DD+D/a theater-based design team

Chicago Service Jam '12 Registration is Now Open

2012-02-09T09:48:00.000-08:00

DD+D will host the Chicago Service Jam again this year!
What's a Service Jam?

On Friday February 24th, people in nearly 50 cities around the world will be getting together over 48 hours for the second Global Service Jam. Working with a shared theme, we will design and rapid-prototype services. It will be a chance to learn more about service design and service design techniques… by ‘doing’. We’ll be uploading the results onto the Global Service Design HQ Hub… and all the designs will be presented to the world!

The Chicago Service Design Jam Host Byron Stewart invites Chicago area non-profit professionals, designers, marketers, managers, researchers, creatives, entrepreneurs, academics, and students to participate in this global experience. Come work with and learn from our amazing Team of Design Coaches and from each other.

Want to learn more about Service Design?

Want to practice your service design skills?

Then this Jam is for you!

The Details
Dates: Friday, February 24th through Sunday, February 26th. 2012

Time: Starting 5:30pm Friday, February 24th. until 4:00pm Sunday February 26th. 2012

Host Location: We are proud to announce that Northwestern University’s Segal Design Institute and Design For America are sponsors for the Jam and will be providing our Jam space for the weekend.
The Jam will be on
Northwestern University’s Evanston Campus
Seabury Seminary
600 Haven St.
Evanston, IL. 60201

Register Here Today!
http://www.chicagoservicejam.org/
Space for only 20 participants.

This Is Service Design Thinking: Deconstructing a Textbook

2012-01-14T18:02:00.000-08:00

I recently completed reading, and this is Service Design Thinking and had pleasure of meeting one of the editors Marc Stickdorn at the Service Design Network Conference'11 (he was also a presenter at the conference). We talked about the use of theatre in the field of service design . With chapter sections titled "What If..?" and "Service Staging" Marc's book explores the use of and place for theatre in this new field of service design.

Here is a very comprehensive review of the book we found. This book is a must read for anyone interested in service design.

“This Is Service Design Thinking… is likely to become the quintessential service design textbook for students, educators, and professionals alike.”If you’re like me, you have a mini-library of those user experience books that are most meaningful to you. No, not the ones hidden away on your eReader, reminding you of their presence only when you see their titles on the screen. Rather, I’m referring to those tangible books, sitting on your office bookshelf or on a side table at home. Perhaps some remind you of the time when you first entered the field of user experience, wanting to absorb everything about the topic. Or maybe everyone raves about a book as being seminal to the user experience discipline, but you keep the fact that you’ve never read it a secret. Regardless of why you have them, where they live, or how much you recall of their content, these books are important to who you are as a UX professional.

I’ve recently finished reading what is now the latest addition to my own professional mini-library: This Is Service Design Thinking, by Marc Stickdorn, Jakob Schneider, and numerous collaborators and co-authors. This book is likely to become the quintessential service design textbook for students, educators, and professionals alike. In this column, I’ll share highlights from the book, along with some of my own interpretations, and tell you why you should add this book to your own personal collection.

Defining Service Design: Establishing a 5-Principle Framework“Service design truly is an amalgamation of disciplines, including product design, graphic design, operations management, and, of course, interaction design.”The authors of This Is Service Design Thinking refreshingly call attention to the fact that no concrete definition of service design exists. Instead of attempting to summarize service design in a neat, mission-statement-like paragraph, Stickdorn and Schneider show how service design truly is an amalgamation of disciplines, including product design, graphic design, operations management, and, of course, interaction design. Service design does not pretend to be the new kid on the block—different from everything that’s come before. On the contrary, service design relies on various existing methods, tools, deliverables, and processes, as well as the expertise of many in these interdisciplinary fields to do it right.

What the authors do provide is a list of the basic principles of service design—as a framework for working in service design. This is where synergies and opportunities for the user experience and interaction design disciplines become apparent.

Services should be user centered. They should be “experienced through the customer’s eyes.” Unquestionably, this first principle is where UX professionals can influence the field of service design the most. Considering the customer is fundamental to any work we do. However, I see placing the emphasis on being simply user centered rather than people centered as a missed opportunity. As the authors’ second principle explains, service design is co-creative—that is, “all stakeholders should be included in the service design process.” It’s critical to consider all constituents who are part of a service—including managers, back-office employees, front-office employees, designers, and programmers—and design interactions through their interactive and participatory engagement in the process. Therefore, implying that the customer is at the center of the experience may put unequal weight on their needs during design, when we should consider everyone’s needs equally.

“Services should be user centered. … This first principle is where UX professionals can influence the field of service design the most. Considering the customer is fundamental to any work we do.”Sequencing is the visualization of a service “as a sequence of interrelated actions” and documenting the individual process steps and touchpoints that comprise a service experience. Evidencing is the visualization of “intangible services … in terms of physical artifacts.” Evidencing makes visible to customers the elements of a service that help them to proceed optimally through the service experience, appreciate the intricacies of the service and exhibit loyalty. The authors use the example of the folded toilet paper in hotel rooms as an example of subtle, but effective evidencing of a hotel’s housekeeping service.

Experience design professionals often integrate sequencing and evidencing into their work. For example, creating user scenarios and flow diagrams for the experience of interacting with a mobile application is a form of sequencing. Making behind-the-scenes processes visible—like the wait time for loading a video—is an example of evidencing. However, as much as experience design aspires to be all inclusive, it often focuses solely on the digital world, so its opportunity for impact becomes stifled.

This is where the fifth principle of service design becomes most relevant: service design is holistic and “the entire environment of a service should be considered.” As the authors advise: “Genuinely working in a holistic way is an illusion, it is simply impossible to consider every single aspect of a service. However, the intention should always be to see the wider context in which a service process takes place.” They continue by explaining that “the system design of an organization, its inherent culture, values and norms as well as its organizational structure and processes are important issues for the design of services … [and] can help promote a service mindset within the organization and to articulate the importance of employee and customer motivation.”

As an advocate for simplicity, I’d like to further coalesce the five principles of service design that the book presents. Service design places importance on

people—both customers and service providers
participatory, ethnographic processes and approaches
tangible, visualized design artifacts
The remainder of This Is Service Design Thinking covers the following topics in discreet sections:

Who are service designers?What is the process that service designers follow?
What are examples of tangible deliverables, tools, and case studies that result from the service design process?
Who Are Service Designers? “Professionals leverage their own unique discipline to provide the necessary perspective to address a service-related problem….”In their book, the authors leverage articles that subject-matter experts from seven different disciplines have written: product, graphic, interaction, and social design; strategic and operations management; and design ethnography. And they admit that their list of disciplines is not exhaustive. Each article details a point of view (POV) or case study that illustrates how a discipline contributes to service design. The phrase contributing to is critical; people in these diverse disciplines do not claim that they should necessarily own the full set of processes, activities, and deliverables of service design. Rather, these professionals leverage their own unique discipline to provide the necessary perspective to address a service-related problem at hand. For example, graphic designers may develop an intuitive wayfinding and signage system to support visitor navigation at a trade fair, or product designers may work with an elevator company on concepts to help improve the efficiency and flow of people in a shopping mall.

Future Service Designers“Service design is in its infancy as a discreet discipline, and applications of it beyond academia are only beginning to surface.”While service designers can impact services from a bottom-up, contributory perspective, the unfortunate truth is that impacting services from the perspective of top-down accountability in an organization—whether strategically or operationally—won’t be easy.

As the authors write, “So why is it that … bad service is still around us? Let’s face it, managers and not necessarily service designers usually make decisions about the level of investment in service concepts…. The ‘production line approach to services’ identified in 1972 still represents the ‘ideal’ service design, whether fast food, customer service in a call centre, or surgical operations. In the abstract view, a service is a machine, which can be reduced to systems, machines and employees and customers that can be treated ‘as if’ they were machines too.”

After reading This Is Service Design Thinking, I believe an important question to explore is: Who will own service design in the future? Service design is in its infancy as a discreet discipline, and applications of it beyond academia are only beginning to surface. As service design becomes a more formal, applied discipline, the necessary skills service designers must have to own—and not just contribute to—service design include being a generalist, with sufficient appreciation of the diverse disciplines that are necessary for service-design success to know how and when solving a problem requires their expertise
enough business acumen to understand and influence strategic and operations managers regarding the importance of designing the service experience—and achieving the aforementioned holistic goals
exemplary interpersonal, communication, facilitation, and management skills

The Service Design Process and Tools “The service design process … is …meant to provide an overall framework within which service designers can work, but allow significant flexibility for iterative problem solving and the creation of multiple design concepts.”Using the words process and tools may imply some rigidity in the approach service designers use in their work. On the contrary, the service design process that the authors outline is high level and fluid by design—and meant to provide an overall framework within which service designers can work, but allow significant flexibility for iterative problem solving and the creation of multiple design concepts. Using tools to define a service design solution quickly and obtain an answer is less important than choosing a process that allows rigorous and validated exploration. The questions are what is key.

Stage 1: Exploration The first phase in a service design project involves understanding the culture and organization from the perspective of the customer, identifying the real design problem at hand through various tools and ethnographic approaches, then visualizing your findings and making service issues and opportunities real and tangible, so you can tackle them.

Stage 2: Creation After problem definition and insight gathering, the creation phase begins with service ideation and concept generation. As the authors humorously describe, service designers love their Post-it notes, primarily because of how they allow iterative, quick thought processes to flow. The creation phase is when you want to be exploring as many potential mistakes as possible rather than trying to avoid them. And you want to involve all groups of people who are part of the service experience in the creation process, including customers, stakeholders, and employees.

Stage 3: Reflection “What’s challenging about service design—as opposed to digital or product design, for example—is prototyping a service experience and all of its nuances effectively.”During the reflection stage, you evolve your visualized concepts from the creation phase, in the form of prototypes, and test them. What’s challenging about service design—as opposed to digital or product design, for example—is prototyping a service experience and all of its nuances effectively. For example, imagine trying to prototype the service interactions of a pharmacy experience, ensuring that you include all of the elements that are critical to effective service design. Merely providing customers and employees with a brief concept description or storyboard simply won’t do the whole service justice. Instead, service designers use practices and artifacts from the theater—scripts, role-playing, props, scenery—to create as realistic a service design prototype as possible.

Stage 4: Implementation Implementation in service design is less about building an application and more about the change management that is necessary for people to effectively introduce and operationalize a redesigned service. The keys to effective service change management are having included the same people throughout all of the earlier stages socializing the various service design deliverable and artifacts that help communicate the elements of the new service.

Tool Highlights“While many [service design] tools are very similar to those UX professionals use to garner insights about a target audience and enable them to begin requirements definition, … they are broader in perspective and scope.”If you were to purchase This Is Service Design Thinking for no other reason, the crowdsourced and exhaustive set of service design tools it offers may be value enough. While many of these tools are very similar to those UX professionals use to garner insights about a target audience and enable them to begin requirements definition—such as personas, customer journey maps, contextual interviews, shadowing, and scenarios—they are broader in perspective and scope.

For example, during service safaris, a researcher essentially does an expert review of the service experience from the perspective of the customer, not unlike using heuristics to walk through a digital experience. The difference is that the digital experience would be just one component of an overall service experience that includes broader interactions with other service elements such as front-office staff and other customers. Similarly, customer journey maps assume cross-channel touchpoints rather a single channel experience—for example, a digital experience.

Service staging and service role-playing employ theatrical techniques to physically act out the service experience and find opportunities to improve it. Encouraging employees to play the role of the customer and vice versa can elicit the softer, emotional insights to which it’s important that you be sensitive as you’re designing services—for example, customers’ impatience during wait times or indecision over their menu selections. Applying these methods to an experience design project could help your stakeholders to be more empathetic to the target audience, leading to more complete adoption of your design recommendations.

How Is Service Design Really Different From Experience Design? “How service designers execute these principles and methods and the breadth of their potential scope and impact differentiates service design from experience design.”One could argue that experience designers follow the principles of service design—and use its processes and tools as well. If, as a designer, you do, and you’re achieving organizational and customer impact across all touchpoints, it doesn’t matter whether you call yourself an experience designer or a service designer—as long as that impact occurs. After all, service design has its roots in user experience and interaction design, among other disciplines.

But how service designers execute these principles and methods and the breadth of their potential scope and impact differentiates service design from experience design. Simply giving the business and technology teams an opportunity to provide feedback on your designs is not co-creation, and doing just digital design is not experience design. Moreover, the service design approach is likely to be more successful in achieving holistic impact within organizations because of its emphasis on co-creation and focusing on employees, stakeholders, and service providers as much as on the user or customer.

Parting Thoughts“The meaning of This Is Service Design Thinking extends beyond its covers and the ideas of its co-authors.”Through the lens of This Is Service Design Thinking, I’ve taken the opportunity to dive deeper into service design as a field. This book will likely become the go-to resource for educators, students, and professionals. Although I hope I’ve done its content justice, I’ve not yet spoken about the book itself as a manifestation of a service. The authors followed a co-creation process involving contributors, teachers, students, designers, and readers in its design. From evaluating good and bad textbook designs to crowdsourcing content to soliciting in-progress feedback on the book’s design, the meaning of This Is Service Design Thinking extends beyond its covers and the ideas of its co-authors. Much post-publication discussion, critique, and ongoing feedback continue. Similarly, I welcome future discussion about this column, to continue co-creating what service design means and exploring its synergies with experience design.

By Laura Keller
Published: September 19, 2011

DD+D 2012 News

2011-12-27T12:05:00.000-08:00

DD+D will be coordinating the Chicago Service Jam again this year as part of the Global Service Jam. The Jam will be Friday , February 24th. - Sunday February 26th.2012. Please contact us if you're interested in volunteering, sponsoring or participating.

DD+D will be launching our new DDplusD site soon please stay tuned!

DD+D is working with others to start the Chicago chapter of the Service Design Network.

And, our client partners, so far, next year range from Universities to Quick Service Restaurants.

Happy New Year!

DD+D's Services

2011-11-17T16:45:00.000-08:00

DD+D: a theatre-based
design consulting firm

DD+D leverages theatre techniques and acting methodology to help designers empathize with users and produce better results for their clients, as well as to communicate and collaborate around design solutions. Theatre is a fun, informative, and effective way to work out ideas, visualize concepts, and communicate solutions. It allows teams to empathize, by stepping into the shoes of users. It can reveal how people interact with services, products, and each other on a physical, emotional and intuitive level.

How can we help?
DD+D offers theatre-based workshops customized for each stage of the design process and tuned to the specific needs of designers, design teams and their clients.

1. Self
Supporting the exploration of the designer’s beliefs
- Design Empathy

2. Others
Helping to engage with and communicate design research.
- Personas

3. Discover
Supporting testing and evaluating of new ideas.
- Bodystorming / Design Improv

4. Develop
Supporting testing of existing concepts and services.
- Performance Testing
- Making Products Considerate

1. Self
Workshop: Design Empathy
The design process starts with the designer. The Design Empathy workshop helps designers acknowledge their biases and challenge their assumptions. Understanding these potential blocks will help you to connect with your customers, team members and stakeholders. Learn how actors, the world's greatest empaths, use acting methodology to understand Self before stepping into the shoes of Others.

“The workshop illuminated a critical part of the design process-the idea of empathy, inclusion, and connection. These concepts are crucial and complex and are often unarticulated. Today's session successfully got us thinking about connection and social dynamics in the way we work in our studio and in communities." Studio Leader, Design for America

2. Others
Workshop: Personas
Reconnect research to personas. We take two-dimensional representations of customers and bring them to life. Participants learn to use acting techniques to connect to the hidden needs, motivations, and goals of users. Make data memorable.

“I tend to be skeptical about ‘exercises’ like this, but I think it’s a great way to get a team reconnected with personas they've been using over time. Also a great way to onboard new team members to existing personas. And for promoting adoption to other teams within an organization." Designer, UXMasterclass Conference

3. Discovery
Workshop: Bodystorming/ Design Improv
This session uses a method of problem identification and solving to translate ideas and opportunities into physical experiences explored through improvisation and role-play. Bodystorming uses a design brief, props and simple costumes to give a sense of place. The process is designed to uncover how relationships between people, locations, and things affect ideas in ways that brainstorming alone cannot.
Rapid prototyping at its best!

“I was a participant in Bodystorming a few weeks ago, and I found it to be the ‘best’ medium for developing a ‘design’ concept within a very short period of time. It is an invaluable tool for educators as well as multi-level teams of ‘any’ discipline, to offer lessons in team building and collaboration. Without having any preconceived ideas of what we wanted to achieve, my team developed a conceptual design for an eye-care kiosk within ‘16 minutes’ - while standing.”Designer, Sears UX

4. Develop
Workshop: Performance Testing
This session is similar to a theatre rehearsal. Using an existing scenario this session tests how users interact with low and high fidelity products or services. Designers act out scenes based on user’s problems identified during the research phase to step into the shoes of the user in the context of a particular touch point or day-in-the-life. Participants learn how to use their embodied insights to create rich contextual scenarios.

"Forcing us to step into the simulation of our project showed some of inefficiencies in our designs." Designer, Design for America

Making Products Considerate

This workshop encourages designers to think differently about the products they design. Designers play the role of the product as they interact with users to understand what users want from an experience with a product. Participants explore creating products that are deferential, forthcoming, and perceptive. Learn to design good product behavior.

“It gave the team time to consider situations that may come up. Usually these situations are considered after the fact= design rework. The session forces us to not just walk through the steps as product developers but instead think of products as people with their own expectations and emotions. “
Product designer, global quick service restaurant

Who We Are:
DD+D Team Members, led by Byron Stewart, bring expertise in: UX, interaction, product, and service design, ergonomics, HCI, and business. Theatre, improv, storytelling, facilitating, directing, acting.

Byron Stewart Design Lead, DD+D
is an actor, director, consultant, facilitator, and presenter, and is owner of Dramatic Diversity/DD+D. For the past ten years, Dramatic Diversity has provided theatre-based corporate training and diversity & inclusion consultation to clients including BP/Amoco, Hewitt & Associates, Motorola, Northern Trust Bank, Brookfield Zoo, Ohio State University, and PepsiCo. Byron has also applied theatre-based techniques to the design field facilitating persona/scenario, performance testing, and design empathy workshops for Critical Mass, RTC, IIT’s Institute of Design, DePaul University, Columbia College and for Northwestern University’s Design for America Fellows. Byron has facilitated bodystorming sessions for Sears and Walgreens, and is a local leader and presenter for Chicago’s Interaction Design Association. Byron was service design consultant on the development and launch of a new diabetes class for University of Chicago and coordinator of the Chicago Service Jam. Articles on Byron’s workshops have been featured in the UXmatters and Experience Matters online magazines. He received his BFA degree from Howard University.

Conferences:
Design Research Conference “Design Improv” workshop, IIT/Institute of Design, Chicago, IL. Oct. 2011

Service Design Network’s Global Conf. “McDonald’s + Service Experience + Jam' Palace Hotel, San Francisco, CA. Oct. 2011

UXMasterclass Conference, “Using Theatre Techniques to Write Effective Personas” Field Museum Chicago, IL. Sept. 2011

DePaul University Continuing and Professional Education, with Millennia Consulting, “Bodystorming: Improv + Inclusion + Innovation” DePaul University, June, 2011

Contact us:
Byron Stewart, DD+D (773) 271 - 6054
byron@dramaticdiversity.com
www.projectbodystorming.blogspot.com

Please click here for a complete downloadable version of our brochure !

Design Research Conference + Design Improv

2011-10-25T16:49:00.000-07:00

Byron and Raph presented, "Design Improv", a four hour interactive workshop for IIT/Institute of Design's Design Research Conference.

The Conference:

For nine years running, DRC has brought together leading thinkers, exceptional practitioners, and seasoned executives. This year’s conference will set the spotlight on exciting changes driven by emerging technologies and the new position of design research within the business world. Please join us for two days of cutting-edge ideas, fresh work, and new business connections.

The Workshop:
Design Improv with Raphael D’Amico and Byron Stewart

As design researchers we strive for empathy with our users but often find it difficult to fully close the gap. What if we could step into their shoes? Design Improv brings research to life by drawing on the unique techniques that actors and improvisers use to create believable characters and scenes. Workshop participants will learn how this approach can help prototype, build empathy, and reveal how people interact with products, services, and each other. Come ready to play!

Service Design Network Conference + DD+D

2011-10-13T10:30:00.000-07:00

DD+D will be presenting with new client partner, McDonald's at this year's Service Design Network Conference Oct. 20-21 in San Fransisco.

Service Design Global Conference

The 4th annual Service Design Conference crosses the Atlantic this year to San Francisco where we will meet to develop and strengthen the knowledge and expertise in the business, science and practice of the innovation and improvement of services. This global gathering will be an invaluable opportunity to meet your peers, expand your network and hear from those operating at the very heart of service design.

Right from our first conference in Amsterdam in 2008; new thinking has been debated, methods shared, great ideas and strategies developed and stories have been told. Invaluable connections have been forged between individuals, groups and organizations to help design and build internal capacity and teams, create new management capabilities, all ultimately generating value for service organizations and users alike.

So if the design and provision of services is on your agenda; whether you’re a practitioner, whether you’re in the business of managing and delivering services or you’re if studying, this conference is for you.

This year’s theme of the conference:
At this year’s conference we’ll be exploring what happens when service design meets business. We’ll look at how, where and when our two broad professions work together to generate value, what we can learn from each other and ask what the future of this relationship might be. The theme is:

“From sketchbook to spreadsheet”
We’re particularly interested in understanding the impact that service design is now making to organisations’ bottom lines and in hearing where the compelling stories of designing business strategies, monetising service propositions and cultural change are.

We will also be maintaining our focus on the practice and business of service design itself; new tools and methods yes, but also how to buy and sell service design, and what the design community can learn from business and vice-versa.

DD+D's Byron Stewart,and McDonald's Jeff Pollard will present:

McDonald's+Service Experience+Jam
McDonald’s Chief Restaurant Officer has a favorite saying, “It’s not real until it’s real in the restaurant.” The path to making service experience real at McDonald’s has had many twists and turns and is still in its early days as a formal practice. We’re excited to share how service culture has been cultivated over the years at McDonald’s and how we’ve employed tools from the disciplines of theater and design and are collaborating with innovators in the service design community to have a positive impact on our business. And it wouldn’t be “real” if we didn’t have an embodied employee persona performance thrown in for good measure!

I attended Adam Lawrence's workshop at the conference.
Adam is the owner of Work Play Experience in Germany.

And also works in the area of theatre + design.
Here is a clip from the workshop.

DD+D Presents at UXMasterclass Conference '11

2011-09-06T18:41:00.000-07:00

DD+D will give a talk at UXMasterclass Conference 2011 from miaoqi Zhu on Vimeo.

Byron presented at this year's UXMaterclass Conference on Friday, September 16 at the Field Museum. Please find above and below a description of the session and feedback from participants.

Using Theater Techniques to Write Effective Personas

Workshop Description:

Designers don’t always have the luxury of getting to talk with users. In fact, sometimes designers only rely on personas when developing ideas. But if personas are to be useful, then designers must step into the shoes of users to gain the insight and empathy needed to create engaging experiences. Byron’s workshop exhibits acting methodology to draw this connection between user research data, user personas, and design.

He will enthusiastically demonstrate how designers benefit from going back to the theatrical traditions to enhance their character and story development skills. Byron will also increase the understanding and application of theater techniques that aid in the development of more life-like personas than those that merely exist on paper. Leading the Dramatic Diversity team, Byron takes a two-dimensional representation of a customer and brings it to life, eliminating user frustration and increasing ease, enjoyment and engagement in all design elements.

Participant Feedback:

"I tend to be skeptical about "exercises" like this, but I think done well , it could be a great way to get a team reconnected with personas they've been using over time. Also a great way to onboard new team members to existing personas. And for promoting adoption to other teams within an organization."

"Very engaging presenter. Got me thinking about how I could potentially apply this approach within my team. Would recommend to my company where appropriate."

"It taught me to go deeper with personas to find the emotional layer."

"Byron enthusiastically presented the material and interacted with the audience suggestions."

"The speaker brought real examples to demonstrate the usefulness of The Method."

"Thought it was great - just the right level of detail for the time limit and the audience. And it was great to engage the audience instead of just talk!"

Design Empathy and Performance Testing with DFA'11

2011-08-31T20:04:00.001-07:00

DD+D had the pleasure of returning to Northwestern University's Design for America this summer. Byron conducted three interactive theater-based workshops with the design teams and leadership.
Two Design Empathy workshops (one for DFA Leadership) and another titled Performance Testing. Our Design Empathy contribution has been added to the DFA Starter Kit Manual.

Here are brief overviews of the sessions and feedback from participants.

Design Empathy - diversity and inclusion training for designers

“Social design education helps develop character, empathy, cultural awareness and flexibility.” Mariana Amatullo VP of Designmatters Social Design Art Center College of Design

One of the goals of DFA Team Captains is to create an environment that values empathy and inclusion and leverages them to promote effective team communication and community collaborations.

Here are 3 key areas of focus and sample exercises to use with your teams to get you started. Remember, it is a Journey.

DFA Team Captains can help team members to:

Connect their own interest and objectives with project issues and partner organizations, helping members to discover and develop their individual voices as socially responsible designers. (Self)

Create interdisciplinary and culturally diverse teams to bring new perspectives to a problem: creating an environment that allows members to work collaboratively with different disciplines, knowledge bases and points of view is critical. Strive to include team members that reflect the diversity of the community you will be working in. (Teams)

Explore the cultural, social, political, and economic factors and assumptions that will inform their working collaborations and provide members with awareness of and skills in cultural diversity and the value of inclusion. (Community)

Performance Testing
(adapted from Design Improv, Nathan Waterhouse)
Acting + Evaluating:

Improv can be a fun informative way to work out ideas, visualize concepts, and communicate solutions. It allows teams to empathize, by stepping into the shoes of users. It can reveal how people interact with services, products, and each other on a physical, emotional and intuitive level.

Here are 3 stages of the design process where performance/theater can be useful in the development of interactive systems:

Supporting the exploration of new ideas.
Helping to communicate concepts.
Supporting testing of ideas.

Here is an example of how to use theater/improvisation with your teams.

Performance Testing
Flow: Using an existing scenario test how users interact with products or services. Set the stage/location, decide where everything should be. Assign roles and relationships based on personas and research. If you are testing a scenario, take it in slices. As soon as it starts to break down, the audience must call bug! Iterate the scene, changing the variables as you do. Change relationships the Who, Where, and Why.

Suggestions: Use this with potential users to test the experience of a device or service. Assess and record findings. Performance Testing can be done on the road ,or in the studio. Film the process/performance to capture and evaluate.

Here is some of the feedback we received:

Design Empathy Workshop:
" The workshop illuminated a critical part of the DFA experience and process-the idea of empathy, inclusion, and connection. These concepts are crucial and complex and are often unarticulated. Today's session successfully got us thinking about connection and social dynamics in the way we work in our studio on campus and in communities."

"The exercises were great! I can't wait to do the activities I learned today with fellow DfA members this fall."

"The activities we did today will help our studio respectfully and effectively seek out resources in our community to make projects that solve real human issues

Performance Testing Workshop:
"The workshop helped us visualize the scenarios from the perspective of the potential users and stakeholders."

"Forcing us to step into the simulation of our project showed some of inefficiencies in our designs."

"The persona exercise helped us delve into the spoken and unspoken mindset of our users: their needs,motives and their environments. It was easier to pull back the layers of certain stakeholders. Could more easily get to the core of what they were saying...what they mean."

Personas In the 3rd Person and IxDA

2011-07-07T05:51:00.000-07:00

DD+D posted the following question on the Interaction Design Association (IxDA) site.
It has had over 60 replies and 1,918 views.

Here is the question, followed by a link to all the interesting responses.

First-person personas are more engaging, and by mimicking tone patterns, grammar usage and other linguistic characteristics that may be possessed by the persona would result in the ability to communicate more with less writing.

Rarely have I come across a persona written from the first-person perspective. I’m wondering if there are reasons for this discrepancy, or is it strictly due to design history/protocol?

Replies here -
http://www.ixda.org/node/30277#comment-82498

Campbell Soup spotlights DD+D in blog

2011-06-17T16:33:00.000-07:00

DD+D's Project Bodystorming was featured in Campbell Soup Companies Diversity and Inclusion blog Inclusion to Innovation.

Inclusion to Innovation -a way of being in the world-is a community leveraging individual differences and commonalities for business innovation.

Please find the link here http://www.inclusiontoinnovation.com/2011/06/bodystorming-improv-inclusion.html

Originally posted by Kevin Carter -Director, Diversity & Inclusion, the Campbell Soup Company and Chairperson, the Society of Human Resources Management (SHRM) Diversity Standards Taskforce Diversity Metrics Workgroup.

Bodystorming:Improv+Incusion+Innovation at DePaul University

2011-06-03T12:40:00.000-07:00

Byron will presenting, Bodystorming: Improv + Inclusion + Innovation for...

DePaul University Continuing and Professional Education in collaboration with Millennia Consulting presents

Catalysts for Innovation

A one-day symposium addressing facilitation innovation in teamwork, technology & creativity

June 10, 2011

We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them. -Albert Einstein

Around the world we are faced with many new issues that demand a different way of thinking. Our political paradigm is in a stage of disruption. Our economy is adrift in a sea of uncertainty. Technology is providing new avenues for social connections. Society yearns for a way to find wholeness within its diversity.

One key to the future is to advance our level of innovation in all arenas—business solutions, educational approaches, technology advances, societal issues, and political processes. In the past, we waited for the single imaginative leader to offer breakthroughs in our thinking.

Today, we look to the team. There is great power in the group if we can unleash and harness the creativity that resides within in it. Therefore, one key leadership skill to solving today’s problems is facilitation: the means to release the latent power and potential of every individual in the group and to capture the collective wisdom to solve the issues that face us.

Join and network with experienced group process facilitators in a one-day Symposium hosted by DePaul University Continuing and Professional Education. Learn new approaches that will help you increase your capacity to serve as a catalyst for innovation with your teams, organizations and communities.

Millennia Consulting, the organizing sponsor, invites you to participate in the upcoming DePaul University Continuing and Professional Education one-day Facilitation Symposium, June 10, 2011.

Who Should Attend
This symposium is designed for facilitators, team leaders,
consultants, leaders, project managers and anyone that wants
to learn more about group facilitation.

How You Will Benefit
• Learn new facilitation approaches
• Increase your capacity as a facilitator
• Be a catalyst for innovation
• Improve your group’s creativity
• Advance innovation within your team, organization
and community

Program Details
Friday, June 10, 2011
8:15 a.m.–4:30 p.m.
Cost: $115 (early bird price until May 10)

Contact Information
Janie Rollinson
(312) 362-5792
jrollin1@depaul.edu
cpe.depaul.edu/facilitate

Symposium Sessions:
• Bodystorming: Improv + Inclusion + Innovation
• Decision Cost Analysis: An Innovative Way to Calculate the
Benefit of Facilitation
• Exploring Mental Models for Breakthrough Collaboration
• Facilitating Change and Innovation—How to Enable Innovation
• Facilitating Knowledge Sharing in Organizations
• Focused Conversation—A Framework for Collaborative Innovation
• From Workplace to Playspace: Facilitating the Mindset Shift
for Innovation and High Engagement
• Innovating Facilitation with Multiple Intelligences
• Innovative Virtual Innovation Techniques Using Inexpensive
Collaboration 2.0 Tools
• Seeing & Doing: Enabling and Engaging Your Groups with
Visual & Kinesthetic Tools
• The Vincentian Question (What Must Be Done?) as Catalyst
for Change
• Using Facilitation to get Unstuck to Inspire Innovation

Workshop Description:Bodystorming: Improv + Inclusion + Innovation.

Bodystorming is a method of problem identification and solving in which teams translate ideas and opportunities into physical experiences which they explore through improvisation and role-play. Bodystorming uses a design brief, props and simple costumes to give a sense of place. The process is designed to uncover how the relationships between people, locations, and things affect ideas in ways that brainstorming alone cannot. It enables empathy and rapid iteration of ideas and relationships through a dynamic process of acting and evaluating. The process reveals how people interact with services, products, and each other on a physical, emotional and intuitive level. Participants will learn how facilitating a bodystorming session can foster an inclusive, innovative environment and bring value to an organization.

To register and for more info:

DePaul registration site;

Millenna Consulting;

Is Humanitarian Design the New Imperialism?

2011-05-19T08:40:00.000-07:00

Does our desire to help do more harm than good?

Fast Company July 10th. 2010

In prep for leading a session titled "Getting out of Your Comfort Zone" for Design For America's summer session I found this useful and informative.

Emily Pilloton's Design Revolution Road Show, the physical embodiment of her non-profit Project H Design rolled into New York a few weeks ago stopping at Metropolis, the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum and ICFF. Yes, Project H is hot in U.S. and European design circles, almost as sizzling as IDEO, the Acumen Fund, and One Laptop Per Child.
And why not? Emily’s Project H is a pure play in using design to do good. It doesn’t get better than this mission statement:

Project H Design connects the power of design to the people who need it most, and the places where it can make a real and lasting difference. We are a team of designers, architects, and builders engaging locally through partnerships with social service organizations, communities, and schools to improve the quality of life for the socially overlooked. Our five-tenet design process (There is no design without action; We design WITH, not FOR; We document, share and measure; We start locally and scale globally, We design systems, not stuff) results in simple and effective design solutions for those without access to creative capital. Our scalable long-term initiatives focus on improving environments, services, products, and experiences for youth and K-12 education institutions in the U.S. through systems-level design thinking and deep community engagements. WE BELIEVE DESIGN CAN CHANGE THE WORLD.

So do I. But whose design? Which solutions? What problems?

One of Project H's initiatives was to redesign the Hippo Roller, a water transportation device.

Let me explain. The last time I saw Emily was in Singapore in the fall at the ICSID World Design Congress where she was receiving a roaring applause from the European and American designers on stage after giving a speech about Project H. I loved that speech because it linked the power of design to the obligation to do good. In a world awash in consumption, with many designers complicit in designing that consumption, Emily’s message was right on.

But not to the mostly Asian designer audience. Of course there was polite applause but, to my surprise, there was also a lot of loud grumbling against Emily along the lines of "What makes her think she can just come in and solve our problems?” This was a challenge of presumption that just stopped me cold--and sent me back to my Peace Corps days when I heard a lot about Western cultural imperialism from my Filipino friends. Are designers helping the "Little Brown Brothers?" Are designers the new anthropologists or missionaries, come to poke into village life, "understand" it and make it better--their "modern" way?

Naw. I dismissed the rumblings in the audience against Emily and Project H as insignificant. After all, what were those Asian designers doing for their own poor people in villages and towns in India, the Philippines, and China?

Then, some months later at Parsons School for Design, the same thing happened. I went to a talk by IDIOM Design, one of India’s top design consultancies.

Might Indian, Brazilian and African designers have important design lessons to teach Western designers?

At the end of a great presentation, a 20-something woman from the Acumen Fund rushed to the front and said in the proudest, most optimistic, breathless way that Acumen was teaming up with IDEO and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to design better ways of delivering safe drinking water to Indian villagers. She said this to the Indian businessman Kishoreji Biyani, who is the key investor in IDIOM, and to my stunned surprise--and hers--he groused that there was a better, Indian way of solving the problem. She didn't know what to say. And I didn't either.

I know the Acumen and IDEO people and they, like Emily, are the very best. I know the IDIOM folks and they, too, are the very best. And I have met Mr. Biyani in India and he is an amazing businessman. But he, too, like many in the Asian audience in Singapore, took offense at Western design intervention in his country.

So what’s going on? Did what I see in these two occasions represent something wider and deeper? Is the new humanitarian design coming out of the U.S. and Europe being perceived through post-colonial eyes as colonialism? Are the American and European designers presuming too much in their attempt to do good?

As I pondered this, I remembered the contretemps over One Laptop Per Child, an incredibly ambitious project sponsored by all the good guys--the MIT Media Lab, Pentagram, Continuum, fuseproject.

The OLPC XO-3, a touchscreen pad device, is planned to debut in 2012

Again, I know most of the players and they are good souls. The laptop itself is wonderful, with a beautiful shape and unique interface. Yet, OLPC failed in its initial plan to drop millions of inexpensive computers into villages, to hook kids directly to the Web and, in effect, get them to educate themselves. The Indian establishment locked OLPC out precisely because it perceived the effort as inappropriate technological colonialism that cut out those responsible for education in the country—policymakers, teachers, curriculum builders, parents. OLPC never got into China either. Or most of the large nations it had originally targeted.

So where are we with humanitarian design? I know almost all of my Gen Y students want to do it because their value system is into doing good globally. Young designers in consultancies and corporations want to do humanitarian design for the same reason.

But should we take a moment now that the movement is gathering speed to ask whether or not American and European designers are collaborating with the right partners, learning from the best local people, and being as sensitive as they might to the colonial legacies of the countries they want to do good in. Do designers need to better see themselves through the eyes of the local professional and business classes who believe their countries are rising as the U.S. and Europe fall and wonder who, in the end, has the right answers? Might Indian, Brazilian and African designers have important design lessons to teach Western designers?

And finally, one last question: why are we only doing humanitarian design in Asia and Africa and not Native American reservations or rural areas, where standards of education, water and health match the very worst overseas?

Bruce Nussbaum blogs, tweets and writes on innovation, design thinking and creativity. The former assistant managing editor for Business Week is a Professor of Innovation.

The Columbia College Project- Scenarios+Theatre

2011-04-26T15:41:00.000-07:00

The Columbia College Project – using theatre/improve to visualize, and empathize with users prior to scenario development
Byron Stewart, Raphael D’Amico, Kevin Henry

Theatre and improvisation techniques have been used at various stages of the design process with much success (Sato and Salvador 1999) (Howard and Carroll 2002). Research has shown that theatre and improv help to create better, more evocative models of the world, which leads to a better foundation for idea generation. Instead of just coldly describing, designers can step into the shoes of – to embody – the user. Many idea generation techniques suffer from two problems: they aren’t connected to research; the ideas are vague and not concrete enough to build off/evaluate. Using theatre/improv techniques can address these two issues. Ideas become more connected to research because designers spend time embodying the user before they begin idea generation, which grounds them in the user’s reality. This is more fun and perhaps more natural than more structured techniques. For example, imagine making a grid where each row is a persona and each column is an ‘insight’ from research, and grinding out ideas for each interaction. You end up with pretty huge matrices when you do that, which can suck the energy out of the room. Instead of being the drudgery of filling out matrices, the process becomes the joy of discovery. Ideas become more concrete because you are forced to act them out. Prototyping doesn’t get quicker and cheaper than that. In design, there is a core cycle of generate ideas> evaluate ideas> generate more ideas etc...

Acting out makes that cycle richer because ideas go from abstract to more concrete.

DD+D’s goal for the Columbia College Project was to bring theatre/improv techniques to a Digital Presentation class of 11 second and third year product design students. We wanted to show that using theatre/improv techniques in the development of scenarios would help students empathize with and visualize potential users. That it would help to bring their research to life and allow the students to step into the shoes of key stakeholders they were designing for. Building on the past experiences of Howard and Carroll and others, we developed a theatre-based curriculum for a four hour pilot class.

The students were given a fictional design brief. Their assignment was to produce a final video presentation based on the needs of their fictional client.

The students were to use the theatre-based class as a problem finding session rather than a problem solving session. Students were to work collaboratively to define parameters, brainstorm, act out, develop specific user profiles, situations or scenarios, and work through potential problems as a discovery process. The first round of the assigned scenarios would be developed out of this process and then progressively refined over the remainder of the semester. Our focus would be on the students creating a very detailed and compelling (but short – 3-5 minute) video/scenario by the end of the semester that might encompass the problem and solution or focus only on the solution(s). DD+D was commissioned to facilitate one four-hour class for this project However, DD+D and its partner would attend and participate in the majority of classes during the project.

DD+D partnered with a Master of Design student from the Institute of Design IIT (ID/IIT) to create the curriculum for the class and to co-facilitate the class with DD+D and the class instructor. DD+D has a history of applying theatre in various disciples including design. DD+D wanted to bring in a partner with a background primarily in design and with a passion for theatre to combine both sets of knowledge to create the curriculum for this class. We wanted to show students that these techniques work and that designers have used them successfully.

This paper reviews the curriculum and outcomes of the class project.

The student’s design brief stated:
The age at which younger users acquire their first mobile devices continues to drop for a variety of reasons- many of which are connected. Tweens are asking for devices sooner because they see their older siblings and parents using them all the time. Parents also increasingly see advantages to having their children be ‘connected’ especially in urban environments. Parents see the technology as a kind of introduction- a rite of passage. They personally want to introduce it to their children as a learning and trust building opportunity while seeing the direct benefits for helping them navigate complex urban lives. The reality is that some tweens will be ready and many will not be, resulting in lost phones, high bills, and irresponsibility.

The Schaumburg-based company Motorola is interested in exploring this emerging market niche to develop use-scenarios that would help steer them in the right direction should they decide to develop a possible ‘tween’ phone. The company is interested in the perspective of all the potential stakeholders (child, parent, teacher, care provider) and finds it challenging to envision the rich opportunities of such a device. For this reason the design managers at Motorola are seeking creative ideas (scenarios) to help visualize (envision) existing problems (problem finding) related to all stakeholders as well as the potential opportunities (problem solving) for this potentially rich market. What they need for their team of designers, engineers, and programmers is compelling visualizations that help define the various personas, problems, and opportunities specifically in diverse urban markets.

The Curriculum
The Project Introduction Class

The students were given an overview of their final assignment for the semester, not including the design brief, by their instructor. They were shown a video example of a similar project produced by Allen Cooper of Cooper’s Product Design and Strategy Inc., their Stratus Air project. There was then an introduction to DD+D and how we’ve used theatre to help designers visualize, ideate around, and empathize with users, and that we would be working with them on this project. They were also shown a portion of a Bodystorming video that DD+D facilitated for a corporate client.

This introduction to the project was 20mins. in length and happened a week prior to the four hour class. What follows is a description of the four hour class.

PART ONE: Re-introductions and Context

At the top of the class. the design student from ID/IIT shared his background as a designer who discovered the benefits of improv in his work. DD+D’s focus in the Intro class was from a theatre to design perceptive. The ID student’s intro was from a design to theatre perspective, representing the point of view of students in the class. After the ID student’s intro we reviewed the agenda for the class. We then showed the final video from the Chicago Service Jam, in which both the facilitators and the class instructor had participated. The service design Jam brought together various types of designers to work on a service design solution based on a global theme. The designers, at the Jam, had 48hrs. to complete this task. Theatre/improv exercises were used to prepare teams for brainstorming (Gerber 2009) and as a prototyping method during the Jam. We wanted to show the students that theatre/improv can be an effective tool when time is a constraint. And to reinforce that professional designers use the techniques. The students had the two months remaining in the semester to complete this class assignment.
Next, we introduced a theatre+design timeline with examples of how these techniques have been used over the years by designers, clients and users to achieve deeper understanding of design problems and solutions. We wanted to show the history of this work, to place it in the historical context of the design field, and to encourage students to do follow-up reading on the research of the past. Different key examples were pointed out from the timeline. (One of the examples given was Patricia Moore’s work in immersion.) We also covered the changes in the design field of late, looking at the trend from product to interaction to service and how this trend requires new prototyping methods including theatre.

PART TWO: Getting In Touch with People (and Problems)

In preparation for the class students were given the above design brief, broken into teams and asked to do primary and secondary research on the stakeholders described in the brief. They were to bring in their research in the form of personas. In class, each team had five minutes to report back their findings and present their personas. The goal was to develop an initial sense of key stakeholders, identify high level insights and problem areas. The students were coached by the facilitators and their instructor to flesh-out their persona’s motivations, biographical details and context as they reported. As the teams reported back, the main insights from their data were captured on whiteboards. Their insights were depicted through drawings, sketches, and words allowing students to visualize all their findings as a group. Patterns in the findings were discussed and highlighted through the drawings.

PART THREE: Stepping Into Their Shoes

We then rearranged the classroom to allow space for movement and acting. The goal of this section of the class was to help the students start to embody and empathize with key stakeholders, and to lower their inhibitions. Students were taken through a series of warm-up exercises that actors use to prepare their minds and bodies for acting. We then moved to theatre–based embodiment exercises to help the students to put the emotion of their personas in their bodies in prep for the scene work to come. The first scenes that were performed revolved around problem situations similar to the ones identified in their research. They were also coached during the scenes; asked about their character’s behavior, motivations, and feelings in the moment, all in an attempt to establish a deeper empathy and understanding of the characters and the context.

PART FOUR: The Scene

Students were then broken into two groups to brainstorm and write a day in the life scenario that they would then play back in a five minute scene. The goal was to use the perspectives of their personas to write a scene that captured the communication breakdowns and opportunities that Motorola could address. Once an idea was chosen, each student was to pick a key stakeholder to embody during the scene development process. Facilitators were to help students pick and stick with these choices. One student would be the narrator, to help glue the scene together and tell the story.

PART FIVE: Curtain Up!

Students performed their scenarios, and critique/class discussion followed including next steps. Students were asked to reflect on the experience as they worked on their assigned scenarios for the next class.

Results

Will be coming sooon!

Chicago Service Jam'11 Final Video Presentation

2011-03-20T07:54:00.000-07:00

Chicago Service Jam 2011 Submission - Swoop from Jennifer Wittman on Vimeo.

Description: Swoop! a service platform empowering people to better their communities one deed at a time. People would like to contribute to the community but often can’t commit to a set schedule. The Swoop! platform allows community members to identify and address local challenges,engages members of the community to solve those challenges, and reap the rewards. Using either their smart phone or home computer, Swoop! users can record social ills such as,trash in the neighborhood, graffiti or snow build up. These needs are posted as ‘missions’ for other members of the community to tackle. Each mission is assigned a point value based on the urgency. Missions can grow in urgency as other people also mark them as an issue. People can then accept the mission, complete the task, and win the points. Points are used toward acquiring community awards like neighborhood beautification, school improvements, or additional resources. Swoop! helps people work together to create super communities The Swoop! ecosystem and photos from the process can be found on our site at http://www.chicagoservicejam.org/

Chicago Service Jam '11

2011-03-05T09:32:00.000-08:00

On Friday March 11th, people in nearly 50 cities around the world will be getting together over 48 hours for the first Global Service Jam. Working with a shared theme, we will design and rapid-prototype services. It will be a chance to learn more about service design and service design techniques… by ‘doing’. We’ll be uploading the results onto Global Service Design HQ Hub… and all the designs will be presented to the world!

The Chicago Service Design Jam Host Byron Stewart invites Chicago area non-profits, designers, creatives, entrepreneurs, academics, and students to participate in the global experience at Conifer Research. Come work with and learn from our amazing Team of Design Coaches.

Scholarships available!

Tickets are going fast Please registar TODAY!

The Details:
Dates: Friday, March 11th through Sunday, March 13th.Time: Starting 5:30pm Friday, March 11th. until 4:00pm Sunday March 13th.Host Location: Conifer Research 67 East Madison Street Suite 1900 Chicago, Illinois 60603

http://www.chicagoservicejam.org/

http://www.globalservicejam.org/

Service Design Thinking for Non-profits

2011-02-19T12:56:00.001-08:00

DD+D invites non-profit professionals to attend a free Service Design Thinking (SDT) workshop at the IIT Institute of Design. SDT is an innovative tool to improve client outcomes, enhance employee satisfaction, and increase program impact. To learn more
http://www.dramaticdiversity.com/images/Promo.pdf

This event is one of the offerings of the Chicago Service Jam '11 For more info on the Jam http://www.chicagoservicejam.org/

Improv and Embodied Personas at IxDA Event

2011-01-29T07:12:00.000-08:00

Byron had the opportunity to collaborate with Ed Chen on a design challenge for the January IxDA event. Byron added improv exercises to aid in brainstorming and played a Embodied Persona/Spark.

Here is a description on the event and design results!
(Originally posted on Ed Chen's Design Intentions blog)

January IxDA Chicago Meeting Recap

Event Description

Natural disasters are disruptive: physically, socially and psychologically. Governments and NGOs devote significant resources to provide basic needs such as food and shelter but little to facilitate social development and psychological recovery. In underdeveloped nations, the results can be devastating. The poor are further marginalized and psychological scars can have deep, long-lasting implications.

At this meeting, we explored in multidisciplinary teams the survivor experience and search for ways to improve the delivery of social and psychological aid services in the 6 month to 3 year time frame after a disaster. We were not there to redesign government preparedness or the NGO model, but to supplement their work with considerations for a more humane response that helps the affected move from victim to survivor status. We presented an overview of the situation in Chile and divide IxDA members into small teams. Each team tackled a different issue such as displaced elder care, psychological aid for children, information systems for social learning, and the reestablishment of community identity.

This was a great opportunity to contribute to a social response project while collaborating with your counterparts in other disciplines.

Meeting Agenda
6:00 Arrive, mix and mingle

6:30 IxDA welcome and introduction

6:35 Presentation: design context

6:45 Improv (warmup) exercises

7:00 Brainstorming sessions

7:30 Presentation of results

7:50 Debrief

8:00 Meeting adjourned

Design Context
About every 25 years, an earthquake of magnitude 8.0 or greater hits Chile. Since the 1960 Valdivia quake, building codes have improved, but has preparedness?

While improvements to buildings and infrastructure minimized the loss of life, the 2010 quake still severely damaged 500,000 buildings and displaced over 2 million people. Hospitals in the immediate vicinity were crippled. Civic activities were cancelled. The school year was put on hold.

Heroic Stage: In the immediate aftermath, victims experienced intense emotions and behaved altruistically. While the media sensationalized riots and lawlessness, it was far more common to see people helping each other. Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) set up tents to provide temporary shelter.

Honeymoon Stage: Over the next few months, these are replaced by slightly more permanent quick build shelters. Things seemed to improve as promises of aid provided hope that lives and neighborhoods would be rebuilt.

Disillusionment Stage: When aid proves insufficient, cramped, temporary shelters become more permanent. Hopes for recovery diminish.

Reconstruction Stage: Real reconstruction begins when people rely on existing community resources rather than foreign aid.

These post-disaster stages map to Maslow’s Heirarchy of Needs. Maslow believed that a person needed to fulfill lower level needs before moving onto higher level needs. Ultimately, people seek self-actualization but few attain that level of fulfillment. In the first week after a disaster, people seek physiological fulfillment: first aid, food and shelter; then safety to secure their immediate environment. These map back to the Heroic Stage. While governments and NGOs often address physiological and safety needs, they rarely address the socioeconomic and psychological needs that allow a person to move up the pyramid.

How can the Chilean community economically address love/belonging, esteem and self-actualization needs in the 6 month to 3 year timeframe?

Improv Exercises
Byron led the group through 3 improv exercises that helped reinforce the rules of brainstorming: renaming things in the room, passing a metaphor ball, and collectively saying the alphabet without simultaneity.

Brainstorming Rules

1. Defer judgment -There are no bad ideas at this point. There will be plenty of time to judge ideas later.

2. Encourage wild ideas - It’s the wild ideas that often provide the breakthroughs. It is always easy to bring ideas down to earth later!

3. Build on the ideas of others -Think in terms of ‘and’ rather than ‘but.’ If you dislike someone’s idea, challenge yourself to build on it and make it better.

4. Stay focused on topic - You get better output if everyone is disciplined.

5. Be visual - Try to engage the left and the right side of the brain.

6. One conversation at a time - Allow ideas to be heard and built upon.

7. Go for quantity - Set an outrageous goal for number of ideas and surpass it! Remember there is no need to make a lengthy case for your idea since no one is judging. Ideas should flow quickly.

Design Briefs

Four teams were given one of two possible design briefs:
1. Children
Challenge: Considering the social and psychological touch points for children, how can we design a an experience that: a) establishes a psychological sense of safety and support, b) encourages acceptance/dialogue of what has happened, and c) facilitates positive meaning making?
Situation: Over half of those affected in the 2010 quake are children. Parents and guardians are injured or killed, disrupting family routines. School is cancelled until temporary schools are built or children can be assigned to other schools. Social networks are fractured as children no longer see the familiar faces that they rely on to talk through their problems. Relocations and temporary classrooms create new stressors. Friends move to other schools. Children act out. Teachers must reconcile inconsistent curriculum between school districts. Some teachers whose homes were destroyed choose to relocate. Adults are too stressed from logistical, social, and financial burdens to attend to children’s emotional needs.

Children often lose verbal skills after a traumatic event. Once a sense of safety is established through environment and routines, primary activities such as drawing, clay modeling, and acting are access points to empathy.

Positive meaning making refers to the process of accepting what has happened and looking forward rather than dwelling on the past. Moving from victim to survivor status requires processing. Part of that is memorialization. Most of it is working towards a future that’s brighter. Creating opportunities for children to participate in the community and the rebuilding process is a positive step.

This quote from an elementary school teacher (after a different disaster) provides a good summary of the post-traumatic recovery process in children across cultures:

Post-Katrina, I worked with kindergarten and fifth grade students. Art turned out to be one of the most beneficial aids in addressing and even diagnosing PTSD in children. Crayons, markers, paints, finger paints, and even creating clay sculptures of jewelry all helped. In some cases, the jewelry was sold and proceeds went to developing a playground. Since so many schools lost their play equipment, just having outdoor play equipment (or not having it) impacted the children and their behaviors tremendously.

Acting/drama/singing was another tool that proved useful. At first, it was serious stuff dealing with the storm. Later, acting became their outlet to relieve stress and help others understand their personal views and emotions.

Free writing and topical writing helped children address issues they were facing (such as living in FEMA trailers) or dig deeper into issues that were important to them.

Children like to feel like they are a part of the recovery process and are making a difference. We did things like toy and clothes drives for students who lost everything. In some cases the kids who lost a lot of “stuff” still wanted to share what they had with friends who lost more.
Any sense of normalcy is also helpful. They liked special treatment and privileges, visits from dignitaries and media, but one thing that almost all of the children said they really liked about school was that it was predictable, familiar, and had a sense of normalcy. Some students said that their favorite times were those spent at school because they could forget about living in a FEMA trailer (with eight other people) and about what had happened.

2. Community Rebuilding / Social Learning
Challenge: Considering the technology limitations of developing nations, create an information platform and system of incentives to: a) communicate and demonstrate a commitment to rebuilding the neighborhood, b) pool resources and exchange local goods and services, and c) support a sense of community.

Situation: After the earthquake, the Chilean government and NGOs stepped in to provide tents, then more intermediate-term shelters while reconstruction was to take place. Case history tells us that funds are limited and reconstruction of civic spaces and infrastructure will take place, but those directly affected will likely be stuck in these shacks until they themselves raise the funds to rebuild, leaving the middle class with a new, lower standard of living.

Community resources exist in the form of experienced labor, contractors, salvaged materials, and pooled donations from NGOs but there is no effective way of communicating individual, family or small group needs and resources and matching them with other needs and resources in the broader community. In addition, the disaster has created opportunities for fraud: not all builders will honor their contracts or use appropriate materials.

In Santiago, the internet is widely available. However, many of the affected regions are more rural and rely on radio and television for information. Regular cell phones are ubiquitous and smart phone adoption is rapidly growing but currently limited.

This quote from an interview of a Katrina survivor summarizes the feelings that people have (across cultures) in the aftermath of a disaster:

When we returned, there was NOTHING normal. Mornings were spent waiting in line (usually two hours) for our daily rations of MREs and ice. Many spent the days standing in lines, trying to figure out how to get money, compensation, weed through the red tape, and to have SOMEONE, SOMEWHERE tell them it would be ok. Afternoons were spent trying to clean, repair, and get back to normal. There was no tv when we got home. The lines were knocked down. There was no internet or land lines. The air was still very still, thick with mosquitoes and nothing else. We had electricity and plumbing, though many still did not.

Schools started to reopen, but teachers were not back yet. I decided to take a job teaching (though uncertified).Money was tight. Everyone had to pay out of pocket for evacuation, no one knew when we would be compensated, how we were all going to get everything fixed, and if life would ever be normal.

There was, however, a good in all of this. EVERYONE was friendly to each other. It was amazing. Strangers were helpful, friendly, people CARED. It was like this disaster brought us all together as a community in an US AGAINST THE WORLD mentality. The donations started pouring in, and things started looking more promising.

Sparks - Embodied Persaonas
Two sparks (embodied personas) walked around to each of the teams to mix up the conversation. One was a local community leader that asked teams to consider the cultural context for which they were designing. The other was a CFO of an NGO that wants cost-effective solutions.
Feedback on the sparks: While useful, this could have been information included within the case itself. Given the 30 minute brainstorming-to-suggestions format, the teams were probably not quite at a stage where new insight was going to help.

Results
The four teams came back with some great suggestions and avenues for further investigation.
Team A (Children)

Objective: create a safe place for children to come to every day to help them cope with feelings of transience
1. Community garden that is run and managed by children2. Bakery to teach children vocational skills / make them feel useful3. Bike delivery service for things from the garden and bakery / bike repair service
Other ideas to help children regain verbal skills: storytelling wall/journal, improv troupe (as a distraction), pet therapy, older children mentoring younger ones

Team B (Community Rebuilding / Social Learning)
Objective: Create a central hub for a low-tech information exchange
Find a central location (perhaps an existing church) to serve as a community hub. This hub could connect to other hubs to aggregate information. Set up a bulletin/white board that collects information on name, skills, and needs, with a slot if you want to fill that need. The bulletin board could have a column where people could leave feedback on whether that person fulfilled their obligation. It’s sort of a low-tech Angie’s list. For example, if one person goes to help rebuild a house, they might then need someone to watch the kids. Maybe someone is good at cooking for large groups. There could be that exchange. Maybe the central hubs could be equipped with computers that have internet access to facilitate a service clearinghouse with other hubs and to organize more complex multiple-party exchanges.

Team C (Children)
Objective: Allow children to express themselves through activities, routine, and empowerment.
Organize kids and schedule events for them to help in the reconstruction. Maybe they can paint murals. Maybe they can recycle material from disaster for use in reconstruction. That would serve as a metaphor that memorializes what happened and serves as a building block for the future. By contributing to the rebuilding, they can see the progress in their own communities in parallel with government efforts. In order to get things on a schedule, a community center or church could serve as an organizational hub.

Team D (Community Rebuilding / Social Learning)
Objective: Create a mobile community hub of trailers with seating and a stage where people can exchange information.
The mobile model can be duplicated and moved throughout the week to serve a broader community base. One trailer would have internet access, one would have first aid services, one would have administrative services to help complete paperwork and organize community efforts. In addition, there would be vocational training to help those with limited skills to develop skills to help others. Maybe there’s a concert here each week or some event so that people want to show up.

In terms of incentives, set up a microfinance system where you get small amounts for certain achievements and future loans (for next steps) are conditioned on performance. Given that people may not have computer access, the internet station would provide access to other towns to match needs with resources. Before the internet stations get set up, perhaps someone could make the rounds through various towns to aggregate the information and coordinate a collective relief effort. A major obstacle to this is building trust. How do you know that others will perform their end of the exchange? That’s where the microloans come in: to provide monetary incentives to perform.

DD+D to Host the Chicago Service Jam 2011

2010-12-27T09:45:00.000-08:00

DD+D is very excited to host the Chicago Service Jam as part of the Global Service Jam 2011!

For more info on the Global Service Jam here http://www.globalservicejam.org/
Chicago Jam www.chicagoservicejam.org

A Service Jam is a cooperative gathering of people interested in Service Design (defined below). It is there to encourage experimentation and innovation – participants come together without a team, without a service idea and are given a subject or theme to incorporate in their new-to-the-world service while meeting new people.

The Global Service Jam is a community of Jams taking place internationally over the same weekend. All the Jams share the same starting themes, and publish their local results over a central platform. The theme and constraints for participants in the Global Service Jam will be announced at 5:00PM (local time) on the Friday, and results must be shared by 3:00pm (local time) on the Sunday. In a spirit of experimentation, co-operation and friendly competition, teams will have 48 hours to develop brand new services inspired by a shared theme.

Dates- March 11th. -March 13th. 2011

Location - Conifer Research

Why Participate?
As a participant in the Chicago Service Jam, you will work through a whole design process in one weekend. Whether you are experienced or completely new to the field, you will learn more about service design.

Furthermore:
You will pick up a load of new ideas and work practices. (e.g., personas, scenarios, bodystorming, sketches, paper prototypes, diagrams, and theatre techniques.)

You work in the Non-profit/community based sector and what to explore "Design Thinking".

You will meet a lot of cool people at all levels of experience.
(service designers, UXers', interaction designers, graphic artists, non-profit professionals, customer experience folks, students, professors, businesspeople, anthropologists, customers, hackers and actors)

Your work and ideas will be reviewed by your peers, and presented to the world, where they can be seen by potential customers or employers.

You will design something that may become a real business.

You might get rich and famous.

You will certainly have a blast.

At a Design Jam, the process is just as important as the outcome. How did you get this idea? How did you approach the problem? To allow teams to compare their processes and bounce ideas off each other. Articulating their ideas and getting questions from the audience helps teams to focus, and seeing how other teams have taken completely different steps gets everybody reflecting on the many different ways to explore a problem.

What is Service Design?
Service design is about designing customer centred business models for the service industry. Designing around customer needs, touch points, to create better customer experiences, which in turn differentiate service companies from their competitors to either capture market share or increase profitability, is where the designer focus rather than management consultancy focus comes in.

Service designers may spend a number of hours literally going out and meeting potential customers, using video and other tools to try and understand and capture their current experience, coming back and analysing that for insights by mapping out ideal journeys and experiences through a service, looking at specific opportunities to improve interactions with a company, prototyping new service concepts and then supporting a roll out. Changing a service model may have a number of implications on the organisational structure that need to be addressed, operational changes that need to be implemented, not to mention building a business case for it.

We're looking for Participants, Mentors, Volunteers, and Sponsors for the event.

Registration website www.chicagoservicejam.org

In the meantime, please direct questions to byron@dramaticdiversity.com

Don Norman's Why Design Education Must Change

2010-11-28T16:01:00.000-08:00

Don Norman has written an amazing article titled Why Design Education Must Change for Core 77 design magazine and resource.

Here is an excerpt :

"Fresh eyes can indeed produce insightful results, but the eyes must also be educated and knowledgeable. Designers often lack the requisite understanding. Design schools do not train students about these complex issues, about the interlocking complexities of human and social behavior, about the behavioral sciences, technology, and business. Many designers are woefully ignorant of the deep complexity of social and organizational problems. I have seen designers propose simple solutions to complex problems in education, poverty, crime, and the environment. Sometimes these suggestions win design prizes (the uninformed judge the uninformed). Complex problems are complex systems: there is no simple solution. It is not enough to mean well: one must also have knowledge."

I believe working with nonprofits (pro-bono) is an excellent way for designers to gain some of the missing knowledge Don speaks of. Designers working with community based organisations. Organisations staffed with people who've studied social science, and the behavioral sciences. And who use those skills daily to serve their communities. This exposure, working on multi-disciplinary teams is critical for designers seeking to fill the gap in knowledge.

DD+D's Design Empathy, Design for America, Project H and others' offer opportunities for design professionals and students to make the change in thier education that Don speaks of.

Please find Don's complete article here.

Insight Translation with Marty Gage @ IIT

2010-11-22T15:27:00.000-08:00

Great video on a tricky subject.

Marty Gage at IIT Design Research Conference 2008 from IIT Institute of Design on Vimeo.

Insight Translation: bridging the gap between research and design.
If design is problem solving, then design research is problem seeking.

Expressing these design problems or opportunities in a meaningful and inspirational manner can be the difference between great design thinking and wasted time and money.
Insight translation provides a clear transition from customer meaning to product attributes – focusing team creativity for market success.

This presentation will demonstrate examples of insight translation and provide 4 principles for doing it:

-Meaningful: clearly linked to the research data
-Actionable: the research approach is designed to deliver data that affords translation
-Aspirational: expresses what people wish
-Inspirational: inspires companies to pursue great design and ignites designer intuition

Marty's Bio :For two decades Marty Gage has pioneered participatory design techniques in order to liberate the unspoken desires of user populations. He has established that user involvement at the earliest stages of the development process provides unprecedented insight for designers, engineers and marketers. Using multi-sensory toolkits along with state-of-the-art ethnography, he provides creative fuel for design firms, engineering firms, and corporate design teams internationally.

His intimate experience with creative teams and his understanding of the design process allow him to turn research findings into simple, actionable design criteria and opportunities. His body of work crosses industrial and consumer product categories encompassing subject matter as diverse as weapons systems and baby diapers.

Marty recently merged his design research firm, Rocket Surgery, with lextant Corporation, a user experience consultancy. This merger is the logical extension of a long collaboration with Chris Rockwell, founder and president of lextant. Marty heads the Design Research Practice at lextant.Marty founded Rocket Surgery in 2002, after having co-founded the research firm SonicRim in 1999. Previously he practiced as a member of the research team at Fitch Inc. for 10 years, where he helped to establish Fitch as a leader in design research.

Marty has won numerous design awards and has published widely on design research, including a chapter on participatory design research methods in the book, Human Factors Testing and Evaluation Methods. He has served on the Business Week-sponsored Industrial Design Excellence Awards jury, evaluating the research entries in particular, and is frequently asked to speak at design conferences and schools such as The College of Creative Studies, The Cranbrook Academy, The Ohio State University and The Savannah College of Art & Design. Marty holds his BA in Psychology from Hendrix College and earned his MS in Human Factors Psychology from Wright State University.

Design Empathy at IxDA

2010-11-07T12:55:00.000-08:00

Byron is organizing the November 17th IxDA meeting to showcase design projects developed for Chicago’s non-profit community. Find out who’s involved and sign up to attend at http://www.ixdachicago.org/events/design-empathy-using-design

Local non-profit design organizations including iamEPIC, Design for America, Project H Design will share recent projects and discuss the opportunity for collaborations with IxDA Chicago members.

Come and find out how you can help them help the community.

Project H uses the power of the design process to catalyze communities and public education from within. We are a team of designers and builders engaging in our own backyards to improve the quality of life for all. Our six-tenet design process (There is no design without (critical) action; We design WITH, not FOR; We document, share and measure; We start locally and scale globally, We design systems, not stuff and, We build) results in simple and effective design solutions that empower communities and build collective creative capital. We believe design can change the world.Every project H team partners with an organization in the community to grow a project. The Chicago team has partnered with Broadway Youth Center, a homeless and at risk youth services group located in Lakeview. We are in the process of researching BYC's processes in order to grow a mutually beneficial project for the staff, youth and the community at large. http://projecthdesign.org/

EPIC helps creative professionals and nonprofits join forces, making a bigger impact on the world than either could alone. In regular intervals, we are pairing select teams of “creatives” from the ad/design industries with select nonprofit clients dedicated to education, children and families. During what we call an “8-week creative rally,” each team creates plans, programs, and materials—on a pro-bono basis—that their nonprofit client needs to positively affect the lives of those they serve. http://iamepic.org/

Design for America (DfA), an award-winning national design initiative using design to create local and social impact. Design for America’s vision is to develop a national network of interdisciplinary university students and community collaborators confident in their ability to bring about social impact through design.

http://www.designforamerica.com/

Design Empathy is a new venture of DD+D, that will provide an opportunity for members of the IxDA community to get involved with communityinitiatives in the Chicago area. The venture will be a clearing house, the middle man,theconnection between those that want to get involved and those that are in want ofdesign services.Event is free and open to the public with RSVP. Attendees will need to have a photo ID to show at security on the 3rd floor when they enter.

What Non-profits can learn from Coke

2010-10-13T12:30:00.000-07:00

“We think, if people need something we don’t have to make them want that something.”

Melinda Gates makes a intriguing case for nonprofits taking a cue from corporations such as Coca-Cola, whose plugged-in, global network of marketers and distributors ensures that every remote village wants — and can get — a Coke.
This is the work of the Design + Non-profits collaborations. We have the skills we need to make a difference. Organizations like DfA and, Epic, Project H, and D4G are all doing this work. And LocalD will soon be there to help these collaborations happen.

More soon on LocalD

Take a look and let me know what you think please.

Service Designers - What's their job?

2010-10-10T17:07:00.000-07:00

Here is Dianna Miller's reply to a question regarding finding employment in the Service Design field that I found helpful. What do you think?
(This is from the IxDA discussion board.)

I can answer from the perspective of how I teach service design here at SCAD. First, a couple things to recognize if you're looking for a job in service design in the US:

1. Service Design as a discipline under that name is currently more widely practiced and understood in Europe (especially in the UK) than it is in the US. There are a few contributing factors to this, but suffice to say, this is where many jobs under that title are currently located (other countries are Australia, India, Brazil, and Korea). This is not an exhaustive list.

2. Some of what I will describe as service design may, in fact, be practiced by people on this forum who have job titles other than Service Designer. This depends largely on the nature of the design problem/space they are working in. You may find a job where it would make sense to use service design methods as an interaction or user experience designer.

3. Service design work in traditional service sectors such as hospitality and transportation likely include human-human, as well as computer-human, touchpoints. These sectors already have positions for designers working on brand-as- service experience and they are probably not called service designers. Software-as-a-Service jobs are much more likely to be filled by interaction designers who may adopt and adapt some service design tools (see #2). Healthcare and public services are important sectors where I believe we're more likely to see jobs emerging for service designers who work with a methodology that is distinct from UCD although certainly related to it (see below).

I'll answer the questions in reverse:
What types of projects could a Service Designer participate in?
I'm not sure we *design* services; rather, we design *for* services. Service happens when one person (or group) exchanges value with another person (or group). This exchange (called a touchpoint in SD parlance) can happen online, on the phone, in person...doesn't matter. It can be a provider-consumer, employee-employee, provider-partner exchange, etc. What is important here is that it is between people, even when intermediated by a device. Because it's between people, we can't always predict what the exchange will be and certainly can't control the exchange as designers.
What we *can* do is design the elements, resources, affordances, interventions (call them what you will) that both providers and consumers use to create this value exchange. Service Designers design the facilitating aspects of a service: the service medium, platform, stage (again, call it what you will).

Service designers refer to these elements that we design (or design for) as the five Ps of service design: people, props (a.k.a. product), place, process, partnerships.
Therefore, a group working on the design for a service might produce:
PEOPLE: service scripts, protocols for employees; feedback channels for customers

PROPS: product design or graphic design of the artifacts used by the service

PLACE: architecture or interior design of the service's location(s); interaction design within the virtual environment

PROCESS: workflows (rituals) and workflow affordances between customer and employee, employee and employee, etc.

PARTNERSHIPS: contracts, proposed relationships between partners to improve the value proposition of the service

Many of these elements are outside the range of any one designer's skillset. Which brings us to...
How do you define a service designer in terms of skills and qualifications?

1. service designers are not the subject matter experts of what they are designing. Therefore their value as designers lies in their ability to bring the benefits of their design process to the people who are the experts: these people are the service providers, partners, and service consumers. Service designers therefore must be good design facilitators: they listen, observe well and can mirror, reframe others' ideas and perceptions.

2. The tools of design facilitation are the same as design: it's all about modeling. Service designers have skills in innovative modeling (visual, sensorial representations: 2D, 3D, 4D + enactment) that we use to help Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) and consumers envision and concretize their own ideas, as well as give feedback on the ideas of others. We use concept modeling to experience prototyping to engage service users directly in the design process. It's this ability to facilitate group ideation and viscerally SHOW (not tell about) the impact of the service that aids in holistically managing the complexity of it.

Side note: Since service design is about the relationships between actors in a service system and the cross functional flow of activity between these actors, you'll note that service designers talk a lot about two specific models: the service ecology (a.k.a actor map) and the blueprint (a.k.a in business as a cross-functional flowchart with "swimlanes").

3. Another important aspect is that service designers facilitate this design process among the SMEs by engaging them in co-design activities. In other words, we do user research, but we don't stop there: we actively engage users of the service system in the design process. It's paramount to engage service users in the design process because we are designing for a system, a platform, and NOT, as an end, for targeted users interacting with the designed thing. We solicit and engage the ideas of various stakeholders to understand how they want to interact with each other. We test the elements of the service with them through experience prototyping so we can see how they, as individuals, complete the experience. In this way, we have the chance to see what kinds behaviors/interactions will emerge.
In other words, service designers are prototyping a future to see how people will create value *with each other* once these designed contexts and resources are implemented and available to them.

I'd like to make one point on the subtle, but important distinction between User-Centered Design methodology and a systems-focused methodology like Service Design. Research and design in the UCD process focuses on representative users for whom we design tools, experiences. Service Design is also user-centric and a service project may certainly require UCD tools and methods such as user modeling, but when we're researching for the service system itself, we're looking at the unique perspectives and activities of the various stakeholders in the system to understand the synergies, breakdowns, workflows, influences between them. The resulting design heuristics are then likely to be for the platform, even though the design is ultimately for the benefit of the users.

Retail and DD+D at RTC

2010-10-04T14:28:00.000-07:00

Byron lead DD+D's “Embodied Dramatic Personas and Realistic Scenarios” workshop for the retail planning, product design, communication design, and marketing teams at RTC Friday.

RTC is a global company that helps marketers connect with consumers in the retail medium.
For more info on RTC http://www.rtc.com/rtcind.ns

Here are some comments from the RTC participant Teams:

"I feel it helps to stretch our boundaries when examining shoppers and how they shop and behave."

" Seems really helpful in idea generation, sharing insights, and presenting to clients."

"The presentation was engaging and provided me with some new ideas for incorporating theatre methods into the design process."

" The technique can be used for internal problem solving and process improvement and workshops with clients."

"The technique would help to round out and ask the "what if''s" once shopper data was initially received."

"As a designer/writer I need to become other people to tease out the best way to communicate information to "me". What would effect "me" and cause "me" to act?"

"Very Effective. I didn't see the connection (theatre+design) before coming today, but when Byron broke it down in terms of trust, improvisation, creativity etc.. , I immediately saw the connection."

"I saw this being a great way to run a participatory design workshop during the idea/concept stage. I especially like the "forum"theatre approach."

"This approach might be interesting in presenting research to designers for hand offs or to clients during research storming identifying their needs and showing them their own clients."

Thanks Ann Zimmerman and RTC!

IxDA announces launch LocalD- Service + Design

2010-09-24T17:42:00.000-07:00

Here is a video from our September Interaction Design Association (IxDA) meeting where we announced our launch of IxDA's LocalD (Service & Design Placement) and our collaboration with Northwestern's Design for America program.

Jeff Leitner and Jason Ulaszek also presented "UX for Good".
An interactive workshop where we worked on solutions for Streetwise Magazine.
A magazine sold by Chicago's homeless community.

For more info on UX for Good please see http://www.ux4good.com/

Jeff is dean of The Insight Labs, a pro-bono program that enlists top business and brand strategists to help non-profits and government agencies. The labs themselves are raucous, 3-hour meetings and, beginning in October, digital events to broaden and deepen the best thinking from the live sessions. Jeff is also a partner in Cause Strategy, a senior strategist with Manifest Digital and founder of 10,000 Blankets. He is a former lobbyist, political operative, newspaper reporter, kibbutznik and social worker. Likes: systems thinkers. Dislikes: timidity, olives.

Publicly, Jason is a leader in the user experience practice at Manifest Digital, adjunct faculty at DePaul University and consultant to start-ups and small businesses. Privately, he's a crazed evangelist for interaction design - accosting strangers with sermons on the value of user-centered design in solving business and social problems. He is a former shoe salesman, animal clinic handyman and telemarketer. Likes: great beer, impossible challenges. Dislikes: negativity, olives.

Byron is a local leader for IxDA ,was a participant in one of Jeff"s Insight Labs for the Chicago Sinfonietta and was a Boot Camp presenter for DfA'10.

Byron also performed as a Streetwise vendor "Spark" during the "UX for Good" workshop.Sparks are those people that make you shake your head and say “what was that?!”. They inspire others by the work they’re doing through the way they question the norm and illustrate a different, better future. They are the innovators in their field. And, they like to mix it up.

Service Jam "Service as a Solution"

2010-09-24T16:05:00.000-07:00

Join us October 10th – 12th, 2010, for an important dialogue on "Service as a Solution."
The Service Jam is an online event that will engage non-profit organizations, corporations, academic institutions, and government agencies in a discussion on how social innovation can help solve our world’s largest problems.

By engaging prominent leaders, professionals, and passionate individuals, the Jam aims to generate breakthrough ideas that will redefine service and social innovation. Through IBM’s Jam technology, participants can collaborate virtually and have the flexibility to log into the Jam from anywhere in the world at anytime most convenient to them during the three day event.

Featuring special guests:

George H.W. Bush, 41st President of the U.S.
Ray Chambers, UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for Malaria
Harris Wofford, U.S. Senator, Pennsylvania
Michael Nutter, Mayor, City of Philadelphia
Jean Case, CEO, The Case Foundation
Sam Palmisano, President and CEO, IBM
Marc-Philippe Daubresse, Minister for Youth and Solidarities, France

During the Jam, invited Hosts—distinguished leaders in the social sector—will be leading specific discussion forums, as well as conversing live with participants.There will be 8 discussion forums occurring at the same time. Participants are encouraged to join any forum of their choice at any time during the event.

Following the Jam, IBM in collaboration with key partners will produce a white paper summarizing key findings and highlighting creative ideas to share with participants. This document will reveal key trends in social innovation and will serve as a pragmatic guide to help organizations innovate, design and improve service programs.

Join service leaders from around the globe October 10-12 at 10:00 am US Eastern Standard Time, as we discuss the current and future role of Service as a Solution.

To register and for more info please go here.

Design for America Final Design Solutions

2010-09-14T11:05:00.000-07:00

Byron and Miaoqi are proud to have been included in this summer’s Design for America (DfA) boot camp at Northwestern University’s/Segal Design. And are invigorated by the final Service Design solutions that DfA Fellows developed for their community-based clients.

We’re not talkin’ brochures and websites, but listening to and designing for people’s actual needs! Please find pics. below from our Bodystorming Boot Camp session for Misericordia Homes one of the community based clients.

Socialization on the Underground theatre+FILM+design

2010-09-11T07:56:00.000-07:00

Jennie Olson, faculty advisor for Northwestern University’s/Segal Design's, Design for America (DfA) used this video as an example of prototyping for a DfA Boot Camp session this summer.

It’s a great example of how personas can “come to life” and their stories. Context of use can be explored using theatre (actors/narration) and film (set) to tell engaing stories.

It's an effective and memorable way of explaining design solutions to teams and stakeholders!

UXmatters features DD+D

2010-08-23T21:48:00.000-07:00

Many Thanks to Traci Lepore, who recently joined our team; she featured DD+D in her regular column Dramatic Impact for the UXmatters Newsletter.

Our work with Embodied Dramatic Personas is explored. Our future plans are also highlighted.The article titled, "Personas: Explorations in Developing a Deep and Dimensioned Character"can be found here on this page.

Who I am, and who you are

2010-08-10T06:10:00.000-07:00

Miaoqi Zhu - DePaul University CDM

Meeting Byron in the elevator for the first time was kind of interesting, especially when he told me his background is acting, and he went to IxDA meeting purely due to the motivation of bringing theater to design. I agree there is definitely something that theater can share with the course of design, but in the meanwhile, as he perhaps knows, I am struggling to understand to what extent design needs qualitative or quantitative study, in other words, which one is better in terms of "measuring" the human experience of interacting with an artifact.

After two years of HCI Design training at Indiana University, I came to DePaul to learn traditional research methodologies in the discipline of Psychology; I took statistics classes and studied experimental design techniques such as factorial designs, quasi-experimental designs, and so forth. Afterward, I compared those with the design research methods learned from IU. I suddenly feel like those differences are not simply the “differences” for me, in fact it brings out a question: what kind of direction I want to go in the future. The “Design-oriented” design and “Engineering-oriented” design are still somehow “disconnected'; basically, the former wants to collect data from the very context in which users interact with the artifact, yet the latter ensures the validity of data, which means a formal experiment should be carefully conducted to exclude bias caused by the "noises."

As I continue the conversations with Byron, I steadily realize that sometimes, you may need to look at a thing as the whole rather than looking into one particular pattern, as everything has multiple aspects, and they are dynamically connected. For instance, when fashion designers try to determine the color theme for jeans, they may also consider the material to be used or the lighting effects under a variety of conditions, even the present ethnographic thinking. By the same token, a real user-centered design is the one that includes most of “individual” aspects and offers the best connection among them; it sounds like finding out I.V. and D.V. and testifying their relationships, but once again, a design study welcomes data from rich contexts instead of rigorously-controlled experiments.

Please do not get me wrong! We still need to use certain methods from traditional disciplines to examine the outcomes/products. For example, if you are going to get rid of all the physical buttons in the car and replace them with a touch screen based interface. It is highly valuable to conduct an ethnographic study to understand diverse scenarios, explore users’ behavior patterns afterward and construct personas; however, we cannot simply let interaction designers play own magic all the time, at some point, they may resort to scientists/engineers to ask if the solutions are feasible, or meet with usability specialists/statisticians to conduct long term studies to discover whether there are potential safety issues or not, if so, are they caused by the new features? If so, what are they? Perhaps during the first phrase of concept generation, designers should get these people involved.

We all can be the “scientist,” when we talk about certain phenomena that occur in daily life, we usually begin with the assumption, then enlist some argument and draw own conclusion, that is what scientists do every day; we also can design, when we shop for favorite clothes or decorate own rooms, we are our own users, so please enjoy being a designer. In the meanwhile, we are acting consistently, as we have many profiles, and we just act it out to interact with external world, it happens so naturally that we barely realize it. However, I am just wondering what if we combine those three together, who you will become and how that will impact other people and the society, let us find out soon by the help of Byron!

( Miaoqi is a Ph.D. student from DePaul University CDM, his research interest and projects involve Computer Supported Cooperative Work, Personality and Game Enjoyment, User Interface on small screen device and Ethnography for HCI research. He has worked for AOL, Indiana University, and Whirlpool Corporation. )

Critical Mass - Making Personas more Personable

2010-08-06T06:48:00.000-07:00

DD+D's workshop, Embodied Dramatic Personas and Realistic Scenarios was featured in an article titled “Making Personas More Personable” in Critical Mass’s Experience Matters.
Please have a look and leave your feedback.

-----------------------------------
Making Personas more Personable

Mo Goltz - Critical Mass Chicago
I recently had the opportunity to attend a seminar with the Insight & Planning team to learn about creating authentic personas. The seminar’s focus was around creating personas that are more like real people rather than the flat, somewhat contrived versions that’s aren’t entirely uncommon. Byron Stewart, an actor and co-owner of Dramatic Diversity/DD+D showed us how we can use techniques from the world of theater to create personas.
This may sound strange, but he had some excellent points that hit a nerve with professionals who have been seeing a troubling trend amidst persona design. Many of us are aware of the theoretical value behind personas, but let me take a minute to illustrate how a robust, well-defined persona can make scenarios come alive.

Let’s take a well-known character from the annals of American Pop culture… Homer Simpson. Imagine him walking from the Quickie Mart to Moe’s Tavern in the town of Springfield. Now imagine him using whatever design you’re working on now. No, seriously, stop reading for a second and imagine it.
The point of this little exercise is that since Homer’s character has been so well developed we can actually see him in our mind’s eye with a strong sense of his perspective on the world. Complete with imperfections and personality quirks that you’ve likely observed in various situations throughout the years, it isn’t so difficult to imagine what he might do using your design. Dare I say it could even be fun and helpful?
Love them or hate them, personas are an established way to put more of the user in the user-centered design process. When utilized properly personas get you out of your own head, designing for the target to make their lives easier and make the experience extraordinary. As humans we are inherently biased, and it can be easy to fall into the trap of making design decisions based on our own preferences, opinions, and proclivities. However, depending on the products or service, the actual users may be nothing like you. Choices that would work for you using your own design could just as likely frustrate and confuse your target audience. This may sound obvious but we all see far too many examples of poor user-experience planning in the products, customer service, marketing and packaging we encounter every day. According to the consulting firm Accenture, “almost 95 percent of electronic goods that are returned are not faulty and 68 percent of customers just that they can’t figure out how to use them!” Just think about any TV remote you’ve ever used.
The question then becomes how to make decisions that will satisfy your USER’s needs while providing an enjoyable experience for them. Sounds easy as pie, right? If a high quality persona is developed as a strong character with a specific point of view, using them in your work is like having a representative of your future user base at your beck and call. The persona helps guide you on your design journey.
As a designer committed to user-centered methods, I have noticed a disturbing trend that was voiced by many Planners and Information Architects in the seminar. More and more personas aren’t evolving beyond an abstract, bulleted list of personality traits, preferences, and other assorted details with an associated mug shot of some random person. These personas-esque creations are veering toward the stereotypical, the hollow and the fabricated. They can’t help us see the world from their point of view because they don’t have a point of view. They aren’t real to us–no more real than the androgynous mannequins at American Apparel, at least. To be a useful tool, a persona should be a character that is real enough for you to conjure up in your imagination, one you can ask yourself what he or she would do in a given situation. The personas that often get created aren’t robust enough to help us out in that department. Here is where theater comes in.
As it turns out, theater has a lot in common with design. (No, not just an affinity for skinny jeans.) The overlap is so obvious that it belies the depth of its utility. In theater there are characters in scenes, and in design there are personas in scenarios. In acting, much time and attention is spent on understanding a character’s motivations, their emotions, their wants and needs. If all falls into place, the audience doesn’t see someone pretending, they see a real person come to life. Even those of us (like me) with no acting background can leverage this thinking by augmenting persona development to bring them alive and make them more meaningful.
What if each member of your team ‘owned’ one persona? S/he would be the explicit advocate before any features are added or removed to the persona. This team member would my spend time determining how the target might FEEL about this, and how s/he would react. If the persona is a fleshed out character that you’ve spent days thinking about–comparing to people you know that are similar to her, discovering commonalities that you share, figuring out what s/he wants or feels—s/he would be much more natural and far from arbitrary. Get everyone on your team to know their personas intimately and then showcase them to others. Your personas can even be used in body storming (The act of combining brainstorming with the physical exploration and ideation) to enact likely behaviors.
Using Theater as part of the design process can take persona development from the prescriptive to the realm of descriptive. Your users are more likely to have amazing experiences interacting with your designs if they are more thoroughly and comprehensively considered at every stage of the design process. One of the best ways to accomplish this lofty goal is to create personas that are real to you, to the full team, and to stakeholders. If you chose to add theater-based methods to your design toolkit, Stewart ensures the user will be at the core of what you create.
To view Critical Mass's Experience Matters on-line zine, please go here.

( Mo is an Information Architect Intern in Critical Mass Chicago office this summer. )
For more info on this workshop and others , please contact Byron at byron@dramaticdiversity.com

Design for America Boot Camp & DD+D

2010-08-01T08:11:00.000-07:00

Byron (DD+D) is preparing to lead two Boot Camp sessions for Design for America’s (DfA) Summer Studio fellows at Northwestern University’s Segal Design Institute.

DfA is an award-winning national design initiative using design to make local and social impact.
For more info on DfA : please click here .

Starting tomorrow the fellows of DfA'10 will work for 6 weeks on designing solutions for two clients, the Academy for Global Citizenship and Misericordia, both of Chicago.

The Clients

The Academy for Global Citizenship is a unique Chicago Public Contract School, located on the Southwest side of Chicago. Their mission is to empower all students to positively impact the community and world beyond. For more info of the Academy http://www.agcchicago.org/

Misericordia offers a community of care that maximizes potential for persons with mild to profound developmental disabilities, many of whom are also physically challenged. By serving society’s most vulnerable citizens, Misericordia also serves the families who want the best for them, yet cannot provide it at home. For more info on Misericordia http://www.misericordia.com/

DD+D

Byron will be presenting DD+D's, Embodied Dramatic Personas and Realistic Scenarios, workshop on August 9th followed by a Bodystorming session on August 16th, both during the research phase of the project. The sessions will be conducted at Segal Design Institutes's Ford Design Center, on Northwestern's Evanston campus.

The Fellows

15 Northwestern students both grad and undergraduates from a variety of majors including Anthropology, Industrial, Environmental, and Mechanical Engineering, Psychology, Biology.

The Faculty

14 distinguished Northwestern Segal faculty, design professionals, entrepreneurs, and DD+D members.

The Design Questions,Process,and Solutions

will be coming soon. Please check back to find out how the project is progessing!

For more info on DD+D's workshops please contact Byron at byron@dramatidiversity.com

Hannah Chung's paper accepted to Design and Emotion Conference

2010-07-25T20:25:00.000-07:00

One of our Bodystorming participants - Hannah Chung (Segal Design School, Northwestern University, mechanical engineering '12, Design For America student founder) submitted a paper co-authored by Assistant Professor Liz Gerber, “Emotional-Storyboarding: A Participatory Method for Emotional Designing for Children," that was accepted to the Design and Emotion 2010 conference.

After Chung won the Social Designer competition for her method of developing a storyboard for a children's story, she and Dr. Gerber wrote a case study outlining how to co-design with children to effectively incorporate the emotions to which children most readily relate.

Chung says Professor Gerber “pushed me to explore more about the process that I created, giving me confidence to find the meaning behind it.” Initially, the coloring book was the goal, but the competition was about the design process—not the coloring book itself.

“Through the research and application of the emotional storyboarding process, I realized the importance of using human centered design principles, designing for the users, and incorporating the emotion factor that the users can relate to,” Chung says. “I think these are the keys to deliver a strong story.”

Again, Congratulations! Hannah

DD+D's Dennis will hold Bodystorming sessions in NYC

2010-07-25T15:22:00.000-07:00

If you're in New York please don't miss it!

---------------------------

Innovation Made Physical: Bodystorming with Dennis Schleicher

IxDA NYC is pleased to present two bodystorming workshops with Dennis Schleicher. Bodystorming is a participatory method for demonstrating or developing ideas in a physical setting. Team members will explore ideas and interactions physically, using props such as maps or photos to give a sense of place. Come explore this unique method for bringing innovate ideas to life!

Bodystorming goes beyond brainstorming by giving an idea a physical form and acting it out in different contexts. The process is designed to uncover how the relationships between people, locations and things affect ideas in ways that written scenarios cannot. It enables rapid iteration of ideas and relationships through a dynamic process of acting and evaluating. The process reveals how people interact with services, products and each other on a physical, emotional and intuitive level.

Register Now: http://ixda-nyc-bodystorming.eventbrite.com

WHEN
Saturday, August 7th 2010

WHERE
Workshop 1: 9am - 11am Central Park
Workshop 2: 1pm - 3pm Prospect Park or McCarren Park

PRICE
$15 per workshop
$25 for both workshops
Each workshop is limited to 30 people. Be sure to wear loose clothing for the event.

IMPORTANT!! Particpant slots are limited. So you must have a ticket to attend. Please only RSVP if you know you can attend.

Cancellations: Please email us (nyc.ixda@gmail.com) as soon as you know you cannot use your ticket. We'll release your seat for one of your fellow practitioners and generate good IxD karma for all involved!

ABOUT OUR SPEAKER
Dennis Schleicher is Director, User Experience Architecture at Sears Holdings in Chicago where he builds the teams that build the online brands for Sears Holdings Corporation, mainly Sears.com and Kmart.com. He has worked with American Public University Systems, Ford, Chrysler, General Motors, United States Air Force, Microsoft, Comcast, Dominos, White Castle, Bosch, and Numara.

Dennis uses his background in business and industrial anthropology to design interactive products to support the way people communicate and interact in their everyday and working lives. He is actively involved with the Information Architecture Institute, the ASIST Special Interest Group of Information Architecture, Overlap, and the Interaction Design Association (IxDA).

ABOUT IxDA
IxDA’s mission is to improve the human condition by advancing the discipline of Interaction Design. To do this, we foster a community of people that choose to come together to support this intention. IxDA relies on individual initiative, contribution, sharing and self-organization as the primary means for us to achieve our goals. IxDA comprises over 10,000 members, and many meet at events like this one in over 80 locations worldwide. If you or your friends are based in the suburbs or further from New York, you can find contact information for other local groups on the ixda.org site.

Register Now @ http://ixda-nyc-bodystorming.eventbrite.com , See you there!

Dennis on our Bodystorming session at Sears

http://uxsears.blogspot.com/2010_02_01_archive.html

For more info. on how you can use Bodystorming please contact byron@dramaticdiversity.com

Thinking like a Storyteller

2010-07-25T15:11:00.001-07:00

Cindy Chastain-Thinking Like a Storyteller from Interaction Design Association on Vimeo.

Experience Themes: An Element of Story Applied to Design

Playwrights weave stories around themes. Musicians create thematic concept albums. Even graphic designers envision around themes. So, why not interaction designers?

Designers too often neglect to define a common vision, or coordinating force, behind the scope of what they’re designing, making or building. Without some means of unifying their efforts they can easily end up with a product or service that falls short of its potential for delivering an optimal user experience. One path to holistic coordination is to employ the concept of themes as used by playwrights, fiction writers, and filmmakers. For storytellers, themes are used as a compass, a means of examining every element in the story for its possible implication with regard to theme. For readers, themes offer a cognitive and emotional response to the story that is often much deeper and more memorable than details of plot.

In experience design, themes can be used to:

pattern and unify product solutions
unifying teams,
assisting in the work of defining strategy
helping to design for the intangible pleasure, emotion and meaning in experience.

By aiming to capture the value and focus of the experience designers intend to deliver to users, themes guide in the design process and, by extension, strengthen the impact and meaning of that experience.

Drawing on personal experience, narrative theory and examples ranging from interactive products to film, this presentation is a call to action for designers to equip themselves with a deeper understanding of narrative techniques. It focuses on core aspects such as theme, scene-making, and sequencing to illustrate how thinking like a storyteller can make you a better designer. You’ll also learn how this approach can be a powerful basis for holistic design.

Cindy's bio:
Cindy has been exploring ways to engage an audience through storytelling, teaching, writing and design for over twelve years. Just recently she took on the role of Creative Director, Experience Architecture at Rapp, a global, full-service agency based in NYC. She’s led projects for clients ranging from BBC Worldwide to Showtime, Fuse, Madison Square Garden, Coca-Cola and Unilever.Cindy earned an MFA in screenwriting from Columbia University in New York and a BS in Radio, TV, Film from Northwestern University. In addition to moonlighting as a filmmaker and screenwriter, she is in the process of researching a book that explores how the elements of story can be used as a framework for design. She also coordinates UX Bookclub NYC.

DD+D has a NEW workshop, Embodied Dramatic Personas and Realistic Scenarios. This participatory workshop, most recently presented for Critical Mass's (http://www.criticalmass.com/) Insight and Planning team by Byron, helps persona writers to use theatre techniques to develop their character building and storytelling skills. For more info. please contact byron@dramaticdiversity.com

Refrences:

theuxworkshop.tv , C. Palle

IxDA.org , N. Barday

Byron (DD+D) co-facilitates, The Marshmallow Challenge at the IxDA meeting/summer bash!

2010-07-18T19:17:00.000-07:00

Event date: July 22, 2010 - 7:00pm - 9:00pm;

Location: IDEO Chicago, 626 W Jackson Blvd., Floor 7, Chicago, IL 60661.  

Event description: Come reconnect with your design community peers, commiserate over a summer of crazy clients, share stories, celebrate the sunshine, have a cocktail or two.

We will be doing The Marshmallow Challenge (learn more here: http://www.marshmallowchallenge.com/Welcome.html) with prizes and food. Come for a fun evening with fellow designers and design appreciators!  

Sponsored by IxDA, IDEO and Design Kitchen!
DD+D is a member of IxDA Chicago.  

IDEO - http://www.ideo.com/
IxDA - http://www.ixda.org/

We had eight teams, five people per team, and a lot of fun!
This diverse group of designers, researchers, students, and entrepreneurs had 18 minutes to design the tallest freestanding structure using only spaghetti, string, tape, and ingenuity with a marshmallow on top.

As an entrepreneur, I know the importance of prototyping early, putting that “marshmallow” on top many times before it actually stands freely on a strong foundation. I thought this design exercise would teach the importance of prototyping and would also accomplish some of our IxDA Local Leaders goals.

The Marshmallow Challenge is an activity that required IxDA members to interact in different ways. Often we meet, listen and leave. This was our first attempt at breaking down some of the clicks and getting people meeting and working together on a fun design exercise. Our hope is to eventually introduce the group to community based organizations and their design challenges. IxDA Chicago would take on these design challenges as a way to expose the larger Chicagoland community to design thinking and its possibilities for changing institutions and individuals. We’ve discussed a conference featuring IxDA members as presenters and community based organizations as participants.

This user experience 101 conference would mean exposure to a style of thinking and doing that is much needed by many service based organizations. It’s also a great opportunity for IxDA’ ers to present and use their knowledge for a good cause.

As for our Marshmallow Challenge we didn’t have a winner within the time limit. However, one team was able to complete a freestanding structure minutes after the deadline. We heard explanations/excuses like, “It was gravity” “We started talking and time got away from us” “This can’t be done.”

Teams reported back that they found the Challenge thought provoking, useful and fun.

I suggest this exercise to design and non-design groups interested in team building, design thinking, prototyping , problem-solving and more.

( The Chicago area chapter of the global Interaction Design Association (IxDA) exists to bring together local area designers in all disciplines that overlap with interaction design, whether it be product, digital, space, research, or even business, that strive to create user-centered design solutions. This organization is volunteer-driven and always looking for sponsorship or hosts for upcoming events.If interested, please contact: http://www.chicago-local@ixda.org/ )

Here are some pics from our Challenge at IDEO Chicago...

Aislinn Dewy, Senior Interaction Designer, IDEO and IxDA Local Leader
Byron Stewart, Owner, Design Lead DD+D Co-facilitators of The Marshmallow Challenge

Traci Lepore joins the DD+D/Project Bodystorming Team!

2010-07-06T20:11:00.000-07:00

Traci Lepore is a User Experience Designer that is committed to understanding and spreading insight about the metaphors between UXD and theater that can help derive a more human-centered design process. Traci has almost a decade of UXD experience working across a broad range of enterprise and consumer level applications for high tech, manufacturing and corporate business services industries. She is a skilled researcher and designer who is excited by the challenges of meeting the user needs, business and technical constraints to achieve the best design. Currently she is also a regular columnist for http://www.uxmatters.com/ where her Dramatic Impact: Theater and the Creative Process of Design articles help to articulate her point of view.

Traci is also a long time actress and has performed in such shows as Twelfth Night, Much Ado About Nothing, and Love Letters. It is the experiences she has had as an actress that have led to the insights and passion about the convergence of her two creative disciplines.

Traci holds an M.A. in Theater Education from Emerson College, and a B.S. in Communications Media from Fitchburg State College. Prior to being a UXD she was a graphic designer who worked mostly with marketing collateral development.

New DD+D Workshop!
Byron Stewart and Traci Lepore will present their workshop, Embodied Dramatic Personas and Realistic Scenarios for IxDA Chicago in October. This participatory workshop, most recently presented for Critical Mass's (http://www.criticalmass.com/) Insight and Planning team by Byron, helps persona writers to use theatre techniques to develop their character building and storytelling skills.
For more info. on the workshop please contact byron@dramaticdiversity.com

DD+D's Bodystorming Video @ Sears

2010-03-24T21:29:00.000-07:00

Project Bodystorming from miaoqi Zhu on Vimeo.

Hi, the video of our Bodystorming session at Sears Inc. just came out, hope you like it, and also leave your comments here to let us know what you think!

(for those who are interested in bringing a "storm" to your organization, please refer to this document )

What is Bodystorming?

Explore this unique mentod for bringing innovate ideas to life!

Bodystorming is a participatory method for demonstrating or developing ideas in a physical setting. Team members explore ideas and interactions physically, using props such as maps or photos to give a sense of place. Bodystorming goes beyond brainstorming by giving an idea a physical form and acting it out in different contexts. The process is designed to uncover how the relationships between people, locations and things affect ideas in ways that written scenarios cannot. It enables rapid iteration of ideas and relationships through a dynamic process of acting and evaluating. The process reveals how people interact with services, products and each other on a physical, emotional and intuitive level

Project Bodystorming/DD+D is the name given to Dramatic Diversity’s (www.DramaticDiversity.com) offerings in the various fields of design. DD+D has an innovative approach to helping designers use acting methodology and improvisation to engage in the design process as well as communicate and collaborate around design possibilities. DD+D uses bodystorming, embodied dramatic personas, realistic scenarios, participatory design, and forum theatre techniques to help designers
empathize with users.

For more info. please contact Byron at byron@dramaticdiverstiy.com

Congratulations to Mert!

2010-03-18T23:14:00.000-07:00

Give parents some peace! - a creative design solution from Mert Iseri, a Segal student and one of Northwestern's Design for America pioneers, for being selected as a finalist for Volkswagen's Fun Theory design award.

Mert participated in our first Bodystorming session. He has shown great enthusiasm in using theater techniques to propose user-centered design solutions. Again, Congratulations to Mert , we are very proud of having him as a member of Projectbodystorming!

Pictures during the Storm

2010-03-04T21:20:00.000-08:00

Here we have attached some of the pictures taken during the Storm:

Voices after the Storm

2010-02-26T21:32:00.000-08:00

Hello Bodystomers',

Thank You! for your participation tonight, we really appreciate it.
We hope the event was useful, informative and fun for you.

Please share with the Team, and the group your observations, reactions, predictions of your experience tonight.

Please also follow the Project's blog.

We all want to continue to hear about your use of Bodystorming, theatre+design, and what ever else your doing/thinking... (Pictures will be posted soon!)

Thanks again.

The Team
Byron Stewart
Dennis Schleicher
Miaoqi Zhu

Storm away.............

Pre-Event Exercise for Participants

2010-02-24T10:44:00.000-08:00

Thank you again for signing up for this experience.
We are very excited you have decided to participate!

The following is an exercise that can help you get the most out of this Project.
It isn't mandatory, but will help you.

Please go buy 4 things.

As you go about purchasing these things think about/observe/record;
What the object(s) mean to you;
Who you are buying it for;
Where you're buying it (e.g.,store, machine, street vendor);
Who you're buying it from (salesperson/self-checkout);
What were the steps to buying.

*What to buy:*
1. Buy stamps for mailing your bills, or a monthly transit pass.
2. Buy your kids some pens, pencils, erasers, or notebooks for school, orbuy some needed underwear or socks for your partner or close friend.
3 Buy some of your own favorite music or if you collect things, something that you can add to your collection.
4. Buy some wine or food that you can share with some friends.

These are items which represent 4 shopping ecologies and can help us start to think and feel our way through different kinds of experiences that people can have with buying things.

After you buy each of these things please write a sentence or two down about each experience.You might also take pictures on your phone or/and bring in pictures from magazines ,newspapers the internet.

Please bring your observations with you on Friday.

*Please note: *If you don't have a chance to complete this exercise it's fine.
Your purchasing observations from the past will serve you well.

If you would like to read more about shopping ecologies please go tohttp://argus-acia.com/white_papers/ethnography.html

Thanks again,

The Team

Voices before the Storm

2010-02-20T19:39:00.000-08:00

What do you hope to get out of the upcoming Bodystorming event? Well, we have asked many conformed attendees, and here what they had to say..

"I think the biggest challenge in Design for America ,NU (DFA) is how to bring people to be inspired and feel comfortable while doing design thinking. By attending ProjectBodystorming, I want to learn how the thinking skills that I learn from this event can be applied to our organization."

- Northwestern University, Segal School of Design

"Sounds like a great concept and I am a sponge right now, learning as much as a can in terms of ideas/techniques for future reference."

- DePaul University, College of Computing and Digital Media

"I am fascinated by all the different methods men have of expressing themselves. Talking, singing, through art like painting, or pictures, through video, as well as acting and movement. Each medium can tell people things, show people things, and communicate messages that no other medium can. I am interested to learn how we can use integrate acting and movement into our design work, two mediums that are extremely untapped when it comes to our design process"

- Northwestern University, Segal School of Design

"I am interested in "bodystorming", to improve my knowledge of research in the disciplines of design...as well as learning how to educate potential clients about appreciating good design."

- Eclectic Design

"One of our biggest challenges in Design for America, NU (DfA)is to get people comfortable in the creative zone. From what I've learned, bodystorming is a very applicable process that we can use during our projects. I would like to know more about how DfA and DD+D can collaborate. "

- Northwestern University, Segal School of Design

"A new technique I can use with clients and project team members, to get them thinking in an open and sensory way."

- Manifest Digital

"Don't really know!"

-Chicago Public Schools

Please also tell us what you think, we hope to hear more from you!

YOU ARE INVITED TO...

2010-02-15T11:02:00.000-08:00

Dear All,

On February 26,2010 at 5:45 p.m., thirty participants from around Chicagoland will come together to do a Bodystorming exercise, a physical brainstorming that will help generate solutions to a problem facing Sears of the future.

We’re hoping you’ll be one of those participants!

This will be an activity in which we learn about and then do a Bodystorming exercise. A Bodystorming is a live presentation (think: a short play) in which participants improvise several scenes and also has the audience asking questions. It leads to a better understanding of the problem and solution space. We will go over best practices as well as theater techniques and tools for Bodystorming (one for idea generation to prepare for Bodystorming and another for analyzing a Bodystorming activity.)

Use Case Theater (Prototyping the Space/Place your product will be used in using “actors” and “props”.) Let’s say you have been hired to build a new hot-dog vendor stand. Bodystorming Type III says you should get 3 or 4 of your co-workers and have them act-out the the different roles. So you have one person be the vendor. Another person ordering their hot dog. The other people waiting in line to order. Perhaps you have them run through it for a couple of takes and you can watch and see what happens and perhaps change things up to explore different options. Such things as how long it takes to service 10 people with one vendor versus two vendors, or if you add a form for people to fill out instead of telling the vendor their order.

Our GOALS:

To use Bodystorming as a tool to introduce design to a lager community. To share the technique of Bodystorming with a diverse group of participants, and to encourage its use in their own disciplines. To interact in diverse groups and learn the value of having done so. To introduce/expose designers to a new technique. To integrate/build on the Focus Troup work of Salvador and Soto.

You may RSVP for the event by contacting Byron Stewart of Dramatic Diversity DD+D, one of the organizations facilitating the evening along with Sears . If you have questions prior, feel free to contact Byron at byron@dramaticdiversity.com.

Is it really possible to change the world simply by exchanging ideas with those who appear to have little in common with you? We look forward to showing you how. :)

Sincerely,

The Team,
Byron Stewart
Dennis Schleicher
Miaoqi Zhu

Bodystorming Video Example -"BetaCup"

2010-02-15T10:25:00.000-08:00

The BetaCup Bodystorming Session - Overlap 09 from the betacup on Vimeo.

This video is an example of bodystorming. Here, a team of designers from Overlao '09 are trying to discover better solutions to replace current coffee cup consumption by Bodystorming. To obtain more information about this activity, you may also look at this video too .

(To view the video of our Bodystorming, please go to this link .)

Also, please tell us what you think?

About DD+D/ What is Bodystorming?

2010-02-07T20:39:00.000-08:00

About DD+D

DD+D is the name given to Dramatic Diversity’s (http://www.dramaticdiversity.com/) offerings in the various fields of design. DD+D has an innovative approach to helping designers use acting methodology and improvisation to engage in the design process as well as communicate and collaborate around design possibilities. DD+D uses bodystorming, embodied dramatic personas, realistic scenarios, participatory design, and forum theatre techniques to help designers empathize with users.

For more info please reach us at byron@dramaticdiversity.com

Bodystorming

Explore this unique mentod for bringing innovate ideas to life!

We believe that Bodystorming is a powerful design/research tool to understand how people obtain desired experience under various contexts in an embodied way.

WHY BODYSTORM?

UX designers are becoming overwhelmed by the mass of design research data they now have access to. Experience designers need to return to core design principles by having better empathy with the users in the context of their everyday lives. We do this by rapidly re-framing the problem in succession over the course of just a few seconds. By creating and “performing” a vision of the future that requires no sophisticated technologies other than people’s bodies to explain, clients or patrons need only “watch” and be entertained to understand. Bodystorming is an innovation tool that helps to create stories or themes out of the things we observe around us- the things we perceive- and translate this knowledge into rapid communication and generation of ideas around an envisioned scenario. It is also a way to allow people to be people, by working together in tight Generate- Do- Learn cycles to engage one another in simulating experiences and processes by designing them through joint acting and improve

Dennis Schleicher, Sears ux, researcher, DD+D partner, and practitioner of the technique considers "Bodystorming" to be used in three ways:

Bodystorming Type I

Working in the Space/Place your product will be used in – Let’s say you have been hired to build a new cash register interface for a cafe down the street. Bodystorming I says that you should go the the cafe and do your work there. I didn’t say analysis, but work. So go there and do all your design and coding there. The idea is that just be being in the environment for which your product is supposed to be for you will build it better. Things such as loud environments, feelings of safety or crime prone areas will be hard to ignore.

Bodystorming Type II

Strong Prototyping the Space/Place your product will be used in. Lets say you have been hired to build a new handheld device that will work in the hallways a submarine . Bodystorming II says that you should construct out of cardboard what the hallways of a submarine would be. Perhaps make the lighting the same (maybe red lights?) So you have test out your handheld in the “simulated” environment. Perhaps it doesn’t have all the properties of the actual field environment, but it should have some of the more important aspects of the setting. Then change constraints such as lighting, or how easy it is to walk through such spaces while holding on to PDA.

Bodystorming Type III

Use Case Theater (Prototyping the Space/Place your product will be used in using “actors” and “props”.) Let’s say you have been hired to build a new hot-dog vendor stand. Bodystorming Type III says you should get a perhaps 3 or 4 of your co-workers and have them act-out the the different roles. So you have one person be the vendor. Another person ordering their hot dog. The other people waiting in line to order. Perhaps you have them run through it for a couple of takes and you can watch and see what happens and perhaps change things up to explore different options. Such things as how long it take to service 10 people with one vendor versus two vendors, or if you add a form for people to fill out instead of telling the vendor their order.

Dennis also suggests several tips for Bodystorming , which can be found here.

Please contact us to bring Bodystorming to you byron@dramaticdiversity.com

Team Bios'

2010-02-02T16:07:00.000-08:00

About DD+D

Project Bodystorming/DD+D is the name given to Dramatic Diversity’s (http://www.dramaticdiversity.com/) offerings in the various fields of design.
DD+D leverages theatre techniques and acting methodology to help designers empathize with users and produce better results for their clients, as well as to communicate and collaborate around design solutions. DD+D uses the following techniques in addition to Performance Testing, Design Improv and Design Empathy workshops to aid designers, design teams and their clients.

Embodied Dramatic Personas This workshop connects research to personas. We take two-dimensional representation of a customer and bring it to life. Participants learn to write character based personas and perform them. Make data memorable

Realistic Scenarios
This session is similar to a theatre rehearsal. Designers act out scenes based on users problems identified during the research phase to step into the shoes of the user in the context of a particular touch point or day-in-the-life. Participants learn how to use their embodied insights to create rich contextual scenarios.

Make Products Considerate
This workshop encourages designers to think differently about the products they design. Designers play the role of the product as they interact with users to understand what users want from an experience with a product. Participants explore creating products that are deferential, forthcoming, and perceptive. Learn to design good product behavior.

Bodystorming
This session uses a method of problem identification and solving to translate ideas and opportunities into physical experiences explored through improvisation and role-play. Bodystorming uses a design brief, props and simple costumes to give a sense of place. The process is designed to uncover how relationships between people, locations, and things affect ideas in ways that brainstorming alone cannot. It enables empathy and rapid iteration of ideas and relationships through a dynamic process of acting and evaluating. The process reveals how people interact with services, products, and each other on a physical, emotional and intuitive level.

Performance Testing
Flow: Using an existing scenario test how users interact with products or services. Set the stage/location, decide where everything should be. Assign roles and relationships based on personas and research. If you are testing a scenario, take it in slices. As soon as it starts to break down, the audience must call bug! Iterate the scene, changing the variables as you do. Change relationships the Who, Where, and Why.
Suggestions: Use this with potential users to test the experience of a device or service. Assess and record findings. Performance Testing can be done on the road ,or in the studio. Film the process/performance to capture and evaluate.

For more info. please contact Byron at byron@dramaticdiverstiy.com

Team Bios:

Byron Stewart Byron Stewart is an actor,director, consultant, facilitator, and presenter, and is owner of Dramatic Diversity. For the past ten years, Dramatic Diversity has provided corporate training and diversity & inclusion consultation to Fortune 1,000 companies as well as colleges and universities. Among the leading firms with which Dramatic Diversity has worked are BP/Amoco, Price Waterhouse Coopers, Motorola, Northern Trust Bank, Brookfield Zoo, University of Chicago, and PepsiCo.

Project Bodystorming/DD+D is the name given to Dramatic Diversity’s new offerings in the field of Design. Byron and the DD+D team deploy an innovative approach to helping product and service designers use acting methodology and improvisation to engage in the design process as well as communicate and collaborate around design possibilities. DD+D uses improvisation, bodystorming, embodied dramatic personas, realistic scenarios, participatory design, and forum theatre techniques to help designers empathize with users. Byron has presented persona and scenario workshops for the insight and planning team of Critical Mass, a digital marketing firm, Northwestern University/Segal Design School’s Design for America Fellows, RTC, UXMasterclass Conference, Columbia College and DePaul University. Byron has facilitated Bodystorming sessions for Sears Inc. ux and Walgreen's. He is a local leader and presenter for Chicago’s Interaction Design Association (IxDA). Byron was Service Design consultant on the development and launch of a new diabetes class for University of Chicago, and was a consultant and participant for Manifest Digital’s, Chicago Insight Lab. He was the coordinator for the Chicago Service Jam '11. Articles on Byron’s workshops have been featured in UXmatters and Experience Matters on line magazines.

As a professional actor, for over twenty years, he has received a Jeff Citation, Black Theatre Alliance Award, and an After Dark Award. He served as Artistic Director of A Real Read, Chicago's African American LGBT performance ensemble for five years. He has co-starred in feature films and did casting for the award winning made-for-television series, Kevin's Room I-III; produced by Chicago Department of Public Health and Black Cat Productions. Byron is a member of Actor's Equity Association, the Association for Standardized Patient Educators (simulation in health care). Mr. Stewart received his BFA degree from Howard University in Washington D.C.

Mr. Dennis Schleicher is the director of User Experience Architecture at Sears Holdings in Chicago. He uses his background in business and industrial anthropology to design interactive products to support the way people communicate and interact in their everyday and working lives. In addition to being a past chair of the largest Information Architecture Summit, he continues to be a leading force in the design community and is actively involved with the Information Architecture Institute, the ASIST Special Interest Group of Information Architecture, Overlap, and the Interaction Design Association (IxDA). He has worked with American Public University Systems, Ford, Chrysler, General Motors, United States Air Force, Microsoft, Comcast, Dominos, White Castle, Bosch, and Numara. His corporate pedigree includes work at Argus Associates, the company that wrote the book on Information Architecture, and the Ford account at JWT, the largest account at the largest advertising company in the US. For more information, please visit Dennis's website.

Mr. Miaoqi Zhu is currently a Ph.D. student at the College of Computing and Digital Media, DePaul University. Before he moved to Chicago, he got his M.S.degree in HCI from Indiana University Bloomington. Being a user experience designer/researcher for the past two and half years, he is always enthusiastic about creating usable and useful interfaces based on solid user research, his work can be seen from certain sites of AOL as well as Whirlpool products. His current research interest include: mobile HCI, CSCW and game interaction/enjoyment. For more information, please visit Miaoqi's website .