Challenge:

In one of my first projects as a professional engineer, I was asked to develop a lighting control

system for The Jefferson Memorial building in Washington, D.C.  The building was undergoing  renovations to clean and enhance the appearance, and my organization, a global lighting control  manufacturer was bidding to provide the lighting system.  As I approached this challenge, I wanted to  ensure that I was designing a product that served the needs of the National Parks Service who maintains  the property, but to also ensure that the system would delight visitors to the exhibit which would  number in the millions.  Even a “backstage” product like lighting can influence the mood of visitors;  when it works you may never notice, but poor lighting will stand out when not designed well.  This was  an opportunity to drive a large sale for my company and improve a national landmark.

With this challenge, we understood that our existing product line might not be a perfect fit for

this situation, and we would need to evolve our product in addition to our pitch.  Our typical solution for  lighting controls was used in corporate office buildings, and we understood that enhancing our product  could lead to additional uses in the future.

Selection:

To evolve our product, and potentially enter a new type of application for our product, it was

important to get close to our customers, and understand their needs.  And, to truly get a sense for  “What Wows”, we needed a means to understand our customers as much as the challenges they faced,  and to use the opportunity to brainstorm new opportunities.

For this challenge, I chose to implement the Storytelling tool where I on the design team would

meet with key stakeholders and ask them questions without jumping to the process of formed  conclusions.  My company afforded me the ability to travel to the Jefferson Memorial, and take the time  to speak with our prospective customer (the National Parks Service) to understand what challenges they  faced with their existing system.  Our stakeholders were responsible for the upkeep of the memorial,  along with many other national sites and buildings.  Visiting the site also allowed for the ability to  engage tourists that were visiting the memorial to get additional perspectives on what they appreciated,  and potential opportunities.  Meeting with stakeholders in their “home” environment allowed for  conversation to develop, and for these stakeholders to share their stories and experiences.

Application and Insight:

When you visit a historic site, or a national monument, the location itself has a story to tell.  In

addition to meeting with our stakeholders, I wanted to ensure that the site had an opportunity speak as  well.  The Jefferson Memorial sits on a tidal basin of the Potomac.  On my first sight visit, I noticed that  you could look across the basin and see the National Mall, with the White House in the distance.  The  large Thomas Jefferson statue within the memorial overlooks the basin focused directly on the White  House.  This along with other input was ultimately refined into an unexpressed need that the north side  needs to have openness and focus to allow visibility from other key landmarks.

When meeting with the National Parks Service onsite, the first think I observed was that we just

met on the steps of the memorial.  After asking questions about their roles, their support duties, their  commutes, etc., I found out that each member of the service supported multiple locations, and their  office was in a separate location.  They had no onsite presence at the memorial, which they shared was

a point of frustration, especially when the site needed maintenance like changing a light bulb.  Further,  the lights used at the memorial were the large gymnasium style bulbs, which required a special order to  obtain them.  For maintenance, this required periodic site visits to just check if the lights were on (often  after hours for the staff), and then a subsequent visit to schedule and install the bulb once it had been  ordered.

We had used power metering technology in some of our lighting control products and thought

this would be a great application – when the lights turned on, calibrate the system to understand how  much power each circuit draws.  Then, monitor the power continuously to determine when the power  drops (e.g. a bulb is burned out).  The system could maintain a database of power measurements and  the type of bulbs used, and email a member of the National Parks Service any time a power reduction  was observed, with the model number of the bulb needed to order.  This ultimately helped to reduce  the amount of time that it took for the National Parks Service to become aware of an issue, and to  ensure that the lighting was replated in a timely manner.

I also took the opportunity to speak with tourists in the area, at multiple times per day.  The

feedback from the tourist during the daytime was relatively positive, although nighttime exposed  different reactions, especially whin visiting other monuments at night.  When at the Lincoln Memorial, I  asked one tourist “Will you be heading to the Jefferson Memorial tonight as well”?  The tourist indicated  that they had stopped there first, although left quickly because it was dimly lit and they did not feel safe  (check; need more lighting to aid the feeling of public safety).

Overall, the project was a resounding success.  Not only did we win the bid for lighting controls

because of our demonstration of power monitoring and proactive notifications when lights burned out,  but the memorial saw an overall increase in tourist traffic, especially in the evening hours.  Shortly after  the project completed, there was a Monday Night NFL game broadcast.  Once feature shot was a flyover  of the Jefferson Memorial shining brightly against the D.C. backdrop.

Approach:

Overall, the approach worked very well.  The process of learning through story telling was the

right tool to discover potential pain points that were not evident in the original request for proposal.   Identifying these unmet unexpressed needs was the key to success in this project.  If anything were to  be done differently, I would say it would be worthwhile to expand the number of conversations held  with stakeholders identifying a broader base and more personas.  A large number of stories would help  to reinforce the themes discovered, and potentially develop additional personas or thems.

