#method cards

[thebigpictureinmind]

Co-facilitation at the Design Museum

Archive: 5.11.2013

A few weeks back, we had the pleasure to co-facilitate the Ideaspector workshop at the Design Museum of Helsinki. Milla Ahola's IDEASPECTOR is a set of method cards to help generate visual ideas. They cards are part of the graphic design exhibition DON'T SHOOT THE MESSENGER at the Design Museum of Helsinki, which ends January 12th, 2013. Go have a look, definitely worth it!

IDEASPECTRUM is a collection of creative viewpoints that are meant to be used during an ideation workshop to as triggers to come up with visual ideas. Some examples are (a) right can be wrong,  (b) play with time, (c) use a cliché and (d) play with forms. You can get familiar with the cards at the exhibition, or in some of our workshops ;)

People had the chance to participate to the Ideaspector workshop on October 29th, 2013 at the Design Museum, where they could use the cards to solve 4 preselected problems that where collected from the exhibition visitors.

Awarded problems and in workshop best voted solutions for them follow.

X How to inspire companies to protect nature? = Create status + pride with re-use, re-cycling + fixing.

X How to get your first design job? = Find your own passion.

X How can we help migrants who drown trying to come to EU? = Migrants Super Cell.

X How to make life less chaotic and accidental? = Problem recycling.

Photos by Arsi Ikäheimonen took during the workshop.

[creative-clo]

IDEO "Method Cards" for Design Thinking

IDEO Method Card from yhi-ling

[teoriadesign-blog]

METHOD CARDS FOR IDEO

51-card deck to inspire design

IDEO Method Cards is a collection of 51 cards representing diverse ways that design teams can understand the people they are designing for. They are used to make a number of different methods accessible to all members of a design team, to explain how and when the methods are best used, and to demonstrate how they have been applied to real design projects.

IDEO’s human factors specialists conceived the deck as a design research tool for its staff and clients, to be used by researchers, designers, and engineers to evaluate and select the empathic research methods that best inform specific design initiatives. The tool can be used in various ways—sorted, browsed, searched, spread out, pinned up—as both information and inspiration to human-centered design teams and individuals at various stages to support planning and execution of design programs.

Inspired by playing cards, the cards are classified as four suits—Ask, Watch, Learn, Try—that define the types of activities involved in using each method. Each approach is illustrated by a real-life example of how the method was applied to a specific project. As new methods are developed all the time, the deck will grow and evolve over time.

In its first year, the Method Cards appeared to have unexpected relevance to groups that are not necessarily engaged in design initiatives. Clients report using the tool to explore new approaches to problem-solving, gain perspective, inspire a team, turn a corner, try new approaches, and to adapt and develop their own methods.

IDEO Method Cards are available exclusively from William Stout Architectural Books in San Francisco. Call them at 415-391-6757 or click here to purchase online.

Project date: 2002

[wan-der-lest]

LOOK

Behavioral Mapping

HOW: track the positions and movements of people within a space over time

WHY: recording the pathways and traffic patterns of occupants of a space helps to define zones of different spatial behaviors

example: tracking the paths of visitors helped designers to identify the traffic spots and the vacant, underused areas of a museum lobby

[wan-der-lest]

LOOK

Rapid Ethnography

HOW: spend as much time as you can with people relevant to the design topic. establish their trust in order to visit and/or participate in their natural habitat and witness specific activities

WHY: this is a good way to achieve a deep firsthand understanding of habits, rituals, natural language, and meanings around relevant activities and artifacts

example: in exploring opportunities for internet-enabled devices, an IDEO team spent time with families from different ethnic, economic, and educational backgrounds to learn about their daily patterns

[wan-der-lest]

LEARN

Character Profiles

HOW: based on observations of real people, develop character profiles to represent archetypes and the details of their behavior or lifestyle

WHY: this is a useful way to bring a typical customer to life and to communicate the value of different concepts to various target groups

example: in order to understand different types of customers and how to target them, IDEO developed four characters for a pharmacy wanting to reach the male beauty-product market

[wan-der-lest]

LEARN

Cognitive Task Analysis

HOW: list and summarize all of a user's sensory inputs, decision points, and actions

WHY: this is good for understanding user's perceptual, attentional, and informational needs and to identify bottlenecks where errors may occur

example: cognitive task analysis helped the IDEO team understand the proximity and disorientation problems that remove-vehicle operators suffered due to the design of their controls

[wan-der-lest]

LEARN

Competitive Product Survey

HOW:collect, compare, and conduct evaluations of the product's competition

WHY: this is a useful way to establish functional requirements, performance, standards, and other benchmarks

example: developing a new soft drink, the IDEO design team surveyed the competition for functionality and form factors