Phase 2: CONCEPTUALIZE

After the Design Review for Phase 1 (EXPLORE), the next class, we were immediately were prepped for the second phase of UOCD: CONCEPTUALIZE. The goal of this phase is "to establish bold conceptual directions in which meaningful contributions could be made to people's lives while evolving your appreciation for and understanding of those lives." Again, the designers should not take the approach of just "design for" but also "design with" and "design by." Thankfully, Prof. Linder and the staff take on a more humble approach to the design project that I think many STEM students could benefit from: "We don't seek to look smart."

For Phase 2, the symbol is no longer a sponge but a compass. Now that we have "soaked" and "squeezed" to gather information about our users, it is time to "make sense" of this information. We ended Phase I with our insights about the experience of community gardening, identifying prevalent themes, behavior patterns and tensions. The next phase is made of three basic steps.

Orienting, Proposing, and Roving.

There is no way that we can investigate any and all possibilities for the sake of time, so the best bet is to identify guide marks and landmarks that can push us (ORIENT) into a smart direction. Future Scenarios or "visions" capture how the environment can be shaped and radically change our personas' lives, which could then lead us to a product or service to shape the world in such a way. These "areas of opportunity" or "improvement areas" -- not "problem areas" -- can be captured in 2x2 experience maps, journey maps, or venn diagrams and they can be prompted through identified human values or need statements.
The resulting raw ideas PROPOSE various alternatives and can range from the high in the "blue-sky" to deep down "on earth." The focus is to allow the imagination to flow freely to generate 100s (not 10s) of such raw ideas. Then, as a group we sort them in order to reduce these ideas into a small number:
  • Solution Hierarchy
  • Preference Voting (individual voting)
  • Fanciful Horizon (magic is brought into the scenario) 
  • Boldness Difference (extensive pushing of the imagination)
  • Screening Matrix (check against Designer v. User Values)

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