Design Led Research Led Design
Posted on May 17, 2011 | posted by:
“How might the attributes and variations of visual representations of a process be informative and indicative about the community depicting it?” The research cycle initiated by this question led me through a journey that transitioned from research to design.
My research strategy started with a more deductive approach with a goal that initiated my research cycle and went on to becoming inductive as I became open to phase shifts and taking forward new opportunities.
To take forward my research question my plan was to do a visual audit of design process diagrams starting with design thinking. I wanted to study the approach taken for these diagrams and get insights about that process and the community following that process. I planned to code the diagrams I collected according to the type of approach taken for them.
Although my planning only included visual audit, my action phase intuitively and simultaneously combined a visual audit with research on diagrams. After studying over a hundred types, I began to gain a new understanding of diagramming.
During this time I had also collected about a hundred design-thinking diagrams. After coding them, I observed that one out of four of the diagrams were Venn diagrams similar to the ones advocated by IDEO, originally from the Keeley triangle. Most of the other diagrams also formed similar clusters barring some including “Squiggle” by Damien Newman, The Eames Design Process by Charles Eames and Paul Hughes design thinking notebook.
I began to reflect that looking at published content was not very rich or informative for the objective of my research. I realized that the diagrams were not inspirational for me as published diagrams are designed for a specific purpose and audience. This was especially so in the case of design thinking diagrams, they are designed with the aim to inform non-designers about design. I realized I needed a new source for finding more inspiring data for myself. I decided to use a new tactic in the form of a cultural probe and ask designers around me to document their design process.
The beginning of a phase shift…
To start the conversation, I designed a probe that would impart knowledge to the respondent to see how they responded to it. My probe included different types of diagrams as a prompt.
While designing and testing this probe I saw the opportunity in how they react to the data as opposed to just the data produced. How do they interpret the different ways that diagrams can be drawn? Do they find it inspiring or limiting? Do they take it forward or do they stick to instruction?
Testing the probe confirms that most of them has not yet visualized the design process. Two important insights while trying the probe made me realize that it made them think of their design process and more importantly think about in a new context.
A phase shift…
What began, as what I first thought was a new phase of design research, quickly turned into research led design. Seeing the potential in redefining this cultural probe as a design tool dawned on me. Using different types of diagrams that can be interpreted, explored and taken forward, the tool kit becomes a spark in starting a process of ‘thinking’ and visualizing ones design process. The primary purpose of the kit is to start a thinking process and not necessarily an immediate outcome.
During my research, I learnt how a diagram can either be ‘informative to the design’ or ‘informative to the viewer’. Through my tool kit I hope to start a process, which is ‘informative to the designer’.
Visualizing the design process is such a personal, complex and transitional process. My research has led me to realize that there is a big conversation currently about visualizing (and in a way ‘designing’) our processes in order to inform non-designers. Why not also have an equivalent dialogue of trying to visualize our process to inform ourselves?