Lecture 7

1. Lecture 7 9/11/11

2. Documentum Salient Points: • Effectively identified a problem • Built a technical solution • Good management team • Issues: • How to choose a target market? • Vertical versus Horizontal • What type of sales team do they need?

3. Documentum Questions: • What did Documentum learn from the first two customers? • Should they go with the insurance company deal? • Is Moore’s approach to selecting the market a good one for the company? • Differences between vertical and horizontal market?

4. Documentum Sales Strategy???

5. Lead Users • Two characteristics of lead users (von Hippel, 1988) • Experience needs months or years ahead of time that will be general in the market • Stand to benefit significantly from a solution of the needs. • Lead users have the competence or knowledge to innovate.[10]

6. Advantages and Disadvantages of Lead Users • Advantages: • It is usual to run a workshop with extreme and analogous users, to develop product concepts. • Workshops brings together very different users and stimulates creative discussions. • Can be combined with experimentation, to test the concepts identified in the workshop. • Disadvantages: • Difficulties in identifying lead users. • Workshop is time-consuming and lead users may need to be motivated to give their time. • Workshop is outside the normal working environment.

7. Traditional Approaches • Traditional market research uses mainly: • Surveys • Questionnaires • Interviews • Focus groups. • Traditional market research compares existing products serving similar customers.

8. Empathic Design • Defined as “the creation of product or service concepts based on a deep(empathic) understanding of unarticulated user needs”[5] • Empathic design is a relatively low cost, low-risk way to identify potentially critical customer needs.[6] • Empathic design techniques include gathering, analysing, and applying information gleaned from observation in the field. • The foundation of empathic design technique is Observation conducted in the customer’s own environment, but also includes discrete observation and contextual interviews.

9. Observation • This directly assesses the use and potential of products rather than customers’ perceptions. • Occurs in the customers’ own environment. • The key to effective observation is the preparation of a good coding scheme. • The coding scheme gives the observer points to watch for and therefore prevents oversights. • This generic coding scheme is comprised of seven categories of data forcing the observer to look at not only how the product fits into the user’s overall environment but also to look for signals that indicate unarticulated needs.

10. Observation • A good observer will seek subtle signs such as; • extra-linguistic signals – Speed and emphasis in speech • non-verbal signals – body language • Spatial signals – proximity of a user to others or objects • It is important to note that actions can be influenced by the presence of the observer. • Time Consuming • Analysis can be complex • Observation is a difficult skill to learn

11. Discrete Observation • Users are observed without their knowledge or permission. • Only viable for consumer products and services that are used in public. • Advantage • Vital information can be obtained. • Disadvantage • Can raise ethical issues. • Type of usage that can be discretely observed might not be typical.

12. Contextual Interviews • Conducted in the user’s environment. • Focuses discussions with customers or users on the physical aspects of their environment. • Semi-structured interview script that concentrates on key steps of product usage.[8] • Produces verbal data on product usage that might not be generated in pure observation of a single user working alone. • Focuses on how the customer “feels” during the service delivery process.

13. Empathic Design: the Process • Step One: Observation • Who should be observed? • Who should do the observing? • A small team, each member in which has expertise in a different discipline. At least one member should have experience in behavioural observation and another should have an in-depth knowledge of organisational capabilities. Each team member must have an open-mind, observational skills, and curiosity. • What behaviour should be observed? • Step Two: Capturing Data • This can be completed through visualisation • Photography and video recording are popular approaches used by empathic-design teams.

14. Empathic Design: the Process cont.. • Step Three: Reflection and Analysis • Team members reflect on what they observed and review any visual data with other colleagues. • Team identifies all of its customers; possible problems and needs. • Step Four: Brainstorming for Solutions • Valuable part of any innovation process • Brainstorming can transform the observations into graphic, visual representations of possible solutions.

15. Empathic Design: the Process cont.. • Step Five: Developing Prototypes of Possible Solutions • Prototypes are critical for the following reasons: • Prototypes clarify the concept of the new product or service for the development team. • They enable the team to place its concept in front of other individuals who work in functions not formally represented on the team. • They can simulate reaction and foster discussion with potential customers of the innovation.

16. Advantages and Disadvantages of Empathic design • Advantages: • Increasingly used to focus on users’ problems. • Gives an in-depth understanding of customers’ and users; product use models. • Contextual interviews are “in vivo” and the environment gives valuable information. • Disadvantages: • Effective observation is not easy and using specialists may be the best approach. • Vast amounts of qualitative data may be generated, which requires effective analysis strategies.