The human face of product development

How can you ensure products really satisfy the needs and desires of the people for whom they have been made? One way may be to adopt the methods of ethnography, the science of studying human behaviour in the field. Now known as Contextual Innovation, this new approach has been pioneered in India and since taken to the US. History, of course, is littered with products that met design specifications first time, yet failed commercially. A prominent UK example has to be the Concorde airliner, which did everything expected of it, yet only 16 machines were sold, because ultimately most of its customers wanted lower fares rather than the shortest possible journey time. Apala Lahiri Chavan, managing director of Human Factors International India, points to other, more recent, market failures. In India, for example, European-designed washing machines sold badly, until investigations found that this was because they tend to catch and tear saris. In rural parts of China, a similar marketing problem led to an investigation that discovered people in rural areas were washing sweet potatoes in their washing machines, which were becoming clogged with mud. Once the problem with washing saris was recognised, washing machine manufacturers changed the way the drum works. “They developed one that does not have any projections inside and came up with a special wash cycle, initiated by a button that clearly says ‘Saris’ on it,” states Chavan. Similarly, in China, the sweet potato issue was overcome when the manufacturer devised a rinse cycle with clean water and a separate mud outlet. Undertaking initial research also has its problems. “You have to be very sensitive,” stresses Chavan. “Video is often too intrusive. In China, you cannot photograph anything in the bedroom and, in India, the same applies to the room used for prayers.” Also, people often give replies they think they ought to give during interviews, rather than telling the truth. She cited the example of an office in the US where the field workers said they made full use of the software on their laptops, whereas the computers were actually left behind in the cupboard. So, how do you overcome this? Good initial probing questions are one proven means. In a study of designs for ATM machines in India, the team came up with the idea of little books of tickets called an ‘emotion ticket’. ”Each ticket looked like a cinema ticket,” she explains,” and was associated with a different emotion: anger, surprise, happiness, loathing, courage, disgust, despair, mirth and pity.” In other words, the ‘nine rasas’ in Indian performing arts, as depicted by illustrations derived from Bollywood films. However, for China, they use Jungian Archetype Folk Probes, where people associate how they feel about a product or service idea with characters from Chinese mythology. Chavan highlighted recent studies that have led to commercial products, including Eduwise – an Intel product conceived for use in schools in developing countries, to be launched in Brazil in July. Eduwise came out of a brief to devise a very low cost computing device to aid lower middle class students in India. The process involved observing and talking to students, parents, teachers and administrators, where it is was established that schools did not have the money to employ enough teachers. The solution, it was decided, was to provide students with very low cost notebooks that could be used to take notes and wirelessly send questions to the teacher’s notebook, which he or she could then answer after class. There were also many other cultural challenges and sensitivities to be addressed. At the same time, the team found that parents were not happy about the idea of students taking notes by typing, since students in India still have to handwrite their examination scripts. Hence the team came up with the idea of using a pen and screen that would allow notes to be handwritten and stored. The team also found that young students had to carry a heavy load of text books to school and that these were expensive, so the notebooks needed to have enough capacity to store large amounts of reference information. Teachers had additional needs, so the plan includes more advanced machines for teachers, coupled to projectors and printers, to create and display coursework. The final concept came after extensive analysis of the research data, along with brainstorming sessions with industrial designers, market analysts, business analysts, psychologists and technology experts, designed to maximise revenue. The final four design options for Eduwise were carefully reviewed before a commitment was made to an initial production of 300,000 units. Pointers * Adopting the methods of ethnography – the science of studying human behaviour in the field – can help to ensure that products satisfy the needs of the people for whom they have been made * It is not enough to consult market analysts to come up with a product strategy – somebody has to study the ultimate user and find out how they do things, which might mean watching them use the product in their homes * The idea has been successfully applied to a wide range of potential products in homes, schools, offices and healthcare