cara Wrigley
Associate Professor
Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning

Let's take a look

at the research project that we carried out in

the design lab here at the University of Sydney.

The project will illustrate the design innovation process we've covered in this course,

and the steps and methods this can involve.

The project was led by one of my research students, Marius Hoggenmueller,

in collaboration with a Sydney-based tech startup called Solar Analytics.

Solar Analytics provides its customers with

a smart device that measures the electricity consumption in the home,

as well as the electricity produced by solar power panels.

This allows people who have solar panels installed on the roof of the house,

to monitor the performance of those panels.

Through an online dashboard developed by Solar Analytics,

the customers can see a visualization of past and current performances of the panels,

along with the actual consumption.

However, many customers are not regularly checking

the online dashboard since it requires loading a website or opening an app on a mobile device.

Solar Analytics was therefore interested in exploring how some of the data

available through the dashboard could be visualized in a more ambient way.

Therefore providing the customers with the ability to continuously monitor

the performance of the solar panels as well as electricity consumption in the home.

After familiarizing ourselves with the existing system,

we started our design process by conducting

a focus group with six employees at Solar Analytics.

This allowed us to get insights about the current solutions.

We also discussed early ideas for an ambient display concept.

One important take-away from the session,

was that the ambient display should not aim to replace the dashboard,

but to engage customers and to get them to

review the detailed dashboard information more often.

We also conducted interviews with members of three households,

that were all existing Solar Analytics customers.

In those interviews, we focused on

current practices such as how often the main customers would access the dashboard.

As with the focus group,

we also sought feedback from the customers on early concept ideas.

A key insight from the interviews was that people

preferred graphical representations over numbers.

The focus groups and interviews are two examples of

methods using the design thinking step of an innovation process.

Here, they allow us to form a better understanding of current practices.

Before the focus groups and interviews,

we had also created a design toolkit that we used to let

participants design what they thought the ambient display should look like.

The toolkit itself was also an innovative outcome focusing on the process,

rather than the final outcome.

Design innovation therefore is not just

limited to the final product or service we're designing,

innovating other aspects such as the process of

coming up with a solution can be just as important.

After analyzing all the data we collected during the focus groups and interviews,

we started with creating visual mockups of what the final solution might look like.

We used sketches initially to explore the form factor or the types of visualizations,

and also how people would be able to interact with the product.

This we resolved to be in the form of a custom-designed mobile app,

that served as a remote control for changing modes and settings for the display.

We also created 3D representations of

the physical display to further refine details of its form factor and behavior.

At the same time we started experimenting with materials.

We ended up repurposing an existing low resolution LED display by taking

it apart and redesigning its physical appearance as well as the display itself.

We frequently moved between the making and the breaking

parts by discussing the design within our team,

evaluating them against design principles

and getting other experts to critique the designs.

This meant that we were repeating the making and breaking parts

several times before getting to the final evaluation.

The final method we used for the design breaking step was a usability evaluation,

and for this, we deployed the display in three households.

The members of the households use the display for several weeks each,

allowing them to integrate it into their daily lives.

We collected data about people's interactions with the display, and the mobile app,

which allowed us to assess how, if at all,

they engaged with the design solution and which features they used most.

We also conducted interviews with members

of each of the households at the end of the study,

providing us with more qualitative insights

into the use and usefulness of the design solution.

Some of the key takeaways from

this evaluation study was that people liked the numeric representations,

even though in initial interviews they

stated they would prefer a graphical visualizations.

We also found that people used the display to

monitor real-time performance of the solar panels,

and the use of the display indeed led to

an increased interaction with

the Solar Analytics dashboard in two of the three households.

For now, the display remains a prototype.

In order to develop it into a commercial solution,

you would need to repeat the process to see what

we have learned from this first prototype evaluation,

and to refine the solution both in terms of its design and technical execution.

So we see in this project that we often move several times through these steps,

and that each iteration

might put an emphasis on one or more of the steps. For example,

in our first iteration,

we focused on the thinking part,

in the second iteration we focused on the making part,

the final iteration which involved the deployment of the display in three households,

focused on the breaking part.

The methods we illustrated through the design research case study where; focus groups,

interviews, sketching, creating mockups,

prototyping, and usability evaluation.

In the next video,

you will get some tips from design practitioners,

from our industry case studies.

We've asked them what they would most like to share with our learners,

something that they wish they had known when they embarked on their career as designers.

Let's see what they said.

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