Physical and mental health, finances, time management, goals and relationships- there’s a lot to think about. No wonder life is full of chaos and often mismanaged!
Lead is a service that brings about mindfulness through social awareness, catering to the holistic needs of personal development.
TEAM
A collaborative effort of three driven individuals from diverse backgrounds, united by the intent of deciphering the secret to life management (through design research)!
INTENT + CHALLENGE
The intent behind this project was to use design research and tools and develop a cohesive business plan together with original design concepts for a successful and profitable product or service.
Since the project was conceived in a college environment, the team was naturally drawn towards the challenge of managing different aspects of student life such as fitness, mental health, relationships, and personal goals.
THE ECOSYSTEM
Given the broad problem landscape, the first step was to develop an ecosystem map that visualized different aspects of student life, the stakeholders involved, and how they affected(or were affected by) a student. This created a basic understanding of the research landscape for the team to dive into. In later iterations after preliminary research and market analysis, user goals and popular products in the market were added onto the map.
Ecosystem map shows relationships between different stakeholders of the life management system.
MARKET ANALYSIS
Following the principles of ‘Blue Ocean Strategy’ and employing tools like ecosystem map, SWOT, PESTEL, and Porter’s 5 Forces, gaps in the industry were identified. Life management emerged as a system, rather than a spectrum of services, with various extrinsic and intrinsic factors affecting student life. Finally, we created a creative brief to clearly articulate our target in focus.
PRIMARY RESEARCH
The secondary research suggested that there was a strong correlation between a balanced life and how one managed their relationships (including the relationship with oneself). This correlation affected their decision-making and other aspects of their life. We decided to test this through a survey and in-depth interviews with the target demographic. With 70 participants in total, a collected blend of qualitative and quantitative data was then wrung into a design criteria through the process of design synthesis.
Contextual Inquiry Framework targeted the innermost desires of users.
Research synthesis was conducted in two parts: Affinitization and Empathy Maps. The former uses designers’ abductive reasoning to group data into clusters, in multiple stages, to create a hierarchical design criteria. The latter uses empathy to address users’ pains and gains, thereby informing the value proposition.
Social awareness in the form of heedfulness, as it can be seen in this design criteria, emerged as the primary user need.
BUSINESS INNOVATION
Next step in this fast-paced process was to develop a unique business model. Using the ‘17-Step Zag’ process, starting with writing an obituary for Lead, a solid foundation stone was established for the service under development (pun intended). This process also defined Lead’s brand alignment. While Business Model Canvas, being an extension to the empathy map, helped us formulate a cohesive brand that communicated to user needs. It also helped the team sketch a value proposition, value capture and value creation schematic of the business.
With the five E’s of experience design (Entice, Enter, Engage, Exit and Extend), the aesthetic seed of Lead started to germinate in the form of a mobile phone app and a festival. The former catering to the immediate needs and the latter providing holistic skill development through a physical social experience.
PROTOTYPING
Both low-fidelity paper prototypes and hi-fidelity prototypes of the app were created. The experience of the app is designed to be conversational and friendly through the principles of gamification.
BRAND DEVELOPMENT
Lead, as a brand, is designed to be fun and engaging, with elements of inclusivity and empowerment. All these decisions were informed by the same design criteria that created the service. Lead is synonymous with the superhero that’s there inside everyone. The skill-developing games in the app and the peer-to-peer blog were branded as ‘Powers’ and ‘League‘ respectively. The festival, which was a physical embodiment of League and Powers, was branded as ‘Conclave’. Finally, a user journey was fleshed out to translate our imagination of the system-service experience.
