Reﬂection - Visualisation

Challenge and selection

I was hired as an mechanical R&D engineer at a ﬁrm which was trying to work on solving trash crisis with local municipal corporation. After joining the position, I got to know I was the only one in the department of design and prototyping the whole thing. My engineering brain kicked in, I designed a domestic trash compactor and presented it to the board. Green-lighted, we proceeded to producing the samples and exhibited it at the local expo, but it was not selling. No one was interested. Price wasn’t the issue, it was the design. We headed back to the lab to start from scratch, but this time, I wanted to design everything with customers in mind. Most of the customers are not engineers, point was not to take mechanical advice from them, it was to have a pleasing design. For that, we used the visualisation approach.

Application

Prior to designing the product again from scratch, we invited the ”potential” customers for a focus group. Instead of showing the product right away, we performed a presentation about the product and what we are going for. Later in the session we handed them a paper with a bare naked design of the product. We provided them with colouring pens and asked them to modify it as though it is in their kitchen. The design had engineering constraints in place, but we asked them to change any and all the aspects that they desire, but none had changed anything in regards to the mechanisms but only the exterior designs. Knowing that the group was diverse in terms of social and economic status, each had their own take on the design. Some concentrated more on the colour of the product, some were into the jaggedness and curviness of the design, some also pointed out the diﬃculty in operating the machine. In the next phase, we segregated the designs and found out that, the customer design require- ments had some particular pattern. Some aspects were accepted and desired by many. We went forward with one design that had almost all the popular modiﬁcations. We arranged another fo- cus group, with diﬀerent people this time, and we presented the manufactured prototype. It was received well, group knew how to operate without instructions, the design was liked by everyone. When asked about any comments on the design and handful of changes were suggested, mostly were related to somethings that are post-manufacturing. During the next expo, we presented it again, and was very successful sales numbers.

Insight & Approach

What this whole encounter taught me, is that, verbally people understand everything slightly diﬀerent from each other. Engineering numbers and design may seem daunting to layperson. What pleases the stake holder is sometimes diﬀerent from what customers want. Visualisation approach streamlined so many things in the design process. Giving the focus group a bare minimum yet technically sound design and letting them draw their imagination on top of it, no matter how crude the picture is, it helped me in the process of designing and also in understanding what appeals and what doesn’t. It goes beyond verbal explanation of what needs to be changed, it dives into the

core of the problem. I have been using this method ever since, even with the shareholders, fellow engineers and marketing department. The method is to give them a minimum picture and make it better visuals. This doesn’t compromise the engineering aspect, but it streamlines the design and prototyping process really well.

