Day 1: Spotting problems
Founders start with people and problems, not with ideas.
Today's goal
By the end of today you can observe and interview people with empathy and write a focused problem statement.
Agenda
- Warm-upCategory, category15 min
- LearnDesign thinking in five modes15 min
- ActivityObservation walk: What? How? Why?35 min
- BreakBreak10 min
- LearnInterviewing for empathy15 min
- ActivityEmpathy interviews and an empathy map35 min
- ChallengeFrom findings to a point of view25 min
- Case studyCase: the canteen queue in Sharjah15 min
- ReflectWhat surprised you10 min
- QuizDay 1 quiz5 min
The session
Category, category
A quick, energetic warm-up from the d.school's list of short 'stoke' activities, used to get a group thinking fast before design work.
- Someone names a category, for example breakfast foods, things in a school bag or things that annoy people in traffic.
- Go round quickly, each person naming one item in the category within 3 seconds.
- If you hesitate or repeat an item, you start the next category.
- Finish with the category 'small daily frustrations' and write every answer down. Keep the list.
Solo
Set a 2-minute timer for each of five categories and list as many items as you can. End with 'small daily frustrations in my home, school or area'.
Group
Sit in a circle of 6 to 10. The facilitator keeps it fast and light. Collect the 'frustrations' round on one sheet for later.
Design thinking in five modes
The Stanford d.school teaches a human-centred way of solving problems. This week follows its five modes.
- Empathise: understand people by observing them, engaging with them in interviews and immersing yourself in their experience.
- Define: narrow what you learned into a focused problem statement, called a point of view.
- Ideate: go wide and generate many different possible solutions before choosing.
- Prototype: make ideas physical so you can learn from them. The d.school's phrase is 'We build to think and learn.'
- Test: put prototypes in front of people and use their reactions to improve both the solution and your understanding.
- The d.school also lists mindsets such as a bias toward action, showing rather than telling, and focusing on human values.
- Paul Graham, co-founder of Y Combinator, adds a warning: 'by far the most common mistake startups make is to solve problems no one has'.
Related lessons: Thinking like an entrepreneur: spotting problems worth solving, What Critical Thinking Really Is
Observation walk: What? How? Why?
You will watch people in an everyday setting and note what they actually do, using the d.school's What? How? Why? method.
- Choose a setting: your home at breakfast time, the school canteen, a family gathering, or a supermarket queue or car park pick-up only with a parent or guardian present.
- Spend 20 minutes observing quietly. Do not photograph people without permission.
- Divide a page into three columns. What: the plain facts of what people do, without assumptions. How: how they do it, including effort, workarounds and feelings shown.
- Why: only now make educated guesses about why. The d.school calls this stepping out on a limb of interpretation.
- Circle every moment where someone waits, repeats, improvises, complains or gives up.
- Produce: at least 10 observations and 3 circled 'friction moments'.
Solo
Observe your own household during a busy routine (mornings, grocery unpacking, getting ready for school), or go with a parent to a shop or mall.
Group
Teams of 3 observe different zones of the school or venue, always within supervised areas, then return and share their top 3 friction moments.
Break
Stretch, drink water and step away from screens.
- Rest for 10 minutes.
- Glance at your observations and star the one you are most curious about.
Interviewing for empathy
Observation shows what people do. Interviews help you understand why. These tips come from the d.school's Bootcamp Bootleg.
- Ask 'why' even when you think you know the answer.
- Never say 'usually' in a question. Ask about a specific time instead: 'Tell me about the last time...'
- Encourage stories, because stories show how people see the world.
- Look for inconsistencies between what people say and what they do.
- Watch body language, and do not rush to fill silences.
- Keep a beginner's mindset: do not judge, question everything and lose your own agenda.
- Safety: interview people you know or in supervised settings, tell a parent or guardian, and do not collect personal details you do not need.
Related lessons: Testing an idea cheaply: customer conversations and simple experiments, The art of conversation, Identity theft and protecting your personal data
Empathy interviews and an empathy map
You will interview real people about one friction moment and capture what you learn on an empathy map.
- Pick one friction moment from the walk. Write five open questions, starting with 'Tell me about the last time...'
- Run three interviews of about 7 minutes each. One person asks, one notes exact words.
- After each interview, draw an empathy map: Say (exact quotes), Do (actions), Think and Feel (your inferences, since the d.school notes these cannot be observed directly).
- Underline needs written as verbs (to feel ready, to save time), not nouns or products. The d.school says needs are verbs, not solutions.
- Produce: three empathy maps and a list of at least five needs.
Solo
Interview three family members or friends by phone or in person, with a parent or guardian aware. Write quotes word for word.
Group
In teams, take turns as interviewer, note-taker and interviewee. Interviewees can be students from other teams or invited adults. Anyone may decline a question.
From findings to a point of view
Now you narrow everything into one focused problem, using the d.school's point of view template.
- Saturate and group: write each interesting finding on a sticky note, cover a wall or table, then cluster related notes.
- Name each cluster in a short headline.
- Write a point of view: '[User] needs to [need] because [surprising insight].' For example: 'Year 11 students who commute by bus need to revise in short bursts because their journeys are split into 10-minute chunks.'
- Turn it into three 'How might we' questions, for example 'How might we make a 10-minute bus ride feel like useful revision?'
- Score the problem 1 to 5 on frequency, pain, existing workarounds and whether you can reach these people (the method in lesson en-01).
- Produce: one point of view, three How might we questions and a score.
Solo
Use sticky notes on a wall or door. Read your point of view aloud to someone and ask if it sounds like a real person.
Group
Each team posts its point of view; other teams add one question on a sticky note. Teams keep their best HMW for Day 2.
Related lessons: Thinking like an entrepreneur: spotting problems worth solving
Case: the canteen queue in Sharjah
A realistic scenario to practise telling a real problem from an assumed one.
- Mariam, 16, notices a long canteen queue at her school in Sharjah. Her first idea is a pre-order app.
- She interviews six students. Four say the queue is fine; what annoys them is that their favourite items sell out before break.
- Two younger students say they skip lunch because they feel uncomfortable in the crowd.
- Question 1: What problem did Mariam assume, and what problems did she find?
- Question 2: Write a point of view for one of the real problems.
- Question 3: Which interview tip helped her most, and why might an app still be the wrong first step?
Solo
Answer the three questions in your notebook in 10 minutes.
Group
Discuss in teams for 8 minutes, then two teams share their point of view.
What surprised you
Founders learn most from surprises. Capture yours before they fade.
- Write the most surprising thing someone said today.
- Note one assumption you held this morning that turned out wrong.
- Complete the journal prompts below.
Solo
Write for 10 minutes without stopping.
Group
Write alone for 6 minutes, then share one surprise in a quick round.
Day 1 quiz
Five quick questions on today's ideas.
- Answer the questions below.
- Check the explanations for any you missed.
Block timer
Your journal
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Day 1 quiz
Score 80% or more to complete Day 1.
1. Which sequence matches the five design thinking modes taught by the Stanford d.school?
2. Which interview question follows the d.school's advice?
3. Which is the d.school's point of view template?
4. According to the d.school, how should needs be written?
5. What does Paul Graham call by far the most common mistake start-ups make?
Overnight challenge
Keep a problem diary for the evening: every time you or someone at home says 'I wish' or 'why is it so hard to', write it down with who said it. Bring at least five entries tomorrow.
Sources
- Stanford d.school: Bootcamp Bootleg, design thinking methods guide (copy hosted by the University of Kent)
- Stanford University, ME113 course page: A Design Thinking Process (content courtesy of ReDesigning Theater, linking to the d.school)
- Paul Graham (Y Combinator co-founder): How to Get Startup Ideas (November 2012)