design management

When my students decided to change their design concept one week prior to their pitching session, I smelled troubles.

Changing design solution, if found to be not fit, is fine, but not the overall framework of the conceptual design.

I guess I need to elaborate. The three-person student team decided to take up the challenge of designing a navigational system for the library (see post on design from persona). The goal of the project from the library viewpoint is simply to guide students to navigate around the library from one point to another based on an identified library resource, for example subject category.

The team proposed a design concept that consisted of the following four steps, which is depicted in Figure 1:

• Step 1: Attract the passers-by in the library;
• Step 2: Captivate their attention;
• Step 3: Invite the passers-by to see the value of the navigation system;
• Step 4: Use the system.

FIGURE 1: A conceptual design framework for the library system.

A noble design concept. The conceptual design is derived from the persona (see my post on design from persona). The four-step design concept indeed captures the essence of the three types of library users: first time visitors, occasional visitors, and frequent visitors - progressively catering to their needs as they are gaining experience with the system.

To be specific, steps 1 to 3 consists of a system (Attraction System) when deployed aimed to satisfy the needs of the first time visitors and step 4 is another system (Navigation System) meant to fulfill the goals and needs of the occasional and frequent visitors.

If the team strictly follows the requirements of the library, they would only need to propose the Navigation System, which would probably include a search engine, a 2D map and a 3D virtual walk-through or a combination of all.

But they did not. Instead they opted for a more comprehensive but in my own opinion a more effective approach. Why do I say that?

When the team conducted a survey with some of the students, the statistics revealed that there indeed remain a substantial number of students neither visit the library nor use the resources. They may not even use the web-based library opac (Online Public Access Catalog) system - of course that needs ascertain.

What is the point if you spend a great amount of time to design and develop a system and eventually left unnoticed and not used? The design, which considered the infrequent library users, is sound. The team is on the right track!

Now back to the design change the team wanted to change. In the original design, the team suggested to place a wide screen monitor, fitted with a camera, at the entrance of the library. The system will constantly monitor the passers-by in close proximity, and trigger an interesting movie clip showing a welcoming gesture to invite the passers-by to come close to the screen. Once it is successful in attracting them, it will engage the passers-by to find out what value the Navigation System could offer, and then invite them to use it. This design concept is like a teaser as we often experience in a supermarket where a promoter gives out food sample to the passers-by hoping that this tiny winy try will lead to a buy.

For some reasons that I am not sure, the team decided to change the concept to a more informative digital advertising concept, drastically sway away from the original more interactive approach.

Whichever design solution, to me, is fine ... only if it delivers the impact. That was what I asked the team to ponder about when they approached me for advise.

In my own observation of the digital advertising in the shopping mall, I am a bit skeptical in their engagement with the passers-by but this by no means conclusive.

If my observation and hypothesis are right, then the revised proposed design concept will now result into two separate systems, which will have little contribution to the overall system effectiveness, except unnecessary time spent and workload.

In its original form, these two systems are seamlessly integrated as one. The scope of these two systems are equally huge. If the team does not work out the details of their vision for the systems they envision and understand the problem situation that they want to solve, it is hard to decide whether they should focus on both systems or just one in their project.

You see, for every project, there is a problem that needs to be addressed and stakeholders' goals and needs to be fulfilled.

With a detailed description of the vision for the system, and understand the time frame, budget, manpower given, we could then classify the systems features and functionalities into two categories: project scope and those beyond that we will not consider.

What I am trying to say is that a designer should not simply just focusing on designing; there are the project management elements to be considered in the overall design strategy.

A success in a project (much more so for the system) depends on how we determine the scope in relation with the problem situation and stakeholders' goals and needs.

And we can only determine the scope if we have a clear vision for the system that we are developing. Let's look at the project vision that I have painted for this project as shown in the Appendix below.

Is it scary? Yes, it is. There are many challenges to be overcome and experimental work to be done.

APPENDIX: A design concept for the Attraction System, which will be used to entice the passers-by in the library - my first attempt, conceptualised intensively in a week but discussed with the student team over many weeks:

Project Description The use of video as interface in interactive media cannot be underestimated. The interface of the system will become more powerful if it is made interactive as it engages the senses of the human beings. One interesting example is incorporating mini games within the video itself like the following: http://www.wethekingsmusic.com/interactive/ In this project, we will develop an innovative interactive video, which will be used in a library to attract passers-by to find books that might interest them and facilitate their borrowing. The system will be either mounted on the wall or placed at a display stand. It will also be conveniently accessible via Internet at a workstation. Video will be used as the interface between the users and the system. Interactivity elements will be incorporated within the video interface to enable users to learn more about the resources and locate the resources. User Scenario When the system is at idling state, the video interface will show a human in a not-excessive motion. In other words, nothing is static on screen. When the system detects passers-by, it will then create a scene and excite the passers-by to take notice of the system. In this case, the human figure will be in exaggerated motion. When the passers-by are interested in the system, they become the users of the system. In this case, the system will "talk" to them, display two menu options to the users: "Give-Me-Five" is an option for users to see interesting and exciting mini video clip for enticement "Show-Me-The-Books" is an option where users can query the system via click-and-drag approach for a listing of (a) newly acquired books, (b) most-read books and (c) rarely borrowed books but highly recommended over the two years periods, and invite them to click on any one of the options. Wireframe Idling State: At a glance: Simple and not complicated motion; it should have wide varieties of video clips. Detailed Specification: When there is no user activity or passers-by, the screen will show a video of a male or female in not-excessive motion. The aim of this slightest motion is to make the screen non-static and to let it be seen as constantly in motion just like it would in the real life. To further invite attention, there is an inviting question or tagline clearly displayed to entice and invite users to interact with the system. Reference Example: http://www.singtel.com.sg retrieved on 27 December 2011 (Figure 1). FIGURE 1: The human character will always in slightest motion. Detection State: At a glance: two states of event when the system detects passers-by: (a) slight detection, and (b) deep detection. The details are follows: Slight Detection detects passers-by in a farther distance; The detection triggers a different kind of reaction from the system to entice and attract the passers-by to come closer to it; Deep Detection detects passers-by in a very close proximity indicating that they have been drawn to the interactive video and interested to explore more about what it is; Detailed Specification: When it detects human motion, the human figure in the video will first utter some interesting words as if it is talking to the users. While the users are drawn to the interactive video, it will then surprise the users by making the human moves in a most creative way coupled with an exciting music played along with the motion. This will further heighten an element of curiosity and hence will draw them to it. The motion should only last for few seconds, for example 5 seconds. Each time a creative motion is invoked, it should not give the users a feeling that the creative motion has been seen before, i.e. it should be non-repetitive. When the teaser video clip ends, it will display two options for the users to take actions. The effects of the video clips should be on the line, for example, of the reference website at http://www.uniqlo.jp/uniqlock/, retrieved on 27 December 2011. FIGURE 2: An example of an interesting teaser video clip. Interaction State: At a glance: When the teaser video clip ends, the interactive video will display two options for users to take actions. One is "Give-Me-Five" and the other is "Show-Me-The-Books". Detailed Specification: "Give-Me-Five": When that happens via the webcam, it will further play a few-second teaser video synchronising with some exciting music. This will continue so long the users "Give-Me-Five". The teaser video clip should not be seen as repetitive, hence there should be large enough video clips to be drawn from and a good randomisation program is implemented.  "Show-Me-The-Books": A number of human characters wearing T-shirt showing the subject headings on it (marketing, management, games, software engineering, etc.) rushes out and stationary at a position just like the reference example in Figure 3 (balls replaced with human). The human figure will not be static – it will be in slight motion but not execessive. The task of the users is to connect the human nodes to display the books of choice. Reference Website: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/384188 http://www.emanueleferonato.com/2007/07/07/creation-of-the-engine-behind-nodes-game-with-flash/ FIGURE 3: Instead of balls, human characters are used. Book Display: The system will display the books in circular forms around the main human figure similar to Figure 4. The human figure stands at the centre of the screen constantly in slight motion. Books will be searched based on relevancy of the subject headings. It will retrieve relevant books in circular format (in that order) from inner circle (small) to outer (large) based on (a) newly acquired books, (b) most-read books, and (c) rarely borrowed books but highly recommended. When users drag the book around the circle, it will move to that direction. If there are more books to be displayed than available slots in a circular links, it will adopt a first-in-first-out approach, i.e. push the first most book out of the way one at a time from the book just coming into the circular links at the end. Book Display: The system will display the front cover page of the books in circular forms around the main human figure similar to Figure 4. The human figure stands at the centre of the screen constantly in slight motion. Books will be searched based on relevancy of the subject headings. It will retrieve relevant books in circular format (in that order) from inner circle (small) to outer (large) based on (a) newly acquired books, (b) most-read books, and (c) rarely borrowed books but highly recommended. When users drag the book around the circle, it will move to that direction. If there are more books to be displayed than available slots in a circular links, it will adopt a first-in-first-out approach, i.e. push the first most book out of the way one at a time from the book just coming into the circular links at the end. The system will display the front cover page of the book in the circular links. FIGURE 4: An example showing how the books will be displayed in circular format. Feature Requirements Webcam: It will detect whether any passer-by within a proximity range and be able to detect the strength of it: how far or near the passers-by are. Video: The interface will adopt the streaming of video and its style as in the "uniqlo clock" reference example. It will only play when it detects some passer-by nearby. Menu Options: Creative menu options to be presented to the users when they are getting interested with the system. Music: You should find music that is simple and interesting enough to attract the passers-by, preferably with no lyrics. There are plenty free music stock in our NP from library. Book Browsing: Click-drag similar to the game nodes program in Figure 3 to be adopted. Book Display: Books should be displayed in a circular format with the human figure in the centre of the screen. It will show different categories of books from inner (small) to outer circles (large). Book Locating: To allow users know where to find the books. Video Clips Storage: External storage. Randomness: Randomising video clips to be played.