Problem solving process

Design thinking Action Lab

analyze the problem

I've been hired to redesign lockers in a large public school. Why current design is not sufficient? Are current lockers ugly? Are they too small? Do they malfunction?

Maybe the problem is something else?

Let's assume for the sake of the exercise that school wants lockers to be bigger than current one.

understand the outcome

What should be the outcome? How should new lockers look / function?

In our case let assume new lockers needs to be bigger but still fit in the schools short and narrow corridors.

understand the stakeholders

Obviously there is more than one stakeholder in this exercise. Students might look a the problem different way then the school.

For example : It might happen that only one group of students complain about the size of the lockers. For some they might be big enough.

reframe the problem

Sometimes reframing the problem helps looking at it from different angle. Can bring new ideas.

In our example : are lockers to small or do people just try to put too much stuff in it?

define criterias / definition of done

What are the criterias used to evaluate the project? How do I know that I am finished?

Example : How much bigger new locker needs to be? What percentage of lockers needs to be replaced?

define possible solutions

There might be more than one solution to the problem. Let's gather them all.

Example : We can make lockers taller. More things will fit. Or maybe we can turn one class into library where students can keep their books instead of lockers. Or maybe we can make only some lockers bigger and leave rest as it is?

define costs of the solutions

How much would it cost? Is the solution affordable for the school?

implement chosen solution or prototype

Sometimes it is enough to create a prototype of the solution or try it on smaller scale. To save the costs.

test

Is it working? Are we confident we can present solution to the customer?

evaluate with stakeholders

Are stakeholders happy? Or did they find out that this is not what they really wanted?