Reflective notes

Design Thinking-India Post

FARISH RAHMAN MP
PGP/1316/06
TEAM 6

DESIGN THINKING

Design Thinking is a hands own learning approach. It is a process that goes sequentially. There is no
wrong answer in DT, we have to build on answers. DT is essential in sectors where problems are
dynamic.

Contribution of Edison: 1500 patents under Edison.Analysing Edison we came to conclusion that
Edison followed a structured approach. He had an innovation lab where people waited outside to
know about new innovations. Failures are obvious and it is a way to find answer.

ORIENTATION

I HAVE I NEED
OPENNESS TO CRITICISM CREATIVITY SKILLS
PATIENCE CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS
LISTENING SKILLS OBSERVATION SKILLS

Iterations of DT: -

1. DT begins with human need. We should find out the latent human needs and check whether we
have found the need correctly

2.Technology or Techniques to get solutions

3.Business viability (impact should be sustainable). What six sigma done to quality dt has done to
innovation. Innovation is the most important thing needed to sustain in this new era.

Models of DT

MODEL 1 MODEL 2 MODEL 3

Understand Discover and define Understand
Observe Finding human need Observe
Develop a point of view Articulate need Interpret
Ideate Find solution Visual
prototype Iterate
Testing Communication

We need to find problems the organizations have, it may be problem with product, retail outlet,
logistics, operational, HR, Finance. We have to create an ability to find problem. .We are going to
study an organization and finding a problem and solving it.
OBSERVATION:

Stake holder list

1. Employee
2. Customers
3. Government of india
4. Suppliers
5. Competitors

Exploration phase/Design research phase: Observation and empathy stage

Study of AS IS. We have to find real and latent needs. To understand our domain, we will depend on
primary and secondary data.

Story of Darwin: Followed structured way of Observation, Documentation and Reflection and it
resulted in theory of evolution. We should have a beginner’s mind set where we are curious and
always ask why. Each team member will have a different perception about things. We have to
combine all observations. We have to get insights from these observations. We should go deep so as
to avoid considering symptoms as problems. We need a micro and macro way of approach.

When I went to field, I was able to come up with observations like

1.All employees are not present.

2.Seperate services doesn’t have separate counters

3.No help desk

4.No fancy infrastructure

5.Glue is provided for sticking

6.No digital payments

7. Two counters are only there

8. Total 9 employees are there

9. Staff didn’t look interested in clearing doubts

10. Walls were filled with posters

11.No parking slot

12.No seating provided

13.Computer, printer and barcode scanner can be seen.

14.People were there to collect pension related documents

ORAL B case study: Observations helps to change the perception of problem or opportunity and also
helps to find out the latent needs.

Activities in India post

1. Mail and parcel services
2. Last mile delivery of Govt. Schemes
3. India post payments bank
4. Post office savings bank
5. Insurance
6. Ecommerce
7. Aadhar updating
8. Post office passport Seva Kendra

Existing systems and processes: It involve studying about the processes and systems mainly the
process through which the customers attain value that he/she has been yearning for.
1. Presenting the need (at post office)
2. Suggesting the services available
3. Sharing the cost of each service
4. Choosing the service required (at post office/collection points)
5. Following the norms of service (like filling from and to address, proper packing)
6. Billing
7. Payment

Customer touch points: Customer getting into connection with other stake holders
1. At office when customers ask about the available services and choosing one among them.
2. At home/office when postman delivers the package.
3. When there is a problem in service customers may contact higher officials.

Technology presently being used

1. Computer
2. Digital weighing machine
3. Barcode scanner
4. Printer
5. Website and mobile application
6. Vehicles are used to transport between points.

Gaps that exist

1. No automatic packaging services

2. Mobile app not user friendly
3. All services cannot be avail through mobile app
4. Ecommerce portal doesn’t have enough items
5. No proper tracking of products lost
6. Delay in delivery
EMPATHY

We have to prepare questionnaire by including the method of 5W and H b4 going to field to meet
stakeholder. The list down the pain points of stake holders and then select some pain points and
then use 7 whys to dig deeper, this method is called ladder technique. We should find the problems
rather than going for symptoms. We have to find the root cause by using 7why technique. There will
open and close end questions and we should go for open questions. The steps to start conversation
with stakeholders that may be individuals, groups or expert interviews are the following:

Introduce yourself

Introduce project

Build rapport with people

Sharing stories by stakeholders (ask the stake holder)

Knowing emotions and feelings

Asking questions (open ended)

Thanking

We have to make a customer journey map to understand the process in a better way. This journey
map should include

1. Touchpoints(interaction)
2. Sequence
3. Emotional journey over time (feeling about)
4. Learn from people, experts, immerse yourself in context

CASE 1

GOOD KITCHEN: (HATCH & BLOOM)

The problems are

1. 125,000 of Denmark’s senior citizens rely on government sponsored meals.

2. Seniors who were residing in assisted living facilities or residential care had poor nutrition.
3. 20% of seniors are actually malnourished

The current menu has to be improved to solve the above problems. So, they hired Hatch & Bloom to
ask elderly clients about their menu preferences.

What is?

They used methods like observing and interviewing the elderly clients, observe their living situations
and tried to understand their needs. They used the technique of ethnographic research here. They
used the design tool Journey Mapping which involves tracing the journey of a customer as they use a
product or service. This tool helps to trace the experience of an elderly from beginning to end. They
also interviewed some kitchen employees. They discovered that working in a public service kitchen is
considered as a low status job in Denmark. They found out that the seniors were reluctant to accept
government assistance in a way everyone notice. The loss of control over the food choices was
painful for the them. They experienced eating alone and missed the seasonal food of their youth. All
of these factors contributed to the nutritional problems. The less the they enjoyed the situation, the
smaller was the appetite. And when it came to the employees’ side, it was seen that employees
were bored from creating the same meal every day.

What if?

After ethnographic research they moved into what if stage. This involved workshop participation of
all the stakeholders like employees of residential care centers, experts, municipality officials, kitchen
staff. They reviewed the ethnographic research and developed insights and designed criteria for idea
generation. This method of inviting the key stake holders into the design process and asking them
what if questions is very useful.

What if the public-service food-delivery organization were a restaurant?

The following assumptions were made;

 Kitchen considered as Restaurants

 Cooks considered as Chefs
 Vehicles considered as Waiters

Ideas to improve the quality of delivery vehicles were considered.

What wows?

This stage is rough prototyping stage. This stage involved visualizing the ideas by making the idea
more tangible and concrete by giving a visual depiction of it. The co-creation was used to test the
generated ideas. Hatch and Bloom asked the participants opinion about menus and this further
helped in improving the menu card.

Wowed on What they like, feel and how they visualize.

What works? This is similar to the testing stage of design thinking process. The team tested the
prototypes with different combinations and tried new ways of presenting the food to actual
customers. This process also included giving new uniform to its employees and considered a new
name to the kitchen – ‘The Good Kitchen’. They introduced new communication channels like
newsletter to pass on information about the kitchen, channel to communicate with kitchen staff and
customers and this improved in helping the elderly and the employees maintain a better relationship
with each other.

The result was a 500% increase in certain meals ordered in the first week itself. The employees are
much more satisfied and motivated than before. This case involves innovation of the entire business
model using the process of design thinking

CASE 2:

IDEO Shopping Cart Project

This is a project TO design a shopping cart. The team is given five days in order to design a new
shopping cart. There has been many accidents and injuries that happened from shopping cart and
hence there is a need to change the design of it. Also, there is an issue of theft of shopping carts. The
team was divided into groups and they interacted with experts of shopping carts. They also took
opinions from consumers, employees and other stake holders.

Next stage was the brain storming from which ideas were generated. All the ideas that came up on
the table were collected and posted on wall. They put the ideas into application. They started to
make different prototypes with the generated ideas. There are shopping carts containing baskets for
separating items. Another prototype gave priority to child safety. One prototype had barcode
scanner attached to it. A shopping cart with mic attached to it for calling out the store employees
were also there. They tested all of these ideas. Finally, they came up with a design with all the best
elements taken from each prototype.

PROBLEM ARTICULATION

An effective problem statement is needed to be:

1. Precise and concise
2. Consider view of all stakeholders.
3. Should not convey solutions.
4. Explain the root cause.
5. Convince all stakeholders about the problem.
6. What kind of solution is in priority?

Problems
1. How might we improve the customer services at India post office in 3 months?

Insights
1.No rush at parcel counters
2.All staffs are not present

2. How might we improve the online presence of India post in 6 months?

Insights
1.No enough products on ecommerce site.
2.Ecommerce sellers are growing but India post’s portal lack sellers.
3.Mobile application lacked certain services.

3. How might we improve the logistics services of India post in 6 months

Insights
1.One of the sellers lost his product while transported through India post and was not able to track
how it got lost.
2.Sellers prefer private logistics service for transportation.

Reflective -2

IDEATION: We can come up with any idea on our problem statements. We have to focus on ideas
that are out of the box and that are creative. As said by Linus Pauling ,the best way to have a good
idea is to have lots of ideas. In design thinking there is no right and wrong idea, there is only good
and bad idea. If we think an idea is bad like if it is not practically possible, then we modify that idea
or we eliminate that idea.

For the Ideation process there are many tools, like

  Mind map
 Brain storming
 Game storming
 Brain writing
 Story boards
 Skits
 Sketches
But we are going to deal with scamper tool and tools related to lateral and divergent thinking. We
are using these tools to generate as many ideas as possible. At this stage we focus on quantity rather
than quality by suspending judgements. Each and every idea is taken on to table. We focussed on
novel and diverse ideas over relevant ideas at this stage.
Generate: bring users to ideate with us

1.Scamper tool

SUBSTITUTE COMBINE ADAPT MODIFY PURPOSE ELIMINATE REVERSE/REARRANGE

Can I Can I Can I adapt Can I Can I put Can I Can the process be
substitute combine with something modify or to some eliminate reversed?
something? something ? change? other something?
else? purpose?

How Mc Donald’s used the SCAMPER tool to bring in new ideas were discussed like the drive thru
concept an idea that adapted from the pit stop in Formula1.

Creative thinking

2.Lateral thinking

Tool used Forced connection: Making a list of random words and connecting any of the words with
the problem statement. This is done to generate as many ideas as possible. If the problem statement
is how might we improve the logistics service and if the random word is water we will think of ideas
where water can improve the logistics service. If there is no connection or any idea that can connect
water and logistics, we will take another word from the list and think whether any novel and creative
idea is generated. We will generate many ideas and then sit together with other team members to
validate the ideas.

3.Divergent Thinking:

Tool used Connect: We are trying to connect the elements of business canvas with the words in
observation and empathy canvas to generate ideas. If the idea doesn’t seem novel, we will again
come up with new word from canvas and generate a new idea. From the ideas generated we will go
for validation stage where we will select novel and creative ideas.

Ideas generated by using the above tools:

1. Same day delivery service by using state public transportation. (SCAMPER)

2. Redesigning the existing ecommerce portal in a way to connect local sellers.
3. Cold storage services at villages to store perishable items like milk.
4. Warehouse construction at seaports, airports to outsource inventory services (Forced
connection)
PROTOTYPING

Prototyping is done to know what our idea looks like in reality. We will find the difficulties in
designing and may get new ideas. After mentoring session, we decided our final problem statement
and solution which is ‘India post tatkal service’.

There are three stages

Idea to paper

We used rough diagrams to bring our idea onto paper. The diagram was not perfect but at this stage
perfection is not considered. we drew the pictures of bus, bus stand, vehicles to complete this stage
of prototyping. Flow diagrams and block diagrams were used to visualise. We tried a volumetric
model with damaged and old things at home.

Paper to concept

We eliminated some of our earlier ideas at this stage, and tried to keep the operation cost of
organisation at minimum. We also included some new ideas to the solution to check the feasibility.

Concept to business

We created a business model canvas where 9 elements like key partners, customer segments,
distribution channels etc were explained. We did the financial analysis of the model and it was
feasible as we kept the operation cost minimum.

TESTING

For testing our idea, we ourselves tried to send a package through local transportation from our
respective locations to find the time taken to reach the destination and to know how it will be
transported. It took around 6 hours to cover 200kilometres between two cities at peak time. The
time constraints were considered and we came up with time restrictions to provide same day
delivery.

1.What worked?

Same day delivery service idea

Easy tracking by direct phone call to bus conductor’s number.

2.What did not work?

Customer will have to go to bus stand to avail this service.

They don’t know where these services are available.

3.What questions came up?

What is the right time to avail these services?

Whether night delivery can be made possible?

How safe it is to send valuable items?

Thus, after going through this trial and testing, we found out that our prototype of India Post Tatkal
Service can be feasible. However, we have to keep in mind the timings may vary depending on the
condition of the vehicle as well as the nature of the driver.
But, to sum this up, we can say that our prototype is reasonably do-able.