Remember when I said last week that I was expecting curveballs in the next few weeks? Well, little did I know that it would arrive literally the following week. To recap, I had successfully picked an idea to pursue: a co-design toolkit. In my naivety, I thought: “Oh! Easy! The next thing I need to do is just research different kinds of tools and toolkits.” Spoiler alert, it was not easy. If you recall the HCD tool “explore your hunch”, there is a similar tool called “Gut check” in the HCD toolkit where you critically think about your research and ideas with your gut instinct (IDEO (Firm), 2015, 110). As previously mentioned, I trust my gut very much and all the co-design tools that I found in my research just did not pass the gut check. At this point in my career as a designer, I rely a lot on taking inspiration and learnings from existing designs. So, when all the existing toolkits I found were just not agreeable with my gut, it made me feel very stumped. Many of the toolkits I came across were intangible (of sorts). To elaborate, they were frequently a collection of different actions the user could take. For example, interviewing, creating personas and rapid prototyping. Some toolkits would take on the form of a book or a website but the tools themselves were intangible. For example, the UK government’s “Policy Making Toolkit” (Open Policy Making Toolkit - Guidance, 2016). The most tangible form was something along the lines of an activity sheet or directions for how to create something tangible. In hindsight, I think the main reason why these tools did not pass the gut check is because I had previously invested a lot of time into researching games as a co-design tool. And, even though I decided it wasn’t feasible for me to make a game, I guess my gut was still very much inclined towards something interactive, fun and physical. I realised this when I came across a reading about the use of tangible co-design tools in healthcare (Rygh, 2019). It demonstrated not only how effective co-design was, but how much more effective tangible co-design tools were. I am so glad I stumbled across this reading because it helped me realise why those previous tools and toolkits felt so off and actually justified why tangible tools were a better choice. From there, I narrowed my searches down to include physical and tangible design tools and the results I got from there on out were a lot more in line with my gut.

I actually managed to make a very quick paper prototype of a tool I found. The tool is called “Value Pursuit”. It a basic board game that can be used in workshops to help stakeholders understand how they can be of value to one another (Value Pursuit | Prototype | PSS-101 | Project, n.d.). I will not go in depth into gameplay specifics so as to not make this already lengthy blog post even longer, but the instructions are laid out on this website: http://www.crisprepository.nl/project/pss-101/prototype/value-pursuit (Value Pursuit | Prototype | PSS-101 | Project, n.d.). It is tangible, interactive and a little bit gamified. During my stream studio, I quickly created a paper prototype and tested it with a few of my peers. Each person roleplayed a stakeholder and thought about how they could be of value to others as that stakeholder.

I think it went really well but because I prototyped it and tested it on a whim, I didn’t have any means of feedback collection prepared. I do regret that but I plan to test it again with the appropriate feedback loop prep. From what I discerned as an observer and from general comments made throughout the activity, the people who participated liked the activity and the element of gamification, but just found it hard to put themselves in the shoes of their allocated stakeholder.

I thoroughly enjoyed making the paper prototype and I’m really looking forward to prototyping more tools in the coming weeks!

REFERENCES

IDEO (Firm). (2015). The Field Guide to Human-centered Design: Design Kit. IDEO.
Open Policy Making toolkit - Guidance. (2016, February 1). GOV.UK. Retrieved August 27, 2023, from https://www.gov.uk/guidance/open-policy-making-toolkit
Rygh, K., & Clatworthy, S. (2019). The use of tangible tools as a means to support co-design during service design innovation projects in healthcare. Service design and service thinking in healthcare and hospital management: Theory, concepts, practice, 93-115.
Value Pursuit | Prototype | PSS-101 | Project. (n.d.). CRISP Repository. Retrieved August 27, 2023, from http://www.crisprepository.nl/project/pss-101/prototype/value-pursuit

‍