Reflection – Visualization

Challenge     I work in India as manager in LPG Plant. On daily basis more than 1 lakh cylinders are refilled in the  plant. In India more than 95% of the population depends upon LPG cylinder as fuel for cooking. It comes  under essential item category. During COVID-19 lock down, as per government order except essential  item industries and its distribution other business activity has to remain close until further order. And  because nearly every Indian depends upon LPG cylinder for cooking purpose we have to run our plant  for LPG supply. Nearly 1000 of people are working here including drivers who take cylinders from plant  to distributor end. Mostly workers and drivers are migrant labor and mostly they are dependent upon  local dhaba(small restaurant) for their food. But due to lock down they are unable to get food outside. In  our plant a small canteen is there for employees and the canteen is able to provide food for nearly 150  people and the canteen infrastructure is not enough for providing food to 1000 people. In such  challenging situation these workers are coming for job, so we decided we will provide free food to all of  them. But it was not simple decision for us in current situation.     Selection     Luckily, I joined this course at same time and I visualized that with help of design process I can find  better way to solve the above challenge. I was able to visualize that with systematic approach of design  process I can reach on optimum solution of above problem. And somewhere I know that it is simple and  small problem. But I tried to apply the knowledge from the course and it did provide practical  knowledge. It helped me also to convince my team member and manager for particular approach.      Application

A) What is:

First I made list of desired output (Design criteria) in this circumstances by meeting with  location in charge & colleague & I noted all the points which we want to achieve.

  We wanted to provide good food all the workers because we felt that in this challenging  situation they are working for company, and we made our approximate fund that we  can utilize for this facility and had to take permission from higher authority for sanction  of this amount.

  Develop temporary infrastructure for cooking the food and sitting arrangement for  workers.

  We have to arrangement everything with keeping in mind the Covid-19 norms such as  social distancing, avoid any gathering during meal and arrangements should be fully  hygienic.

  Decide the food menu with consideration that large workers present in the plant are  migrant workers.

For the entire above plan we formed a team including canteen supervisor, worker’s manager         and a  maintenance officer.

Reflection – Visualization

B) What if moment: As per above mentioned points, team had started brain storming to get out

solution for the mentioned problems. As time was very limited, we had to reach on some  concrete decision in first meeting itself and if any change was require that would be done during  execution time. After lots of discussion we had reached on conclusion. We would arrange sitting  arrangement next to canteen in a big club room. The club room would be utilized as dining room  on temporarily basis in addition to existing facility. We would arranged chair and table for sitting  arrangements. To accommodate large number of people we would increased lunch duration  from 2 hour to 4 hours. And we would arrange coupon system outside the canteen premises. So  at once we will give only limited coupons so that only limited people can take food. So, social  distancing can be followed. And we keep ready few food parcel if it is desired we can distribute  it to workers. Food menu was prepared for two days only; we thought on feedback from  different group we will decide the menu for remaining time in coming days. And we also discuss  menu item and quantity with canteen supervisor in detail, so the definite budget can be  decided. During making these decisions team knew some modification would be done during  execution part

C) What Wows and What Work: We started our plan in execution, with help of team member. We

completed our desire facility and Canteen was ready to supply the desire quantity of food. And  mostly things went in right direction as team thought but few decisions we changed. At first we  thought coupon issuing place should be adjacent to canteen but later we felt to fulfill Covid-19  norms it is better to issue food coupon near main gate. So that people will not accumulate in  and around canteen surrounding. We also painted circled at different places for queuing  purpose so people can stand at proper distancing.

We got many suggestions regarding food menu and we tried to accommodate item in menu                      without compromise on nutrition part of food. And I am happy that things are running  smoothly, here in India lock down has been extended and we are providing food to our workers  in same manner.

Insight and Approach    Above examples shows that even we can utilize design thinking method on our daily basis problem. It is  our visualization that we can get optimum solution when we utilize designing thinking. Visualizing a  problem helps us understand it ourselves and then gain consensus with others on it. It also allows us to  determine if we are all seeing it in the same way. When I approach for above problem I visualized in  myself that I can achieve target by utilizing the core concept of design thinking. I feel whole course  remain success to motivate us to think any problem in new way and take steps in very systematic way.  Visualization of solution to any problem gives us confidence and it also motivates us to take action as  early as possible.

Reflection – Visualization

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