Design thinking action lab : redesign lockers process.

1. Problem solving
process
Design thinking Action Lab

2. 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.

3. 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.

4. 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.

5. 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?

6. 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?

7. 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?

8. define costs of the solutions
How much would it cost? Is the solution
affordable for the school?

9. 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.

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

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