Is Human-Centred Design the Key to Transforming Industries?

Human-centred design is not about putting yourself in your users' shoes. It's about making sure that you understand exactly what they need and want from the product. To do this, don't fall victim to your own biases while developing a solution – ask your customers what they think!

THE PHASES OF HUMAN-CENTRED DESIGN

Global design firm IDEO popularised human-centred design, breaking it down into three phases:

1. Inspiration

2. Ideation

3. Implementation

Here's what each step of the process means and how you can implement it to create products and services people love.

1. Inspiration

The inspiration phase requires empathy—the capability of understanding another person's experiences and emotions. You need to put yourself in your users' shoes and ask questions to determine what products they are currently using, why and how they are using them, and the challenges they are trying to solve. A useful concept to understand is Harvard Business School Professor Clayton Christensen's "Jobs to Be Done" theory. The theory asserts that customers don't buy a product; they hire it to do a specific job or achieve a particular goal.

By viewing your offerings through this framework, you can begin to develop products centred on your users' motivations rather than standard customer attributes, such as age, gender, income, and marital status. To determine the job that your customers hire your product or service for, observe how people use it and conduct user interviews. Ask questions such as:

• What challenges were you trying to solve when you bought this product?

• What other options did you consider when making your decision?

• What made you choose this product over the alternatives?

With each answer, you'll start to generate bold, new ideas. Your goal is to gather as much feedback as possible so that you can begin to spot patterns, behaviors, and pain points that can inform your ideal end product or service.

2. Ideation

After your research and interviews, you're ready to move into the ideation phase. Now is the time to brainstorm as many ideas as possible based on the research you gathered. Remember that, when brainstorming, there are no bad ideas. The only way to derail this process is if you ignore your users' needs. As you start narrowing down ideas, build out a prototype using simple paper wireframes or PowerPoint presentations so you can test them with real people.

3. Implementation

The final phase of the process is bringing that ideal solution to market. You should first consider where your users are and how they would prefer to be marketed to. Yet, as you roll your product or service out to a broader audience, continue to solicit and analyse feedback.

The iteration process should never end because your customers' wants and needs will continue to evolve. Your goal is to adapt to meet them. Keeping humans at the center of the development process will ensure you're continuously innovating and achieving product-market fit.

HUMAN-CENTRED DESIGN IN ACTION

A great example of human-centred design is a children's toothbrush that is still in use today. In the mid-nineties, Oral-B asked IDEO to develop a new kid's toothbrush. Rather than replicate what was already on the market—a slim, shorter version of an adult-sized toothbrush—IDEO went directly to the source; they watched children brush their teeth.

They realised in the process that kids have a hard time holding the skinnier toothbrushes their parents used because they do not have a similar level dexterity or motor skills. What children need are toothbrushes with a big, fat, squishy grip that would be easier for them to hold on to.

"Now every toothbrush company in the world makes these," says IDEO Partner Tom Kelley in a speech. "But our client reports that after we made that little, tiny discovery out in the field—sitting in a bathroom watching a five-year-old boy brush his teeth—they had the best-selling kid's toothbrush in the world for 18 months."

Had IDEO not gone out into the field—or, in this case, children's homes—they would not have observed that small opportunity, which turned a big profit for Oral-B.

Source:

Harvard Business School Online by Lauren Landry.