Quality Alchemist (品質煉金術師): ISI Seminar on Design Thinking

2018年1月15日星期一

ISI Seminar on Design Thinking

The seminar entitled "Design Thinking" was co-organizer by Institute of Systematic Innovation Hong Kong (ISIHK), Hong Kong Quality Management Association (HKQMA) and Six Sigma Institute (SSI) on 15^th Jan 2018. Design Thinking originally is about presentation of functions to their user and aesthetics is only part of design. It is first started at IDEO and then was popularized by the design school (d. school) of Stanford University which teaches of Design Thinking to people beyond the design profession. The seminar aimed to discuss the basic concept and application of Design Thinking. I took a photo with Mr. David Kwan for memory.

In the beginning, Dr. Frankie, K.S. LAM (Chairman, HKQMA) introduced the guest speaker Mr. David Kwan to us. Mr. Kwan is an experience automation and mechanical system designer consultant and he is a MATRIZ Level 3 Triz specialist.

Mr. David Kwan (Founding Director, ISIHK) introduced the concept of Design Thinking. He said he like the meaning of Design search from internet that “… a Rational Presentation of Function…” Then he quoted David Kelly (1978) who started at IDEO about Design Thinking (Human-Centric Design) meant that “Apply the mentality of Designer to Solve Problems” (employing Designer’s thinking logic).

And then David told us a story about Joe (Boss) and Mary (Subordinate) in which Mary was a supervisor in the warehouse of supermarket. He described some scenarios that you could observe some problems. How Design Thinking could help Joe?

After that David briefed the process of Design Thinking that included Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype and Test. He employed the engineering terms (roughly) described 5 steps below:

Empathize: On-Site Observation & Data Consolidation

Define: Problem Definition

Ideate: Brainstorming

Prototype & Test: Concept Simulation, Evaluation & Feedback.

He added those steps were not necessary in sequence and it could jump from one to another depended on the need.

David interpreted those terms one by one as follows.

He quoted Bible to explain “Empathy” that “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”. Then he future interpreted as “Put yourself into others’ shoes” (to feel) + “Open Mind” (to understand) + “Objectivity” (to think). (He added that you could understand and feel the person situation but you may not agree with him.)

The most important of “Empathy” was to discover people’s real and hidden needs, motives and their underneath emotions that guides their behavior into order to ensure we solve the right problem.

“Define” step is to review data to find the user’s feeling and physical and emotional needs and re-state / reframe as a problem statement. He quoted Forbes that top 20 reason why startup fail was no market need. That’s why empathize plus define so important!

“Ideate” step that brainstorm was employed for ideas such as use Story to elaborate your ideas and select ideas based on potential and not feasibility. At the time, Dr. Micheal Li added TRIZ could trigger some ideas in this step.

“Prototype” step that build “physical prototype” to explore your ideas and to verify your problem definition. He added this term may be misleading and now somebody employed “Pre-prototype or Pretotype”.

“Test” step used to refine your idea; to learn more about your user and verify your problem statement, as well as, to validate your idea at the final phase.

Finally, David showed us “Design Thinking is not a Linear Process”. It was a cycle fail and trial fast to test your problem and solution. He added the “Creativity” kicked in during Problem Finding. Even though Solution Finding also introduced “Creativity” but Problem Finding was more important.

Lastly, he briefed the Design Thinking Mindsets to us below.

Curiosity – Opportunity is often the result of Keen Observation.

Reframing – Looking for Alternative View Point

Mindfulness of Process – Don’t Sidetrack

Radical Collaboration – Nobody knows everything. (Idea Cross Pollination)

Action Orientated – Don’t be afraid of Failure. Learn from it. (I said to try in controlled area like Fintech Sandbox.)

At the end, he introduced “Abductive Reasoning that thinking in terms of probability. (Accepting a possible explanation for an observation according to previous known facts) Then he pointed out Tamed Problem (e.g. solve problem to arrive in Mars) and Wicked Problem (e.g. solve problem to celebrate Valentine’s Day). David recommended us to read three articles about it.

We had discussed different items during Q&A session.