Page - 172 - in The Future of Software Quality Assurance

172 M.F. Tannian 5 Challenges ofDesign Thinking Design thinkingdoesnotmitigateall the risk of innovation.At times it mayappear tomakeinnovationmorerisky.Aninnovationthat involvespeopleisbestdonewith input from the affected users. Avoiding the user community results in a design that is based on assumptions that lack validation prior to release. These assumptions start with the problem definition and continue to the ultimate design outcome. Design thinking provides an approach to gathering, interpreting, and responding touser insights.Thissectionexploressomeof thechallengesdesign thinkingeither introducesordoesnot fully resolvefor thedesign team. Design thinking is not a cooking recipe (i.e., gather listed measured ingredients, prepare ingredientsas specified, assemble, cook,andenjoy) for innovativesuccess. The dimensions of problem domain, team composition, level of design thinking expertise, cooperating users, available materials and parts, supplier relationships, market timing, market conditions, budget, business climate outside of the team, and the state of the art individually and in combination may fatally hinder the design project or the ability to realize monetary value or brand elevation from its result. Diversity of users within the targetedmarket is desired in order to recognize the breadthofpreferences, taskvariety,anduserchallengeswithin theproblemdomain as well as challenges with the design alternatives. Some of the most informative users are those who “suffer” from “restless-user syndrome.” This nonmedical condition presents itself as perpetual dissatisfaction with the products and services at hand combined with imaginings of capabilities, features, and qualities not yet considered or have been discarded. An “afflicted” person understands the task objectivesandthat thesetasksarelargelyindependentoftechnology,but technology stronglyinfluences themanner inwhicha task isperformed.Locatingrestlessusers foryourcooperatinguserpoolmaynotbeeasy;however,theyareextremelyhelpful. Regular users are needed as well. They are able to share with the team reasonable and useful perspective on what is present in an alternative. However, a restless user will also guide the design team deeper into the problem domain or suggest things not previously considered. A challenge is to find a diverse set of restless users. Basing design decisions on user input can be puzzling. Unlike electrical and mechanical measurements like speed, distance, height, or voltage, locating and interpretingrelevantinsightsandrelatingthemtoeachother is relativelymorecom- plicated. User-based signals are embedded in noise of uncertainty,unique personal preferences,distracted thought, limited imagination, inconsistent rapport, language shortcomings,and inter- and intra-user inconsistency.Team members familiar with interpreting user session results will be needed to identify commonality, useful suggestions,andguidingdirection.