Co-Design Methods

How does Co-Design work? 

Co-design allows the user to become an active part of the development of a product, by interacting directly with design and research teams. It is a method that can be used in all of the stages of the design process, however it is especially in the ideation or concepting phases. The inclusion of the users knowledge development, idea generation, and concept development on products has the goal of serving the same users in the best way. There are several stages in the co-design research process. 

The stages: 

• Stage 1: Self-Reflection Research Methods 

• Stage 2: Running Co-Design Workshops Onsite 

Stage 1 

A co-design session can yield in various data outcomes. These include creations of cognitive maps or mockups of a product or service. It is important to prepare participants beforehand by allowing them to think and reflect about the topic that is to be studied. When choosing which research methods to use in this phase, it is important to think about three considerations: 

• What are the research goals and questions? 

• Who is the audience and what tools can they use?  

• What is the stage of the project and the users who are invited to participate? 

It is important that the participants are given the opportunity to think about the topic of the study and reflect on it before meeting with the design team for an onsite co-creation workshop. Furthermore, it is important what the limitations of the research tools are that people would be using for the study. In some cases, the self-reflection research exercises can be shortened or bypassed. This normally occurs when the research is about a specific product or service, where the team is dealing with users who have long and expert-level experience and can talk about it without much preparation. These are the users who generally deal with the product on a daily or weekly basis and are passionate about finding ways to improve its potential. In other cases, co-designing can be performed as a weekly or biweekly process in combination with rapid iterations in an agile development cycle. Or simply to develop a continuous relationship with different kinds of users during the initial stages of development and in these cases, an email with three or four detailed questions might be sufficient to get the participants thinking and reflecting.  

Stage 2 

Co-design workshops can be conducted with one participant or with a larger group of participants. It is important that the researcher guides the sessions at all times and instructs team members on how to best participate and inter with the user participants, such as what types of questions to ask and what kind of language to use. When working with a larger group of participants, it would be best to break the group into subgroups of a maximum of three members and monitor their work and their internal discussions as best as possible. Each subgroup can work on the same theme or variations of it. They could present their work to the rest of the group at the end of the session. A mixed group of users, designers and researchers could lead to rich results and can aid in the alignment of a user-centered process with the organization.  

Methods  

There are some research methods that can be used in co-design sessions that lead to a variety of insights. The materials and tools that are used for each workshop should be designed to satisfy the needs of the specific study and therefore should vary depending on the project.  

Examples of research methods for co-design 

• Collages 

• Cognitive and context mapping (creating mindmaps of abstract concepts, events, processes, routines, experiences or systems  

• Storyboards 

• Inspiration cards 

• Modeling 

• Paper prototyping and sketching 

• Games  

A typical co-design workshop has at least two different parts. The first part is where the participant is interviewed about their current experiences in order to start the conversation. The other part is where hands-on co-design exercises take place. These workshops (generally) involve a collection of materials, instructions for the co-design exercises and time. For these reasons, it is important to pilot test the design of the sessions.  

Results 

The data that is obtained from co-design sessions can aid in presenting research findings and is in direct connection with users’ ideas and feelings in more engaging and understandable forms.

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Co-design Methods

The previous mentioned stages were implemented in this project. Below will be described how we used it and what the result were.  

In stage 1 we set up possible ways to co-design with the participant. We defined what the research goals and questions were and who is the audience (and what tools they can use). We have to be well aware of what the participant is capable of and what the aim of the co-design is going to be. So, before actual co-design exercises the group conducted a number of interviews to gather necessary information about what the user might need or want and how will they need or want it. These interviews can be found in the 'Online Meet' and 'First Visit'. 

Stage 2 was started once we had enough information on the participant and his challenge. After research on several other co-design with people with cerebral palsy or a speech difficulty several methods to co-design with the participant were chosen.  

Firstly, interviewing and brainstorming together on possible solutions. The participant mentioned a microphone and an exercise that he already tried in order to help keep his hands down. This exercise was crossing his hand. This brought us to the idea that keeping his hands occupied might work as well. 

Secondly, to we also tried the home safari. This we did during the 'Second Visit', where we went to his house. Here we looked at what he could control in his house and how that all worked. Also we looked at his style and talked about his interests and hobbies. During the same visit we also tried the black box method. We placed an object on his desk and we described a scenario where he was presenting and asked him what he would like the object to do. His answer was to have a voice tell him to breathe. This is something we continued with as a concept as well. 

Thirdly, trying our concepts with rapid prototyping. During the first physical visit, we brought some stress balls to test our theory from the interviews and brainstorm. The participant could keep the balls for longer to see if it did indeed work. The next time we visited he told us it did indeed help him. From here we knew how to help him with his hands, but we also wanted to help him remember to use the balls. We also tested this by rapid prototyping, which can be seen in the video at the bottom of the page. These concepts were rated by him via a rating system that can be found in 'Third Visit'.  

Continuing from that we chose the highest-rated concepts and continued with rapid prototyping on hand grip shapes. These can be found in 'Concept Development'. 

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