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Unit 14: Evaluation

Given that my team came from a variety of backgrounds, I believe it would be best to evaluate our team efforts from a holistic standpoint. Thinking about all phases of the creative problem solving process, there are several ways we can evaluate our group performance. One evaluation method from the asynchronous material that might work well for my team is formative evaluation. It’s important to think about how each team member contributed to the process and grew from it given their unique skill sets. As a product designer, I did a lot of questioning and prototype development, whereas Janae looked at our project from a business standpoint and often brought us back to reality after brainstorming. (e.g. it wouldn’t make sense to evaluate Janae with the same product design metrics). Once we got to the implementation phase, I noticed more scheduling conflicts and fuzzy decision-making. I think we got to a point where we were too agreeable (in terms of completing the project) causing us to lose track of our main focus. For that specific case, I think it would be useful to establish a rubric in which each team member can numerically assess the project in their own time. Then, we might consider taking evaluation to a convergent level where we come together and discuss our thoughts. On a similar note, I think defining measurable goals during the selection phase would have been beneficial for my team. When we came together on Zoom, we set up reasonable milestones for each team member to complete before the next meeting; however, I think having a broader set of project goals to follow throughout the duration of our project would have given us a better framework to follow.

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Unit 13: Implementation Pt. 2

My team met on Saturday morning to discuss how we wanted to further our prototyping documentation. Utilizing various design tools such as task analyses, service blueprints, and user stories, we reflected on some of our key insights and what we thought worked well and what didn’t. While we didn’t completely pivot our idea, we noticed that we were moving away from our initial goal to better business ethics in the workplace, and shifting more towards improving business culture. We all agreed that we wanted to highlight how ethics plays a large role in workplace culture, so we divided up prototyping tasks accordingly. We decided to put our tasks into two categories: a more service-based approach and a user journey approach. Given we all have different backgrounds, figuring out how we would further our prototyping process was a bit of a challenge. However, I think my group did a better job of putting communication at the forefront of our meetings this past week. Usually, we’re very agreeable and divide tasks quickly, but this time each of us had a few different viewpoints on the product vision. We discussed how we could make our project more cohesive, how to integrate ethics to keep our vision consistent, and how to use storytelling to make a stronger product. While we all took different approaches, I look forward to our meeting this evening where we bring our separate ideas and thoughts together for discussion (moving from divergent to convergent). We used tools and techniques such as Miro, Figma, sketching and mind-dumping into Google Docs to generate visual assets. In the next few weeks, we plan to create a style guide, make mid-fi wireframes and make clickable prototypes. Furthermore, we plan to dive deeper into our user stories and create a compelling presentation centered around the people we’re designing for.

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Unit 12: Implementation

My group and I have used a number of different techniques to get the ball rolling on our project. One technique from Unit 12 that we unintentionally used was translating and digesting. Creating a communication tool and onboarding platform that helps new hires (and company stakeholders in general) is a rather large and ambiguous process, so we broke down what we had to do in smaller, digestible tasks that helped us paint the bigger picture. Another technique we used was understanding group dynamics. We’ve all taken on different roles that have helped us contribute in unique ways, while being a team player/helping out where we need to at the same time. Knowing what my team members are most interested in and comfortable with helps me figure out which tasks I should be responsible for. To visually communicate our idea, my group decided to each tackle various communication methods/design tools this week for our upcoming presentation. I created a basic landing page/wireframe last week, so I built out a complex task analysis going through every potential feature of our platform to gauge where improvement is needed. Chloe began working on a competitor analysis to better understand how we differentiate from other platforms, Janae took a human-centered approach and created a few user scenarios for our product, and Nick tackled a service blueprint. Personally, I think my group’s decision to utilize some of these design tools before moving forward with prototyping was a smart one because we’ve gathered quite a few insights through this design process that will give us more to work with as we finish this project. As we think about pitching to a variety of stakeholders, my team discussed using the TOAST format we talked about in class to convey our ideas: transparency, opportunity, analysis, strategy and transformation. This concise method will help us get our point across effectively and efficiently.

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Unit 10: Team Ideation

After reading one of our articles for class about group versus individual brainstorming, my team and I decided to do a little bit of both in order to generate some unique ideas. We met for an initial meeting where we laid the groundwork for our brainstorming. We discussed what our next steps would be for this particular assignment in Unit 10, then went into detail about the various pain points and successes surrounding our topic: business ethics. 

After our meeting, we individually brainstormed pain points, successes and potential solutions surrounding our topic in Miro by using the sticky note feature. After completing our individual work, we met again on Zoom the next day to discuss our findings. We each had a few unique ideas, but we noticed there was some overlap between our findings. We categorized our sticky notes into different sections, then “starred” / made connecting lines to the ideas that were similar. 

Once we analyzed each of our ideas, we combined ideas that we thought had potential to work well together and came up with our three solutions. Our three solutions ended up being:

A communication tool that leverages anonymous submissions to promote comfort

Promotion of cultural events to encourage learning about one another and advocating for diversity

In-depth onboarding process and training to establish better relationships with new hires and set a strong foundation for company morals

My team did a great job coming up with ideas in Miro and sharing their findings. While designing around business ethics might seem rather vague, our team has started to uncover the many complexities and layers around healthy and unhealthy work environments. I’m looking forward to diving deeper into this topic with my team and further ideating on the ideas we’ve already put into place.

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Problem Statement Documentation & Definition

When attempting to define our problem statement, my group got together for a brainstorming session over Zoom where we utilized the “mind dump” method by writing down anything that came to mind involving business ethics. After we came up with a bunch of bullet points, we sorted through them and mentally categorized each as positive or negative outcomes. To come up with a few more ideas that weren’t yet brainstormed, we each came up with a few examples of companies that exhibited positive business ethics and ones that seemed to have a lack of business ethics. We admired the practices of companies such as Ben & Jerry’s, Patagonia and Gravity Payments, in addition to discussing the lack of practices from companies like Theranos, Amazon, and Nestle. Once we felt like our business ethics mind dump was complete, we researched different ways to write a problem statement. We settled on these 7 points:

Describe how things should work.

Explain the problem and state why it matters.

Explain your problem's financial costs.

Back up your claims.

Propose a solution.

Explain the benefits of your proposed solution(s).

Conclude by summarizing the problem and solution.

We went through each of these points and wrote down how things should work in an ethics-oriented company, why implementing good business ethics and corporate social responsibility was important, the financial benefits and repercussions, came up with a few potential solutions and did some research to back up our claims. The following paragraph is an individual after-product of our brainstorming session: 

In running a successful company, business ethics are vital to maintaining a company’s positive reputation, establishing a healthy work environment, ensuring no legal or financial repercussions, and impacting society in a beneficial way. Companies have a responsibility to be transparent and meet the moral guidelines they set for themselves and their employees from the start. Ultimately, consumers, management and employees prosper in honest and safe environments that emphasize ethical practices — this is a big contrast to the Facebook and Theranos case studies we’ve analyzed that highlight a lack of business ethics. Many studies have shown that companies who exhibit strong corporate social responsibility often thrive in innovation, increasing profit, and retaining employees. It is pertinent for companies to involve all stakeholders necessary when making important decisions and to revisit their business ethics guidelines often. 

I’m looking forward to our next team meeting where we’ll be discussing our individual paragraphs and concluding what our group problem statement is. 

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Unit 9: Conjunction Junction

1. My French Bulldog’s name is Jojo and she has a brindle coat and is a bit chunky. She makes pig noises and loves to eat treats in the morning and takes naps all day. She enjoys going on car rides and gets excited when she hears the word, “walk.” | My French Bulldog’s name is Jojo but she has a brindle coat but is a bit chunky. She makes pig noises but loves to eat treats in the morning but takes naps all day. She enjoys going on car rides but gets excited when she hears the word, “walk.”

2. My 3D printer is an Ender 3 Pro and it’s all black. I was able to keep my printer if I passed Mechanical Engineering 104 and I named it Lola and it’s very loud. The alignment on Lola’s print bed often gets messed up and the prints come out wonky. Lola currently has a spool of black PLA and is in my closet until further notice. | My 3D printer is an Ender 3 Pro but it’s all black. I was able to keep my printer if I passed Mechanical Engineering 104 but I named it Lola but it’s very loud. The alignment on Lola’s print bed often gets messed up but the prints come out wonky. Lola currently has a spool of black PLA but is in my closet until further notice. 

3. My partner’s car is an S2000 and it’s white and it’s low to the ground. My partner’s car is a manual transmission and it’s a convertible and it has large, gold coilovers. His car has a red leather interior and it does not have AC currently. | My partner’s car is an S2000 but it’s white but it’s low to the ground. My partner’s car is a manual transmission but it’s a convertible but it has large, gold coilovers. His car has a red leather interior but it does not have AC currently.

4. My cousin’s glasses are large and round and have a black outline on the lenses. The sides of her glasses have a sparkly, gold trim and fit her face nicely. Her glasses have nose pads and are from a brand named Furla. The right lens of her glasses is thicker than the left and both lenses are slightly dirty. | My cousin’s glasses are large but round but have a black outline on the lenses. The sides of her glasses have a sparkly, gold trim but fit her face nicely. Her glasses have nose pads but are from a brand named Furla. The right lens of her glasses is thicker than the left but both lenses are slightly dirty.

5. My younger sister is taller than me and has brown eyes and a deeper voice. My sister has long brown hair and she has freckles on her face. My sister has a thin figure and very short fingernails and she has 5 piercings on each ear and she has bad asthma. | My younger sister is taller than me but has brown eyes but a deeper voice. My sister has long brown hair but she has freckles on her face. My sister has a thin figure but very short fingernails but she has 5 piercings on each ear but she has bad asthma. 

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CPS: Analysis Post

My initial thought process was to utilize the idea dump technique to bring up my own past experiences involving business ethics to light. I jotted down a few of my memories in my notes app and realized that my perception of business ethics from past jobs I’ve had were rarely positive. Another realization I had was that my experience with business ethics from my time at one particular company influenced my view on the topic in jobs I held after the fact. Knowing that I had to expand my view, I utilized the micro and macro techniques to conduct further research and honed in on the idea of fluctuating my perspective to gauge different qualities of the problem. Looking more specifically on how public influence has an effect on business ethics, I found an article from the Harvard Business Review that broke down the creation of an ethical culture into four pillars: explicit values, thoughts during judgment, incentives, and cultural norms. An additional technique I used was lateral thinking, a way to search outside of my expected disciplinary boundary to reveal more information through tangential exploration. In doing so, I found a Dartmouth article that discussed Supreme Court Policy decisions as well as the war in Iraq, as a way of summarizing how business leaders are more desirous of social approval than others think. Through my lateral thinking, I better understood how companies positively and negatively respond to public influence in relation to their actions/decision-making.

Main Learnings from Research (so far):

Public influence is the likeliness of businesses to listen and consider, when dealing with subtle pressures stemming from public unified voices (in other words: public opinion as a factor influencing companies).

Companies can respond to public opinion positively or negatively: with accountability and honesty (+) (inherent desire for businesses to justify their actions to those whose support they seek) or with defensiveness and reluctance (-) (instead of acknowledging their past mistakes, businesses will form defensive views) (Dartmouth).

Having explicit values such as a well-crafted mission statement can reinforce a broader ethical system that more employees will strive to follow (HBR).

“Ethical lapses can be reduced in a culture where ethics are at the center of attention (HBR).”

An ethical culture not only does good, but it feels good — employers often underestimate how their employees will feel when connecting with others in an impactful way. Moreover, companies that involve more than just financial incentives are likely to produce loyal employees (HBR).

Social norms often have a big impact on setting ethical standards in an organization.

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CPS: Acceptance Post

My group chose to explore the topic “business ethics” and I was assigned to study the subcategory “public influence” and how that plays into business ethics holistically. I enjoyed completing my part of the morphological analysis and diving deeper into the positive and negative “hows” that public influence has over business ethics, including accountability and honesty (+) as well as defensiveness and reluctance (-). Accepting to participate in this project and to personally explore public influence has been beneficial thus far because I’ve been able to defy my assumptions around the effect that public voices have over company considerations. Prior to this project, I put business ethics and social responsibility in the same category. I didn’t understand that business ethics involves knowing what is right or wrong for the company and its employees, whereas social responsibility is about understanding the impact one’s business is making in society. Moving forward, I better understand how public influence affects how companies either defensively justify their actions, versus how they seek accountability and own up to their decisions after being questioned by the public. Having business ethics lays the foundation for strategic decision-making and allows stakeholders to participate in the process. This is beneficial to me, especially as I navigate my professional career, because workers and leaders of a business are often characterized by their ethical behavior and socially acceptable decisions. Moreover, the incorporation of business ethics helps build and maintain reputation and relationships. Putting all business aside, maintaining strong morals and prioritizing my relationships is a high priority in my personal life. I think putting an emphasis on ethics in my professional life will further how I inclusively and effectively make decisions for the greater good and for myself too.

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Creative Problem Solving Methods Interviews

Sarah: Business Strategy at Adobe, Concert Photographer

1. Sarah generates ideas by looking at a lot of other artists for inspiration. She is mostly inspired when she sees work that’s a little more unconventional (whether that be using graphic design elements or bold colors), or work that evokes a deeper feeling (usually very cinematic photos that look like stills from a movie). Her main obstacle recently has been a lack of content because she hasn’t been able to shoot much concert photography since March of 2020. Another obstacle for her is lack of knowledge or ability - she’s had to self teach the entire way through with my photography, and recently I started to learn After Effects to create 3-D photos. Since this wasn't a skill that I previously had, I ended up watching a lot of YouTube tutorials to pick up basic skills. 

2. Once Sarah finds a few photos she’s inspired by after her shoot, she goes into Photoshop and edits each one individually. She’s not a huge fan of presets, because she thinks that each photo needs very specific and individualized treatment.  On top of the fact that she likes to add graphics to a lot of her images. Then, she’ll scroll through her own work and see what styles/types of photos have performed the best on socials in the past. She’ll use that as a point of reference when editing new photos. She has to be cognizant of engagement because in most cases, those photos are going to a publication that will repost them on Instagram. 

Sam: Social Media & SEO Management for a wellness startup 

1. Sam finds that he’s best able to generate ideas and find inspiration when he’s experiencing very little sensory input or just one or two main streams of sensory input and being present. He generally starts with playing music that fits the atmosphere of the objective he’s trying to reach as well. The main obstacle he faces when coming up with new ideas is analysis paralysis (thinking that an idea is too outlandish, too boring, or not unique). He typically overcomes this obstacle by making an effort to put himself in a headspace where he feels safe and confident internally. 

2. With most of his problem solving, Sam usually likes to start with a blank sheet of printer paper to organize information, thoughts, feelings, and ideas. He typically folds that piece of paper into 4 separate sections where he creates sections for objectives, processes, timelines, and miscellaneous. This folding method isn’t always the case for him though. Sometimes he’ll fold in half as well. It just depends on the problem presented. Starting off with a blank white sheet allows for almost any form of organization which is why it appeals to him.

 Jael: Founder of GT Goods, Content Creator

1. Jael generates ideas through asking himself questions such as how, when and where:

- How: Research adjacent/successful/new sources of relevant inspiration, who's killing it in this sector? Who's slept on? Who's failing? See what you like, what you don't like, what works, what doesn't. Think, “what is nobody doing?”

- When: When intentionally exposing himself to things he dreams about or aspires to achieve, during sunset cruises past nice houses by the beach, watching videos of cars he wants to drive, looking through product catalogues of goods he wants to provide. 

- Where: At home in his room browsing through online content, out in the world driving through neighborhoods he wants to live in, visiting stores that offer goods I'd like to design/produce, or local meetups/events around cars he wants to own.

Jael’s main obstacle is narrowing down on one design and limiting his involvement/invested-ness in his current work. He often overcomes this by reminding himself of the value of MVP (minimum viable product) concepts and fail-fast techniques to test for product success and market demand, and remembering that not everyone is going to notice the details he notices. 

2. Jael attempts to solve problems by using this method:

- Identify(ing) the problem at hand, isolating symptoms and possible scenarios.

- Research(ing) the problem and root cause, breaking it down into smaller parts, and understanding how and why it works. 

- Plan(ning) possible solutions, parts/information required to execute, mapping out goals, logistics, limitations, prepare plan A, B, & C. 

- Execut(ing) the plan. 

- Test(ing) the solution, gathering information acquired during execution, and evaluating success. 

- Monitor(ing) the solution for long term feasibility, reliability, sustainability. 

Main Takeaways:

Although I’ve never tried the folding method, my ideology probably resonates most with Sam’s problem solving techniques. Sam’s folding method allows him to break down the problem he’s attempting to solve in manageable chunks which is something I prioritize too, although I usually make a digital timeline which differs from his pen to paper method. I admired how one of Sarah’s techniques involved analyzing her old work to see “what didn’t work and what did” and apply those positive outcomes to her current work; this is something I don’t do nearly as often as I should. Similarly to Sarah, I almost always use Pinterest to gain inspiration for my design work or just to get my creativity flowing. Jael’s problem solving method reminded me of the design thinking process that I use when problem solving, but misses one of the most important steps I follow, which is empathizing. 

When reviewing each of their interviews, I thought their processes were all similar in the fact that they all focus on individual work. As someone that collaborates often with other designers and engineers, I sometimes forget the value of individual brainstorming and really checking in with myself before presenting ideas to others, which is something I can take away from these interviews. Jael’s process (identify, research, plan, test, execute, monitor) seemed to be more deliberate and calculated than Sarah’s process, as she more so relies on the various feelings evoked by different pieces of work as well as what people liked or disliked about her past work. On the other hand, Sam seems to utilize the environment around him in addition to his day-to-day feelings to generate ideas, then goes into organization-mode using his folding method to problem solve. 

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What is creativity?

In the simplest terms, creativity is starting out with nothing and ending up with something. To be creative, you must be able to let go of certainty and widely-accepted processes in order to look at things through a different lens. Creativity is having the confidence to lead with humility and sometimes naivety. Understanding that you don’t know everything and having the courage to ask questions can help foster creativity and lead to analogous ways of thinking. To spark creativity, one must be observant, mindful of their point of view, and with the understanding that their ideas carry energy.

As an engineering student, I used to think creative people were individuals who crafted beautiful paintings or studied the fine arts. Many times, I heard that one must be “right-brained” to be labeled as “creative.” However, even our day to day activities require some amount of creativity and ingenuity. To get from idea to execution, there has to be some willingness to work in a cross-disciplinary manner to make things happen. The creative process as a whole requires the use of many areas of the brain to execute properly. For me, creativity is the willingness to create without inhibition. It’s understanding how you think in a way that feels most natural to you and not worrying ahead about the end-product.