Will Mederski

The second set of readings in our Theory class revolved around creativity, strategy and design, and how those three concepts are practiced in design education versus business management education.

In my position diagram I used the two extremes of Objective and Subjective approaches to education. Where Business Management education typically focuses on a strict system of how companies and organizations operate “most efficiently,” the practice of Design is much the opposite; relying on subjective insights, intuition and abductive reasoning.

What I try to develop in the linked slides below is what the strict school & practice of Business can learn from the rapidly evolving character of Design thinking.

Bringing Design thinking into the Business world, I believe can contribute to much more innovative and agile business models for a world that is more and more user driven.

Position Diagram Presentation Slides

The first two weeks of our Theory IDSE302 class we worked through ten readings on the changing role of technology in the world. Everything from Steve Mann’s idea of sousveillance, to Bruce Sterling arguing that designers can learn from fiction writers.

We were then tasked to produce a position diagram developing the authors contributions to the subject.

Below you can see a bit of my process, starting with a blank canvas and then filling that with key concepts and ideas. I then worked that into a communicable story line.

But unhappy with a simple loop diagram showing the input-output cycle of human-computer interaction, I decided to try a more hands on approach.

After verbally developing progress of design & design research, I had my classmates take the final slide, which I had printed and handed out, and roll long-ways it into a cylinder.

Feel free to print out the image below, or just imagine the point at which the the “User” side meets the “Designer” side. At that intersection you have what you have today in a user-centered, participatory design process. Not only the inclusion of the user in the preliminary design research and development, but a continual loop of feedback from user to designer.

The two words, User Designer now form one concept, whereas previously they had been at opposite ends of the spectrum.

IDSE302 – assignment one – handout

Taking from the feedback from user testing with the last iteration, I redesigned the course selection module. Users wanted a simple view of “What are my options for required classes?”

I broke that down into four steps, starting with days of the week classes are held on, typically MWF and TTh, then a level down from that to Morning and Afternoon classes.

You can see an annotated walk thru of the iteration here:

Iteration Version 4 Presentation Slides

While the internals of the module work well, there are still many things lacking in this iteration. In presenting this version lots of question were asked about why those were the only classes offered. Was this just a small school, or what filters were applied to the course listings.

What I learned is the value of a scenario or back story, a way to tell the audience why they are looking at what they are looking at. In the case of the user, a way to tell them what filters have lead to this list of class options. In the case of clients / an audience, you need to give some credible story about both why the student is left with just these six class options and why the student would find value in that.

Lesson learned!

Over the last five weeks, in our Rapid Ideation and Creative Problem Solving class, we have been working on a making a web app that helps students sign up and schedule classes for college.

First we start with a general design & layout, then user-test it, then go back and integrate that user feedback into the next iteration. And repeat.

This is the third iteration, and definitely my favorite so far. But that makes sense, right?

You can view the annotated slideshow here.

You can see the entirety of the wireframe here.