Approaches
Social Design or Socially Responsive Design
Social design addresses real user needs, rather than the perceived or prescribed consumer needs often created by market-led design. Where market-led design creates market opportunities in pursuit of financial profits, social design responds to social needs and pursues social benefits.
User Centered Design (UCD)
This is a design philosophy and process based on ethnocentric methods, where the designer immerses him or herself in the user’s world to understand context of use. It is different from some anthropological approaches to ethnographic observation because the designer or researcher asks direct questions about the needs, wants, and limitations of the end user at various stages of the design process.
User centered design does not directly involve the users in co design of briefs; the designers and researchers gather the information and make the decisions.
Participatory Design
This is a design approach that attempts to actively involve the end users in the design process. Including users in the design team, rather than gathering user feedback through observation and testing, helps to ensure that the design is wholly relevant. It has much in common with user centered design but there are structural differences as explained in terms of the way users participate with the design team.
The approach has been most influential in Scandinavia and is used in urban design, architecture, landscape architecture and planning as a way of creating environments that are more responsive and appropriate to inhabitants’ and users’ cultural, emotional, spiritual and practical needs. It invites end users to co-operate with researchers and developers during an innovation process. They participate during the initial exploration and problem definition to help define the design problem and brief. During development they help evaluate proposed solutions.
“The approach has been criticised because of the risk of designer-users becoming expert, rather than offering a fresh user perspective.”
Design Council
Participatory design is a common approach to ‘place making’ involving the community in defining design briefs. It is associated with groups like the USA’s Project for Public Space and has been used in many settings and at various scales. In the UK it is linked to community architecture approaches.
When used properly, this approach focuses on process and anticipatory design and can be seen as turning end users into researchers and developers. This is in contrast to user centred design, which can be seen as moving researchers and developers into the world of end users. When used badly, it does not allow design to serve the community of users it has drawn upon, and some developers with hidden profit led objectives have been known to reduce user feedback to ‘lip service’.
Links
Project for Public Space
Co-Design
Co-design is different from participatory design - it does not assume that any stakeholder is more important than any other and anticipates multiple stakeholders need to be involved in the co design of briefs.
It also differs from various user centred design approaches - it acknowledges that the client or beneficiary of the design may not be using the product itself but their views need to be addressed. For example, disabled users of the streetscape may be asked for their view about the positioning of bike stands.
The problem with co design is that although the process invites shared ownership of problems and their responses, community members who participate do not hold the same amount of power as those managing the process. Community members, for example, are not paid for their expertise, observations or for the significant amount of time they may need to spend in responding to questions posed by the design process. Consequently those community members involved in the co design process can only be as effective as time and passion permits.
Links
www.designcouncil.org.uk/en/Design-Council/Files/Podcast-Transcripts/Nico-Macdonald-Joe-Heapy-Lynne-Maher-and-Austin-Williams-Can-good-design-be-co-created/
Service Design
Service design is the activity of understanding, planning and organising people, infrastructure, communication and material components of a service in order for it to work effectively.
It involves elements of user centred and participatory design but recognises that no single area of design feedback is by itself sufficient to understand all the needs of those providing or using the services. Service design can be both tangible and intangible.
This approach can involve viewing the design process as a user journey and reviewing the artefacts, communication, environment and behaviours encountered by those who use a service en route to their desired destination. Whichever form the approach to service design takes it must be consistent and easy to use, as well as strategically applied.
The Design Council is currently investigating the role of service design in responding to needs of the public sector. They point out:
“Only recently have managers in organisations involved in the service sector realized that a conscious effort in applying design techniques to services can result in greater customer satisfaction, greater control over their offerings and greater profits.”
Design Council
Links
www.designcouncil.org.uk/en/About-Design/Design-Disciplines/Service-design-by-Bill-Hollins/