05 Human Centered Design
Amanda Damewood (https://twitter.com/AmandaDamewood), Human Centered Design Coach, drives a chat about Human Centered Design and how you can harness it as your secret super power.<br><br>### Resources and Shoutouts:<br>- [Ideo] (https://www.ideo.org)<br>- [+Acumen] https://www.plusacumen.org<br>- [International Design in Government Community] (https://designnotes.blog.gov.uk/2017/12/11/growing-the-international-design-in-government-community/)<br><br>##### Music Credit: [Tumbleweeds by Monkey Warhol](http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Monkey_Warhol/Lonely_Hearts_Challenge/Monkey_Warhol_-_Tumbleweeds)
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- service design 0.006
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Transcript
Hello. I'm Ryan Cook, and this is Civic Tech Chat, a podcast about the civic technology movement. We seek to harness the power technology has to improve the delivery of public services to people everywhere. Joining us is Amanda Damewin, a former Code for America Fellow and service designer. Amanda currently runs her own human centered design coaching firm, which fits right in with our topic for today. So let's go ahead and hop right into the discussion. Amanda, thank you so much for joining us on the program today. Can you introduce yourself to our audience and tell us a little bit about your background?
Sure. My name is Amanda Damewood, and I'm a human centered design coach. My website is www.hcdcoach.com. And, I guess we're gonna spend a little bit of time talking about what that means, so I won't go into it too far. But I am based in the Bay Area. And before I did what I'm doing right now, I was at Code for America. So a lot of love for the civic tech community.
Absolutely. Now you mentioned you were a human centered design coach. What is that?
So when I was at Code for America, I worked with a lot of folks throughout, the workforce development system specifically, but was also privy to a lot of other people's work. And, they were really excited about doing human centered design work. But they go to workshops and get really pumped about, a thing that they learned to do, whether that was talking to users or making a journey map. And then they come back to their office and they kind of have this one skill or this one technique or tool that they learned, and they didn't really know much about what to do with it next. And so I'd be talking to folks and, I'd say, oh, I heard you went to a a design workshop. What did you learn? And they tell me, you know, know, oh, we made this journey map. We're really excited. We stuck it up in our break room. And I say, oh, that's really great. What are you gonna do with the journey map now that you put it up in your break room? And they'd say, oh, you know, when we're drinking our coffee and and chatting, you know, we like to look at it or sometimes we'll talk about it. And I said, great. What do you talk about? And they'd say, oh, how nice it is that we went to that workshop or that we have this journey map in our break room, which is not really what a journey map is for. You know? A journey map is a a start start of a process. And, so I just heard a lot of need for follow-up after those workshops, and that's where the idea of the coaching piece was born, which is instead of just going to a workshop and learning something in two hours or four hours and coming back and trying to teach this really, maybe subtle is a good word for it, concept to your colleagues or your coworkers, you can actually have someone to follow-up with you and say, hey. How's it going? You know? Where does it, feel good? Were you having some problems? Kind of like an athletic coach or a life coach would do for you.
Oh, I could definitely see the value in that follow-up. I I also like that you mentioned the relation to things like like a fitness coach. Because it's definitely something that I myself have had experiences in requiring that follow-up. Out of curiosity, how did you wind up in the field as a design coach like that?
Well, it's a it's a story with a lot of twists and turns, but the short version basically is, I was working in nonprofits for a while, and became I guess, was sort of always interested in things like continuous program improvement and, did the plus acumen human centered design course a few years ago, which is a great course, that I recommend folks check out if they're interested in dipping their toe into the field. But like I said, I live in the Bay Area, and it's really expensive here. And I kept finding myself in jobs that were a little bit of that human centered design or continuous program improvement kind of job duties. And then the other part of the job duties would be things I really hated doing, like, just really dense administrative work. And to be honest, stuff I wasn't very good at either. And so kind of recognizing, you know, the what I was really passionate about was the human centered design piece, which is, you know, bringing in your clients or your customers into your, process for deciding about programs or policies and then, taking your own expertise and figuring out how to best implement that. That was really what got me excited to get out of bed in the morning. And so I had a friend who was a graphic designer, and she said, you know, you really care about customer service and customer success, and you have a great eye for detail. Why don't you do this, UX boot camp? I don't know if the listeners are familiar with UX boot camps, but, basically, it's like a condensed course that then when you're done, you're all set to enter your new field. And I completed the UX boot camp and then found myself working for, profits put on, like, website projects and technology work. And that's initially how I ended up at Code for America. And that's when things got kinda interesting. Because at Code for America, I thought I'd be working mostly on, making a couple of websites, is the short answer again. And I was working with, economic development departments. And, really, for those of you that work in economic development, I'm sure you know that it is not very straightforward if you don't have any economic development, experience in your background. And so there were a lot of things that we needed to do in real life to make that process easier for people, whatever it was. So getting a business license, getting construction permits, whatever that is, I couldn't just fix the website. I also had to fix the permit desk experience, or I also had to fix, you know, what was it like to get information out about public meetings. And that idea of connecting what we call touch points, public meetings, calling people on the phone, permit desk, website, I was hooked. And I found out that that was called service design. So I looked for, jobs when my fellowship was coming up in service design. And, it wasn't quite as big of a field then, which was just about a year ago, believe it or not, as it is now because it's really exploded, and ended up sticking around in Code for America where I worked on some service design stuff in the workforce development field and also a lot of coaching and capacity building. And that was where I started to hear those stories like I was telling you about, you know, the journey map that just lives on a wall or, that people were excited to keep talking to their customers, but they get kind of, confused about when to stop talking to customers and when to start trying to make something. And so that was when I really felt like, there was a big need in the field, and I felt excited to jump in and and do this work.
Wow. That sounds like quite a journey going from a a start with, like, a boot camp education into then honing it into this the service design elements that you discovered to then ending up running your own firm doing that sort of work. That is that's incredible. And you definitely sound like you're the poster child for that whole, lifelong learning and training mantra. That that yeah. That that's a really cool story. Now with the the how much work that probably was, I definitely have to ask the question, what is your personal why? What what drives you towards doing these things as you wake up every day?
Sure. I mean, there's a lot of things. I have a sister with a disability, so I grew up with the the very real fact that the world is designed for most people, but not all people. I lived overseas for three years and came away with having faced a reality where I was living somewhere where people are making decisions for me because I wasn't able to be part of political processes. Filing lots of visas and being married to a legal permanent resident also, has given me a lot of window into, like, why process and government policy transparency is really important. And, I think all that stuff kind of ladders into, this idea that when you include people in processes and make sure that they reflect the needs of the people that they're serving, they're more effective for government, they run better for government, as well as actually meeting those needs of the people in the community.
That's fantastic. You definitely have solid ground, under you as a foundation for what you're doing, and that that that is a really good place to start. So I think that's a good way for us to start into our topic as there's probably listeners out there that are going, okay, Ryan and Amanda. You've said human centered design a few times now. Well, what is that? So, Amanda, could you describe for us what that is at a high level, for folks that aren't quite as well versed in in the concept?
Sure. Of course. So human centered design is this this idea, and you might hear it called user centered design or a user experience design. Service design is sort of a similar, take on a lot of the same ideas. But, basically, human centered design just means that we should be designing for humans. There's a long tradition of humanism in design and, just making sure that instead of, you know, this mythological Steve Jobs kind of figure goes out to the mountain top and has a vision and comes back and tells people about the iPhone, you know, that's great if everybody had that kind of, ability to observe people and internalize it and then instinctually move towards solutions. But at the end of the day, it's not very effective because it requires you to have all these skills that we don't all have. And so, human centered design basically starts with people, starts with people going out and talking to other people, and then coming back and listening to listening might be the wrong word. But, you know, taking that information that they got from people that they talk to in interviews or, through work workshops and using their experience as designers to create something small and then put that out in the world and see if that actually solves the need that they thought they heard from folks. So it's a lot different than how government in the past has approached things where, you know, you gotta nail the requirements, and then you build this big, big project or go through this lengthy process. And it's much more about, trying something and making sure it works. And then as it works, building something bigger, more permanent, more complicated, etcetera, etcetera.
I can definitely hear you there. In fact, in in tech in the technology side of things, I think there's a bit of a trap in thinking that the design is really just about, you know, making something pretty, and then that's where where it stops. And I'm getting that perhaps that might be something that happens in government as well for from your answer from the last question. But what I get from the sense of doing doing my reading before talking to you is that it should start earlier than that, that it should be part of the problem finding and solving stages as you then go forward into what what comes next. In in your view, how can one ensure that that human element is there from the beginning and not just pretty stuff thrown in the middle?
Yeah. That's a great question. So I think that the hardest thing about that is that people are really familiar with design in the sense of, like, graphic design or graphic design or maybe industrial design, interior design. And what you experience with those is a beautifully designed poster or a comfortably designed chair or, you know, a well put together, office experience or or living room or something like that. And you don't really see what the process is that goes into it because design isn't really about a finished product. Design is about the process that you go through to find a solution to a problem. And so once you think of it that way, there's actually a huge part of the design field called strategy. And, design strategists play a big role inside design agencies and other places where there are a lot of designers. Sometimes in technology, especially in smaller organizations, there's just one designer, and they're kind of stuck on that, UI side of things. But, really, the sooner you get someone that's trained in design thinking and comes to things with the human centered design point of view, the better your output's gonna be because what happens is they know what they need to think about, and they know where to look, and they can help organize that for you. So, you're talking about how can we ensure that the human element is there from the beginning. And, basically, the best way to do that is to make sure that you're talking to the people that you're gonna serve from the beginning. So in other words, instead of having a solution in mind, having questions in mind, Instead of saying, you know, we need a website, going out and saying, you know, people seem to have a hard time, getting through our permit desk process. We think it should only take three months. What's standing in their way instead of, I think we just need
So I'm hearing from you that there's a big emphasis on asking that correct question. In your view, what are some good practices for trying to get to that? That, like, for example, like, that second question you asked that was better placed to to get to that to a solution. How do you focus on the right thing?
I think a big part of that is kinda focusing on, data you already have. So, you know, a lot of the time, I think what's hard for people when they start a human centered design process is they think that they're just supposed to, intuit some kinda, like, question from somewhere. And it's not that not that easy. So one of the things that I talk about when I work with government clients is, like, where do you already have data? So who do you, what do you have records of? What do you have electronic records of? Who's enrolled in your services? Who shows up to your workshops and signs in on your sign in sheets? If you have access to and feel comfortable with Google Analytics, then you can always look there. A lot of people don't or aren't, and that's okay. And so as you look at who's on your worksheet or, you know, your workshop sign in sheets and you look at the different populations that are participating in your programs, you can kinda start to ask questions, based on, excuse me, the trends that you see. So you might say, you know, gosh. We have a lot of people 45, or we have a lot of women, or we have a lot of parents. And you can kinda figure out who those people are that are coming, or maybe it highlights somebody that's not coming. You know? Maybe you realize that, oh, everybody has 45. We're all the 45. And that's when you can start having conversations with people and asking those questions that are uncovering the behavior that you need to know about. So, for instance, if you were trying to, improve workshop attendance for people 45, you might, come up with some questions like, when was the last time you attended a workshop? What sort of workshop topics would you like to see in the future? Right down to something like, we don't get too many people 45 in our workshops. Can you tell me why? Or, you know, would you attend this kind of workshop? Does this workshop seem like something for you? And then people will be able to answer those questions for themselves. And that's just one data point. But the more interviews you do, you'll hear,
themes, and then you can find those themes. And the themes are sort of what eliminates the next step in the path. So it sounds like data and the trends end up fueling a pretty significant chunk of how this process goes. And speaking of process, one of the other things I turned up is that there seems to be a six step process, one of the other things I turned up is that there seems to be a six step process to how this works that kind of forms a circle where Mhmm. You're you're observing things, you're coming up with ideas, you're creating prototypes, soliciting feedback, iterating, and then you have an implementation. And then I implementation, and then that kind of gets you your full circle. Could you talk a bit about, like, what that process looks like as as you go from one point to the next, kinda getting back around?
Sure. So observation that, is kind of that piece that I was just talking about. You know, it's like looking at your data. What do you have? What do you know? What do you wish you knew? What do you think you know that maybe you don't actually know about? Sometimes, when I'm starting out with clients, we do, assumption mapping, which is where you write down all the things that you think are true, and you kinda rate them on, like, how sure you are or how unsure you are versus how big of an impact they have on your program or program or project and how small of an impact they might have. And then going out and talking to people. That kind of all falls into the observation, step that IDEO describes. And so when you're done with that stuff and you've had time to sort of process it, look at it, and think about it, the next stage that IDEO outlines is ideation. And so a lot of people like to use the how might we framework. It's really good because how might we is, not something that says how can we. You know? It's not, what are we going to do? It's not putting a lot of pressure on people. So you can be very broad and, even silly. You know? And it's also got the word be in it, and that's really great because design is not a team sport. If you're just again, you know, Steve Jobs alone on the mountain top, you're not gonna be able to get as much stuff done as if you have a team. And so when you ask yourself and your team how might we do the thing that we, heard was a problem in in the observation stage, how might we solve for that, you can get all kinds of ideas. And so, for instance, you might hear that the problem for people since I since this is my example from earlier, people 45 aren't coming to your workshops. Maybe they think that it's not, not got enough technology, and they know that they really need to have more technology skills to be in the workplace. So then you could say, how might we incorporate technology skills into our workshops? You know? So it's not how might we incorporate computer skills, which is different than iPad skills, or, how might we incorporate word processing skills, you know, because that's a very specific part of technology. But it's, keeping things open and broad. Just kinda letting us, let the mind wander and kind of see what connections arise for you, which might sound a little fluffy maybe to people. But, you know, at the end of the day, what you're gonna do next is ground that and prototyping. So you're not gonna spend a lot of time prototyping every single idea that you have. You're just gonna pick, the few that sound the most promising, and then you're gonna build out something that kind of mimics what you think would solve people's problems. So for instance, you might, go through that how might we process and, people might say, you know, something about technology skills and, and so you might think to yourself, well, you know, I don't really know that people need a lot of help learning how to use an iPad. It's very graphic. It's visual. It's pretty easy to adapt to, but with computers stuff can be hidden. People need, you know, typing skills and stuff like that. So maybe a good way to, help with that is to create, a game for people that, need typing help that will also help them, learn other soft skills or something like that. This is turning into a very complicated example. And so if you're prototyping, you know, you wouldn't necessarily, like, build out a whole game to teach people typing, but maybe you would, like, find free games on the Internet and then have a day where people could come into the computer lab and try out that game. Or maybe you would do some sketching and show things to people and say, what do you think about, a game that looks like this that has these kinds of features and functionality? And then you would get feedback, which is the next step. And then you just keep working on it. You know? If people play that typing game and enjoyed it and said I liked it and I think it would help me with my typing skills, then you can start looking into whether or not you're gonna stick with that one or if you're gonna buy something with more features that people said that they would want or something customized more. You know, and you're just gonna keep going through that cycle of the the feedback and then iterating until you get to something that you can implement. And that's, not necessarily the final step. You know? Sometimes projects end because the time the team allotted to it ended, and that's sort of the final step. Sometimes, budget ends, and that's the end of the the project, you know, and that's fine too. What we try to do is not have it end in a way that it feels unfinished or, under polished, but in a way that feels like something that can continue to be used in the state that we leave it in.
One thing I'm hearing in there is that there's a lot of interactions with people in various circumstances and with various needs, and they're going to interact with whatever solution it is you're going through this cycle on, perhaps a bit differently than others. So you're gonna run into a lot of variation. I would imagine that in order to address those things adequately, that a great superpower to have would be to have a tremendous sense of empathy. Could you talk to me and the listeners a bit about how that plays a role in human centered
design? Sure. I think that the most important thing about empathy is that you kinda put aside your own biases. You are putting aside, thinking to yourself, you know, well, I'm the supervisor here or the manager or the customer service. You know, I'm the the greeter at the desk, and I deal with hundreds of people every day, and I I know what's going on in their lives. It's possible. Some of the best human centered design sort of feedback or a a great person to start with is often that front desk person because they do hear so many stories. But at the end of the day, it's not really you and your experience that matters. It's the people that you're designing a solution for. And so when we design software, we say you're not the user. So just like when we design solutions for people out outside of software, you know, in the service design kind of context, it's really important to realize that, like, you're not the person that's coming in to apply for food stamps or you're not the person that's coming in to get a business license because you're already such an expert that it's impossible for you to know what their problems are. You already have, so much more knowledge than that person could have because you've been so immersed in it that you kinda have to take off your expert business process hat and put on your you know, we're two human beings, and we're just connecting about what someone needs to be able to do their job well, to be able to stay in their home, to, you know, complete this process that's gonna make their life easier.
That's a really important nugget of wisdom right there. You are not the user. I can't begin to tell you how many times in in my experience, working on software that I've had someone come up to me and say, hey. For a moment, pretend you're a user and use the product and then make changes. Like, that that's that being the process. And you're what you're clearly presenting to us is that's not really the the right way to go about it. And you've also kind of gotten into that that concept of, well, you are already an expert at the thing because, well, you helped make it. And that definitely makes sense to me. It, in a way, connects a bit with some some things I've seen in social sciences, where when you're doing a study, you have to avoid priming someone before you ask them the question if you want a real result. If you prime them, then you're gonna get a biased result, and then the result's really not worthy of study. As a bigger question, when someone, say, asks you something like, hey. What does this button do? I what I've gathered is that, well, you shouldn't tell them. You should respond with some sort of question. Is that am I on the right track? What is the right way to respond when you're soliciting feedback and you get questions from the subject of that feedback?
Sure. I mean, you're kinda waiting into some controversy here anyway because in, in research in UX research, services and research, there's definitely a you should never test your own stuff camp, and there's also a it doesn't matter any feedback is good feedback camp. I fall somewhere in the middle. There's actually interesting science that says that even though we think we're being neutral, the expression on our face or our body language can kind of clue people into, like, the option we want them to choose or the opinion that we want them to have or the feedback that we want them to give. So that's something really interesting to think about, when we're thinking about social sciences. But, to get to your your more pointed question, for me, one of the techniques I like to use is to turn it around on the person and say, like, what do you think it should do? Which is really, a a good way to solicit more feedback about, you know, what the problems they are that they're having or, sort of what other patterns they know from elsewhere, whether that's the Internet, you know, oh, it looks like a button, so I think it's gonna open in, a new page. Or that's, you know, what do you think would happen if the sign at the permit desk says x y z? And they'll kinda tell you a little bit about their their mental model or, you know, something else that they're familiar with. And then that's, like, a great little nugget to tuck away for later. But you can also, just encourage them to say, you know, I just want you to do what you think you would do in this situation. The important thing is we're testing the software, this layout, you know, this whatever it is you're testing and not you. And that's the other big thing. It's just no matter what happens, I think that oftentimes the subject feels like we're testing them because they don't know and they know that we know. And so I just try to reassure people and say, you know, it's not about you. It's about this thing that we're looking at together, and, everything that you do is the right thing.
So at this point, let's say someone's been listening to our conversation. They run an organization, and they're going, you know what? I'm convinced. I am ready to buy into this concept of human centered design. I wanna get started. What would you say is a good first step for somebody in that mindset?
Well, I really recommend the plus acumen course. I don't have the URL in front of me, but I'm happy to, get it to you a little later. But the plus acumen course takes you either in a team of your own building or a team that they can help you form on their online platform and walks you through, the steps to do a human centered design project. And the great thing about that is then you've done it once, and so you have skills that you can apply to something else. The other thing I would say is, just do some. There's so many resources out there right now, that if you put in human centered design or service design, so many resources. There's, a great group out of the UK government headed up by a woman named Kara Kane. It's k a r a, and her last name is k a n e. And it's all a bunch of people in government talking about how to do human centered design in government. And, and lastly, first, you can always check out hcdcoach.com.
Nice. And, worry not listeners, I will go through this podcast, listen to it, and put a bunch of links in the description. Although real quick, what is hcdcoach.com? Could you tell us what
that site is? Sure. So that's my website, where I can tell you a little bit about myself and a little bit about what I offer, with the idea that everybody's at a different stage of this process. And so I have three main offerings. One is workshops, and all the workshops come with follow-up. One is coaching help. So if you're already familiar with human centered design, but it's just not going well or you haven't figured out how to operationalize it, we can work together on that. And then also helping out with projects because sometimes you're like, hey, Amanda. I'm really excited about getting the voice of my client into my organization, but there's only five of us, you know, or we just don't have the time or whatever that,
that roadblock is for you, and I'm happy to help you think about how to get over that hump and how to make it part of your everyday work. Excellent. It's great that that resource is available for those that decide to, take advantage of it. I think this is a good opportunity, though, for us to, do another shift of topics. I'd like to talk to you in a a little bit about the future of work. One link I came across on one of the resources you sent me to help me get started on this topic talks a bit about how middle skill jobs have started to disappear in a bit. Not in very large numbers, but that trend has started due to automation. These are mostly, like, roles that require a high school degree, but maybe not necessarily a college degree. Things like it's
designed
their education to avoid being left behind by automation like that?
So I think that's a really interesting question. You know, there are a lot of things happening right now in automation, in artificial intelligence, and people are very quick to get excited about that kind of stuff. But the thing that I really wanna highlight is that design skills or at least the way that I see design skills isn't that, in the future, we'll all be able to do a certain set of jobs that weren't able to be done by a computer, but rather that design and design thinking is a skill set that you can sprinkle into pretty much any job. So, maybe it's not a great skill set for someone that is working in a an industry that we know, like truck driving, that, is probably gonna become automated in the next five to ten years. But when you think about, like, managing people or, providing medical services or things that are harder to automate, having those extra design skills will just make you that much more successful at your job because you'll be able to provide great customer service. You'll be able to find operational efficiencies that don't sacrifice, what your customer wants and needs and that kind of thing. And so, overall, I would just challenge everyone. You know, if you look at technology, if an engineer knows about design, if a product manager knows about design, then they're gonna make the designer's job easier. If you're in some place where there isn't a designer, like, if you're working in, keep going back to that permit desk example. You know. But you have that design thinking mindset. You can look at, you know, how to get more applications processed faster, and do that in a way that, still delivers the right quality of service. Then that's kinda similar to automation, but you haven't actually automated anybody out of a job.
Oh, okay. So it sounds like as opposed to being a replacement skill, it's something that is a a skills multiplier. It makes you better at the thing you're currently doing or perhaps the thing you wish to do in the future. Am I hearing you correctly?
Yeah. Absolutely. I think that that's a great way to to think about it, you know, like a secret superpower that you could have as, you know, a manager or a customer service representative or whatever that level is that you're at.
Awesome. I know a a secret superpower is something that I've always wanted. So let's say there's a and I'll be asking this for a friend. Say say there's a podcast host out there that really wants that superpower, you know, a friend of mine that, basically, they wanna unlock their design skills potential. What advice would you give them, for taking that path?
I think the biggest thing about building design skills is just to practice. And so, if I was a podcast host and I was trying to build my design skills, I do some thinking about what data do I have already. You know? I know that I have a list of my listeners. I might be able to look at my most popular podcasts and see if I see any themes there. I might reach out to that list and do a survey about what people like or what drew people to listen to my podcast, where they heard about it, other podcasts they listen to. And then I might experiment. You know? What's my, maybe I'm gonna do, like, some shorter format shows or maybe I'm gonna invite some particular guests. Maybe they wanna hear more diverse voices, and so we'll try to find, you know, more people of color or people from outside our field or whatever that is. And then just keep looking at those metrics. Do they go up? Do they go down? And if you see something that you're not sure you know the answer to, you can always check-in with your audience and ask them either through, the survey or through interviews or tools like that that gather qualitative information.
So that sound of scribbling that was probably heard from my mic was definitely not me taking notes at all. No. I I I'm kidding. Of course, that that's a really good information, and it sounds like it's applied. I mean, it's not just applicable to a podcast. It sounds like the approach you're taking to asking those questions is really helpful to any endeavor, be it creative or business or government. I think there myself included, there's a lot of us out here that can be really thankful for getting that perspective.
Awesome.
Now looking into the future a bit, I like to ask these sort of questions in these interviews. Your field in of human centered design, how do you see that looking in the future? Kind of good, bad, ugly? What's your perspective on that?
Well, like I said, you know, I've really seen an explosion in service design in the last year. And so service design is that idea of how do you experience a service very, very straightforwardly, which is basically anything that happens from the moment where you discover you have a problem that you wanna solve. And that could be, where do I get the best cancer care for my mom all the way down to, like, where am I gonna get lunch in fifteen minutes before this meeting starts? And, all problems in the middle. You know? And you just apply it to, any situation that you might be in. So just the same as, I think, in the last ten years or so, we saw every company's become a technology company. Sort of at the same time, but in the shadows or around the periphery, every company's become a service company. No company really competes on product anymore. They compete on customer experience. And so, if you think about what that means for the business world, it just means that we're gonna have to really take it seriously and think about new ways to approach what does that customer experience mean. And when you do that, I really think that design thinking and human centered design is one of the best tools to make sure that you're delivering the best experience possible because it's one of the best ways to make sure that you're as close to your customer as possible. And the closer you are to your customer in the sense of, like, knowing what their wants and their needs are, their preferences, then you can make better informed business decisions that will bring them along and keep them because we all know that customer retention is really key for a successful business.
Absolutely. I I believe they say that it is far less expensive to keep a customer than it is to try to find a new one. Yeah. Of course. So I I think you're you're making a very excellent point there. Now another thing that I like to do on these is to give the guest an opportunity to leave the listener with whatever concluding thoughts they would like to leave them with as we draw to a clues. So do you have any thoughts like that you'd like to share with us?
Well, I think that, when people ask me about how to get started and I tell them, you know, go out and talk to their users, it's really hard for folks to figure out what does that really mean. Like, you mean I have to actually go out and talk to people? People are strangers and strangers are scary. And so, I, you know, I tell people, no. It doesn't mean you need to go out and talk to strangers. It just means you need to go out and talk to the people that are experiencing, what it is that you might wanna solve for. So for instance, you might have a friend that started a new business or you might, you know, know someone in a social club or a church, and you can start that conversation with those people. And then you might say, you know, do you know anybody else that's gone through a similar situation or has made a similar decision recently? And then they give you a warm intro. You know, it's like networking but for, human centered design, basically. Because the worst thing you can do is just not start. You know? You wanna have a a a you wanna get started so that you can start being more successful.
So it sounds like we need to leverage the six degrees of human centered design
in terms of the answers. Like that. I mean, eventually eventually, it's actually enough people that, you know, you'll you'll have a sense of, like, what are the right questions to ask and how is you know, what what's the right words to use to get the kind of information that I want. And, and then you'll be able to start talking to strangers with ease. But, you know, don't let that fear of strangers put you off. Because the other thing is, if you ask somebody for help, so many people, you know, most people are very generous and especially excuse me. If it's a small ask, they're always helpful sorry. Happy to help. And so if you can frame it as well as, you know, like, I was wondering if you could help or could you do me a small favor or something feel honored that you'd even ask them for help, and then they're they're pretty kind. No one you know, I I always joke and say no one ever died from doing user research. So Well,
that certainly helps out. You won't die. But on that same same note, thank you for coming on and being kind enough to share your expertise in this area. You've certainly done us the favor in in sharing that with us. And, again, thank you so much for coming on the program.
Oh, it's been my pleasure.
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