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0:06
And let's introduce the last of the unit that is unit number five, that is going to be OK. So, Stefano, we have seen the in the process of design. We have seen the design mindset. We understood with the opportunity template. Is that a problem that we can solve with design thinking or should we use rational thinking? And then we kind of start to understand a little bit more about the design brief. OK, what we need to do before closing all
0:43
of this is that we need to put some project management into this. Is not that just we have the template that everything is going to work. What we need to do now is really to get people on board, our team members on board with us on working on these templates and working on the tools of design. So what do we need to do here is basically try to understand that any design thinking project that is less successful is based at least on three different plans. OK, the first one is very important and is
1:22
very relevant for the time that we are experiencing. That is the project setting and we are going to see now in a second what are the different setting that we can choose? The second type of plans is about the people that are involved in the design thinking process, and people are the centre of the success of any design thinking process. As you remember, from Innovation 1.0 to Innovation Point 2.0 is that one is Innovation 1.0. That is only one person that does the innovation job for everybody.
2:01
And Innovation 2.0 is when we embrace the overall intelligence of the group to solve problems that are complex. And the last plan that we need to put in place is about research. Because you remember, the data that we are looking for is not quantitative, is not 200000 piece of data, but rather what we want is maybe 10, 15 one to one interview is what we call ethnographic interviews. And the question is who is going to be performing those interviews?
2:40
OK, so what is the first plan that we need to put in place? The first plan that we need to put in place is what is called the project setting. And let me tell you that by experience, I'm a remote design strategist. I work mostly remotely. But if we follow in order of how are we going to work together with our team on a design thinking process? Well, the first and most obvious of the answer is a physical environment. So basically you are co-located with your
3:16
team members in the same room or in the same building, and you are able to have five or six people in the same room to work together. Now, with what is going on in the world right now, physical environments have become a privilege for only few of us. So what we are trying to understand, maybe physically is good. But even if there if there wasn't a covid around, I'm working with different organisations where they have their innovation team that is spread amongst different nations.
3:53
So it's not only the limitation of the companies that sometimes you have very smart people that you want in your organisation working together that are not co-located. So what they actually they are developing is what is called a remote setting. What is a remote setting is when you are able to use the power of the Internet to collaborate on the same project. And we will see in future webinars that there are software like, for example, mural dot com. I will write that in.
4:29
In the chat box that is basically a whiteboard in your coat is a big whiteboard online that we can use in order to share ideas, a Post-it, a drawing, and that really enables us to work remotely. And obviously we do that through this kind of creative tool like mural. But also we need to put in place a very strong a project management system where we see the team members assigned to each team members a set of tasks that they need to perform.
5:08
And also one important thing is also placing deadlines for each team members. Remember that the design there is always a risk to remain in the air, to remain philosophical or remain to creative. So design the impact of design can only be measured when design is translated in an artefact that your user can actually experience. Or indeed, when we talk about prototyping is really a free experience on what your final product or service is going to be. But the one of the setting that probably
5:51
is becoming organically more and more important is what I call mixed setting. And what is that? Well, basically is when you and your team are working remotely Monday through Thursday and on a Friday, you come together keeping the two metres distance and start to share ideas face to face. So you have all the job done remotely, but you come together in the same room keeping the distance. There is something magic. You think about human beings when they
6:24
come together, not in a would say online environment, but in the same room. We can have a that might not be happening online for many different reasons. So I would say that probably the one that I'm seeing that is happening the most is not the physical, is not the remote, but it's a mix between the two of them. Now, you need to be very clear with your team members the way that you're going to work. Are you going to be working the same
6:55
company physical for this remote, for this design thinking project? Are you working remotely or you work in a setting environment? I would say that the mix setting is the one that is is getting more and more. A team is getting more and more traction over time. Now, one word that I need to to spend about remote setting, why remote setting is very convenient and enables us to work with people spread amongst different locations. You need to familiarise with a set of software that is not immediate.
7:29
So in using this platform online that enables us to create or to work remotely and you need to practise, there is a learning curve with with with those online software. And my suggestion is you, even before proposing these remote tools to your team members, you need to familiarise with those tools yourself first. And my personal experience, there is nothing worse than talking or speaking about the tool with your team members when you are not familiar about it.
8:06
So don't make the same mistake that I did at the beginning. When I say, oh, you know, there is the magic of a the online remote creative session. And they told me to show me how it works. And then I remember the first session was a disaster. Why? Because it's not that I wasn't familiar with the tools. I wasn't able to facilitate those online tools to my team member. And they say, Stephano, look, is a complete disaster. We are going to work in a physical space soon.
8:36
So there is no time to be wasted to do. The reality is that if you get ready and you familiarise with those tools when you communicate that to your team members, chances are that they will understand. OK, so that's kind of what you need to be very clear with yourself and your team members how you are going to work physically, remotely or a mix setting. The second point is really you need to understand that we when we use design, we are in innovation. Point to is not only your job is not the
9:12
job of the designer, you become a facilitator. And in design we need to type of teams. OK, most of the time the team that is most well understood is the team that is responsible to implementing. Solution. OK, so I call that the core team, so the core team are the four, five, six people that are actively working on the design thinking project full time. OK, so those are people working for the organisation full time and they are responsible for the outcome of design.
9:51
Now we in design need another team that is called the extended team. And those are your colleagues or user customers or industry wide stakeholders that you need in order to create a product or service. So in other words, the intelligence that you need in order to develop a successful design thinking process exceed the intelligence that you have in your core team. Your core team are five, six, seven people that can be as smart as you wish. But when it comes to the prototyping phase
10:34
or even before in the ideation phase, you need to embrace the collective intelligence that exceed the intelligence that you have as an expert. So most of the time when we run cocreator session or we run ideation session, what we do is that we invite different types of people, different background, and try to see their perspective on the job that we are creating on the new solution, on the product or the service. And what happened is that what we try to
11:11
do is we want to grab the intelligence of that, extend the team and bring and use that in order to create a better, not only better, but a solution that really tackles needs that we might not were able to see them because we never talk with that, with people with that background. So diversity is exceptionally, exceptionally important in design thinking. Now, one thing very important to be said here is that while diversity inform your divergent thinking,
11:51
if you put too much diversity, you will be never able to convert your thinking. So you always be in this kind of oh, give me another idea. Give me another idea. You need to be very clear that there is a point in design where you stop collecting those data and say now you and your core team need to collect all the data that come from the extended team and try to sensemaking those data into theme of ideas that eventually will enable us to create a working prototype.
12:29
So to to really to to cut the short you when we perform a people a plan, we need to have both. They extended the core team to the core team. Are the people working full time on that project? But also we need to engage people that are not in that team. But they will part will be part of this extended team that enables us to embrace a larger intelligence that we need in order to guarantee that broad view of the design thinking process. OK, so the last plan that we have related to the research
13:15
now, if you remember when we were talking about data, we obviously design thinking is not just out of the blue thinking based on no data, that just because I'm an artist, I can come up with the solution just because I am a genius. Not the way that we think about design. Thinking is data driven. The difference between rational and design thinking is that design thinking requires a type of data that is not based on quantity. So we are not trying to prove
13:53
at the beginning, early on in our design thinking process that we are right. We want actually data that tells us that there is a potential need in there and help us to streamline and dig deeper into what that need might be. So we are not proving we're not looking for data in oh, we have to another customer actually telling us that we are right. We are not interested in that. Maybe down the line we will be when we after prototyping, we were looking
14:29
at the overall demand for that specific problem or service, product or service. What we are doing at the beginning of the design thinking process, really, we want to collect as much qualitative data as possible. So we need to perform those interviews with people and try to understand what is the need that is in there that we need to really to refine. So we have as human being, we can develop this understanding of a need, but we are not able to to really to put on paper.
15:03
So we need to to to decide which type of research are we going to perform. And obviously in our research plan, really start who who are the people that we need to discover about. Now, if you remember and this is connected to our design brief in there, we already decide the kind of users we want to serve. So this goes back to the people that we want to serve. Second is where we can find these people. Obviously, if we start to narrow down our
15:41
design, brief certain users, then we need to be able to understand when is the best time to interview our users and say that in there there is a very fascinating understanding on how to find your users saying, oh, you know, the user that I want to serve is actually going to the grocery store is just an example, mostly at lunchtime. Then my suggestion in there is that, yes, you go there and perform your interviews at the at the grocery store at lunchtime,
16:20
but some time is also good to go there at other time to see different type of users and how different type of user make different use of a similar service that really enables us to see the complexity of the picture. Then it is very important also to understand what is the experience that I want to to monitor. So it just not enough to say, oh, I want to monitor where, but what is the experience? And you and your team need to be very clear on what experience you want to discover.
16:57
More than how many how many interviews do you need to connect to to conduce like maybe 10, 15, 20. Remember that in design we are much more focussed on what is core quality rather than quantity. So is for design perspective. Five interviews that are in depth can create more insight there to other interviews that are based on yes or no answer. What we are looking for here are those needs that the customer is not able to tell you, but it can tell you hints he or she can provide you, hints
17:41
that will enable you during the creative phase actually to discover. So the number is very important. The one and that is kind of I have already anticipated you might want to test different times and try to see the different needs. And then the most important in terms of project management, who within your core team is responsible to perform those kind of a research? So when you put all the component of in a research plan together, you start to see that actually design is not just happening
18:22
randomly, is not that innovation? Is that messy? A in confuse a process design actually can be artificially linear rise in the way. If I start my design thinking process, a project understanding who is the core team with these to extend the team, who is responsible to perform those research, how are we working? Are we working remotely or are we working in the same building? I think all of this was really necessary in this first lesson that we are trying to put together and communicating the
19:04
importance of both the process of design but also the role of a designer, not like somebody that has all the answers, but rather somebody that becomes the facilitator within their organisation of a design thinking process that is step two steps. And there is also accountability. Who is responsible for that part of the design thinking process? Now I see that there is a question or a comment by Mari. You say remote and imprisons iBrain, plus
19:42
some in presence meetings when it will be possible a safely again. Yeah, I suppose Mari is right. I mean, eventually we will be able to go back to normality. So to have the possibility to work in the same room and to. But I think if during this period with familiarised with online tools of design and start to understand their power when that they they give us to work remotely, then they can only help when we work face to face. So I, I think that the hybrid model will
20:21
be the new Noonamah that we familiarise with the design thinking tools online and we bring those tools back with us. Even in the East, when will it be possible to work face to face? OK, now we covered a lot of ground in in this in this first webinar and I'm happy to see how many people stay with us because it's kind of at the beginning of design. There is a lot of in a lot of information to to take in. Now we have a comment from Illanes in any there are two questions.
21:00
First, is there flexibility in terms of the stages of the design thinking to be followed? But now my job as a design strategist and in this case, as somebody that comes in as an between an advisor of the design thinking, I would say before you is better that, you know, to walk in the way that design creativity is never linear. So the process that we have started to highlight in in this webinar is a way to artificially make something that is very complex into a linear project.
21:43
But, yes, obviously, if you already have the clarity of the problem that you are trying to solve and you are already advanced in creating insight, obviously skip the first phases of design as long as you have already clarity that is provided you by the design brief. If you already have a design brief, obviously skip and go to the maybe the research phase. But at the same time, if you are now as Meitav, you can be already in research and they realise that there is no clarity
22:22
on the different point that we made in the design brief. By all means, go back and try to clarify that it might be that you are stuck in the design thinking process because you often look at a step that is very important. So let us assume that in agrifood companies struggling to respond in a broad in and increase consumer in other countries, how design can be applied, provided that it is rather difficult to find the target focus group and conduct interviews.
22:53
I mean, how do design think is applied in cases that the focus group is not easily OK so that there is not an easy answer? So I would say if the problem is only that you don't have staff in the country where you want to enter, I would say that nowadays you can use the obviously the online tools. So most of my clients use in the or other meeting software to perform online interviews, and they also use Muro to create possible solution.
23:30
Now, obviously that there is nothing as powerful as being in the country and. See the experience of similar products as yours in that particular country, so that can never be replaced, interviewing face to face, it will be never as a starting interviewing through a a zoo meeting is never as powerful as a face to face interviewing. But I think nowadays is a skill that can be acquired, can be refined. And if there is not the possibility to enter that market, it would be very difficult.
24:08
But yes, the possibility of travelling to and going in that place where you can perform face to face interviews is needed in design is really needed. If there is not the possibility to fly, then we do that online. But being in the place, having the feeling develop, the empathy for those customer being there with them in design, we say putting ourselves in their shoes. Obviously, if I am in Dublin and I'm trying to solve a problem that is, let's
24:42
say in a place, the climate is completely different, let's say that I'm going to solve a problem in the south of Italy, in Sicily, in Sicily, and I live in Dublin for me to experience even how food tastes in Italy. There is a place in Dublin called the Little Sicily. Now, I go there and my grandfather was Sicilian. And I know what does it mean to have dinner in Sicily is not the same thing. So what I'm trying to say here is that desire requires us to immerse ourselves in
25:12
the reality where our final user is really exist. Online tools can help us to to overcome that, but never to the extent that the physical presence can help us. So thanks, Elaine, for the question. And we have Mario, I would just emphasise that everything is changing, but face to face is very important for you. Exactly. Exactly. I agree completely. So we should really be on familiar with remote work, but some face to face activity can be there. Absolutely.
25:44
I would say when I say that is also true not only for your final users, but I think for your team, for your core team and for your extended team. Having the possibility to meet face to face is something that is difficult to replace. Even with all the new technology. There is something magic when people meeting in person that is hardly irreplaceable. No I. I work mostly remotely so I can say that I become very good at changing the webcam so you can have a better idea of my workplace.
26:25
But if you are here in my office, see the way that I work, you will have an experience of my work that is different than see through the lens of a webcam. So I think it is OK. And here after that experience that the empathy is the very basic of design thinking and there are some tools that they are using in order to identify how the final users or the people having the problem are experiencing the problem, because many times the events themselves, they don't know what is the exact problem. So
27:03
I think that face to face or ethnographic research, as we call it, are very crucial for design thinking this for as a reply to a lead or so it's very, very important to be in close contact with the final user should not define how they perceive the situation of the problems. Who are the pain points, who are the point and all the stuff. Otherwise, the solution is not going to be should be through design thinking. So we can also say things in Africa without feeling how they live there,
27:40
and many times the same brother has different taste from other cultures. It's an example of the architect that he would like to sell a house. And if he has to go to the customer with him to live with him, we'll have one there. Understand how what is pretty and most beautiful and what is not. Maybe he's going to build the house that's not so good for the customer. So ethnographic research and empathy is very basic for this reason. And I have to go now that is
28:16
going to interrupt you afterwards, that the fourth industrial revolution is here. Now, that is a very fundamental change in our lives and to the complex, as you call it, before the complexity of design thinking. Exactly for this. It's recorded. In other words, systemic approach is everything's going to be very complex, but at the same time very human centred. So design thinking has its place in this new world that has already here. And the replying to Mario also about the
28:48
change in mindset, of course, is not an easy task. We have to face it. We have to produce a tool and method to train them to change the mindset. And through this simple, not the very complex code that we are creating, we are going to lead all the way step by step design thinking process. Of course, there are many levels, but the level of our winter produces the beginning of the can, let's say, after they're going to follow the course to start to have this
29:21
basic step by step design thinking process. This is our objective and this is not so ambitious. I think we can have it. And especially the younger people that have a good command of the technology, the digital and foreign language. It would be easier for them to have this change in mindset. It's not so easy for the people that are many, many years in a specific way of a different culture or a management culture. But this is going to be very, very
29:50
helpful tool in the hands of professionals in order to create this kind of working things and then school at the beginning. It's a basic and start the design thinking project only it will have a team that shares the same culture. Not not always the case in our culture. We know that we cannot work as things. So it's very difficult to start. But I think that we have to start working on this. And in Italy in general, the Iranian countries have some problem in working in this.
30:26
They build walls between that. But this is Innovation 1.0. It's not innovation as you talk to. But we have to pursue there and you have to promote it. You have to have skills. All the skills are needed in order to proceed to this industrial revolution that has happened in our lives. And Eleni is making a very good point, says that in India, I think that the question is how to somehow change the mindset of the agrifood businessman to top design thinking.
30:59
And what I've seen, if I can make a suggestion on those lines, is that that is really dependent on country by country basis. But what is in common is that if we can enable champions of change, of acquiring design thinking, and we in a way create testimonials on how they are able to change their mindset and create videos or papers around their work, and we share that with other with other companies operating in the same area. I think that is really powerful.
31:38
Talking about design or beautiful design, it is as powerful as it can be. You will never be as powerful of showcasing real case example of somebody working in the same country. So I think the challenge here is how do we create these champions of design? And hopefully this is a material that we are putting together nowadays will inspire somebody in the agrifood sector to really do something about not only thinking about design, not only seeing the process, say how can we start to create change?
32:12
And that goes back to the culture. So culture always and that many different level of society. And I think the contribution of this project that you guys are putting together might generate that first input of change in culture, of the business, the businessmen operating in the agrifood sector. And the Bible says is the conclusion of the first web design thinking tries to solve very specific problems, not general problems of the enterprise.
32:45
So we should analyse the problem in a nonconventional way. That is absolutely right. That is my understanding. We need to focus mostly when we are not familiar with design, with a specific user that has a specific problem and try to focus on that as narrow as it can be. I think when we are not familiar with the topic, we need to start from a from kind of a very a well a frame problem. And then when we will become familiar with design thinking, then we eventually
33:25
can enlarge the scope of our initiative for design.
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