In the past, I'd taken Human-Computer Interaction courses whose textbooks described a number of analytical and design techniques for product development -- terms like Activity Theory, Cultural Models, and the DECIDE Framework. We never really explicitly used any of the methods described in the textbooks, and I always felt that these methods seemed a little forced, and that in real user experience design, the process wasn't quite as rigid. At other times, I felt that the processes all seemed about the same, with a few minor tweaks between them. Even in the text book for COGS 102C (Cognitive Design Studio), the three processes (Lightning Fast, Lightning Fast +, and Focused Rapid Contextual Design) all seem to be about the same. It'll be interesting to see just what technique we use during this class.
And I'll admit that even the beginning chapters of the COGS 102C textbook had me feeling the same way: "great, more terms that I'll never use." I mean, much of it seemed useful, like the fact that the textbook described user personas, prototypes, storyboards, etc. I'd used these before and understand their use. But other things just seemed unhelpful.
However, after watching both a video about IDEO and hearing students from previous years speak, I realized that the stuff I'd always read about in these books really is used in the real world. The video showed the design firm IDEO quickly (in just one week!) redesigning the traditional metal-grid-frame shopping cart that we all know and probably don't love. I found it particularly interesting how much time the team spent just brainstorming ideas before even conducting any research. They next interviewed and observed a bunch of users in the field (i.e. in grocery stores) and then continued their brainstorming to address the issues that people had. In the projects I've done in the past, my favorite part was always talking with the users and understanding them and their requirements, so it was encouraging to see that this was a very central part of the design process.
Several students came in and discussed their experiences in the class as well, which I found to be pretty helpful. Where as I had initially been focused on digital interfaces and physical products, these students discussed redesigning physical places/spaces, which is something I hadn't thought of. Additionally, they talked about how they went through each step of the processes described in the textbooks, which came as a surprise to me.
For COGS 102C, we have to form a group and redesign something based on the methods covered in the class. I have a small group formed already, and we've begun brainstorming project ideas. It's already been a good learning experience to just come up with ideas without even doing any research. I don't want to give away any of our ideas quite yet, but I think we have some good things to build on. One problem I'm running into is figuring out what the correct scope of the project is. I'm not sure whether our ideas are too big or whether others are too small. I'm sure we'll be able to narrow it down later, though.
Initially, we started brainstorming on a Google Doc, which was pretty good, but it was a little hard to have conversations about particular sections of the document. We tried Google Groups next, but at this brainstorming stage, while it's easy to have conversations, it's hard to have a list of ideas without the conversations. We're now trying Google Wave, and it seems to be working pretty well so far. It's really easy to have conversations about particular points while still maintaining a full list of the ideas. By the way, if anyone wants a Google Wave invitation, I have 21 available, so let me know!
