Using Design Thinking to solve the twin challenges of recycling and waste

1. Design Thinking
& The Hackathon
16 June 2015
Padang & Co, a Newton Circus company!
Adam A. Lyle, Executive Chairman | adam.lyle@padang.sg!
Derrick Chiang, CEO | derrick.chiang@padang.sg!
The Pilot Project!
Chris Pile, CEO & Founder | chris@thepilotproject.io!
Jon Hoel, Co-Pilot | jon@thepilotproject.io!

2. Padang & Co and The Pilot Project conducted this 3-
hour Design Thinking session as a pre-session for the
2015 Clean & Green Hackathon for the National
Environment Agency of Singapore. 60 participants
from a range of backgrounds attended the session.

3. The purpose: to help make Singapore a truly clean city
and a 'Zero Waste Nation' by creating solutions that
enable behavioural or mindset change, with particular
reference to the twin challenges of recycling and waste.

4. 1. Understand what Design Thinking is and why it is useful
2. Know why brainstorming sessions often don’t work – and what to do about it!
3. Master a simple Design Thinking method you can apply to various challenges
4. Come up with plenty of good ideas for the upcoming Hackathon!
5. Learn about some Design Thinking resources
Session outcomes

5. 1. What is Design Thinking?
2. Barriers
3. Activity 1: Observations
4. Activity 2: Insights
5. Activity 3: Solutions
6. Activity 4: Select & present your top ideas
7. Resources
Agenda

6. “Design thinking is a human-centered approach to
innovation that draws from the designer's toolkit to
integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of
technology, and the requirements for business success.”
Tim Brown, CEO and President, IDEO.

7. Desirable!
Feasible! Viable!
Needs of people!
Possibilities
of technology!
Requirements for
[business] success!

8. Ok, but what about more
granular criteria?

9. Desirable!
Feasible! Viable!
The boss will say yes!
IT dept. will say yes!
We have the skills!
We have the budget
It’ll fit our policy/
strategy/campaign!
It will provide real value
People will actual use it!
It will be worth all the
money/time/effort
We won’t be embarrassed
we thought of it!
!

10. Desirable!
Today, we’ll do focusing on what’s desirable.
(Let’s think about what’s feasible & viable later.)

11. We go very broad in thinking what is desirable
After we have done that, we think what is feasible and viable

12. Design thinking is kind of similar to the way you used
to think, long before you started studying for exams…
… but it’s done in a systematic way.

13. Example session: heaps of ideas generated in 20 min:
… because all the players took part.

14. Reasons why ‘brainstorming’ can fail!
Don’t try and ideate & evaluate simultaneously!
Evaluation is important, but it comes later in the process!
1!
Ideating & evaluating at the same time!
2! You need to generate a large quantity of ideas, then you can build
on these ideas to generate the quality you need.!
Too few ideas generated/scope too narrow!
3! This is a follow-through problem,
not an ideation problem!!
Not enough follow-through !

15. Encourage each
other to give ideas
Ground rules for this session
Build on one
another’s ideas
Use quantity to
generate quality
Switch off the
internal critic

16. WELCOME
Put out the Welcome Mat!
Spelling
misteaks
Umm…
kinda... Sorta
incomplete
ideas
Stick figure
sketches
Your opinion,
without stats to
back it up.
Bring it!

17. 1. Ideas get shot down!
2. People start to self-censor!
3. Fewer ideas are generated!
4. People stop thinking laterally!
5. People don’t build on each other’s ideas!
6. Ideas tend to get stuck in a narrow band!
7. People feel less engaged and less committed!
!
What happens when you
don’t set some ground rules…

18. Design Thinking is about going broad & deep !
Ideate!
Explain
& build!
Decide
on your
Top 3
ideas!

19. This session! Hackathon!

20. This session! Hackathon!

21. Discover ! Develop ! Deliver !Decide !

22. Design Thinking is best learned by doing!

23. Will divide the room: half focusing on Reduction in Litter and half on Reduction and Recycling
Then you will form into groups to work on 3 Activities
• What you have Observed
• What Insights this provides
• What potential Ideas or Solutions these Insights provide
Please
• Share results
• Do one Activity at a time
• We will ring a bell to move to next Activity
What happens now

24. We’ll divide into two groups based on the coloured DOT on your name badge:
RED Dots - Challenge 1 Reduce Littering
• RED Dots to the right of the room - the bench side
GREEN Dots - Challenge 2 Reduce and Recycle
• Green Dots to the left of the room - the windows side
• Now form into groups of 5 or 6 people
• FOR EACH GROUP THERE ARE MULTIPLE COLOURED POST IT NOTES
• Please use one colour per person
Process

25. We need to be clear about the
problems before trying to come
up with solutions

26. Activity 1: Observation

27. Challenge 1 - Littering
What do you see ?
What type of litter occurs at events ? Where do you see it ?
What type of litter do you see in your neighborhoods ? Who do you see littering ?
Challenge 2 - Recycling
Thinking of your home and neighborhood environments – AND EVENTS
What do see people doing in terms of recycling, How do people deal with waste ?
What waste gets recycled ? What doesn’t seem to get recycled
Who do you see recycling ?
JUST FOCUS ON WHAT YOU’VE SEEN IN YOUR EXPERIENCE .
WRITE CLEARLY ON POST IT NOTES. NO SOLUTIONS - JUST OBSERVATIONS
Activity 1: Observations

28. 1. Observations !
Actions – what are people doing?!
Problem actions:
• These are your personal observations & opinions
• You’re not trying to prove anything!
• Don’t worry if your opinion is ‘correct’ or
not – you are just sharing your own experience
• Don’t worry about statistics or figures
• You’re just helping to map out problems
• Don’t write analysis or solutions yet
• But you can start thinking about context:
• Who is doing it?
• When are they doing it?
• Where are they doing it?
.!
People are
throwing drink
cans on the
ground at
sporting events
People are
not using
recycling bins
at all
People are
dropping used
tissues on the
ground at
hawker centres
People are
putting the
wrong things in
the wrong bins

30. Activity 2: Insights

31. Now look at the Observations - take a few minutes and think about them
Individually write down what Insights this gives you
• Why do you see what you see, what is the root cause, the driver
• What does it say about Mindset
• what does it say about the physical environment, the infrastructure
You don’t have to agree as a group . We want multiple points of view
We don’t want solutions yet we want understand the cause of the problem we have observed
WRITE YOUR INSIGHTS ON YOUR COLOURED POST IT NOTES
Activity 2: Insights

32. 2. Insights!
Ask why the problem is occurring!
Mindset factors:
(Again, don’t worry about statistical accuracy at the
moment – just your observations are fine for now)
• Think in the 1st person (I, me, my)
• Why are people doing/not doing things?
• What are they thinking? Why?
Infrastructure factors:
• Facilities
• Built environment
• Maintenance
• Etc.
Hmm, no-one
seems to be
watching…
I’m always in
a hurry! I don’t
have time to
hunt around
for a bin!
There are no
bins around
The bin is
overflowing
already…

34. Activity 3: Solution ideation

35. Now this is what you have been wanting to do
Now build on the insights and write down as many ideas as you have to solve
This is brain storming
We want lots of ideas
We all know the rules
No bad ideas, no evaluation - just get plenty of ideas
Build on one another’s ideas
Activity 3: Solution ideation

36. 3. Solutions!
How might we solve !
Mindset:
• Why are people doing/not doing things?
• What are they thinking? Why?
Infrastructure factors:
• Facilities
• Built environment
• Maintenance
• Etc.
There are no
bins around
Move
bins to
higher-traffic
locations
Install more
bins
Schedule
maintenance
more regularly
The bin is
overflowing
already…
Develop bins
with weight
sensors that call
to be emptied
when nearly full

39. Now pick your Top 3 ideas!

40. Bring them to the front

42. The Design Thinking session generated a very large
volume of ideas as a kickstarter for the hackathon.
The hackathon itself took place the following weekend.
25 teams developed solutions to the twin challenges of
recycling and waste. More information

44. Design Thinking Resources

45. Useful resources: blogs!
Design
ThinkingTim Brown
metacool
Diego
Rodriguez

46. Designing
for Growth
Jeanne Liedtka and
Tim Ogilvie
This is Service
Design Thinking
Marc Stickdorn
101 Design
Methods
Vijay Kumar
Useful resources: books!

47. Change By Design
Tim Brown
Design Works
Heather Fraser
Back of the Napkin
Dan Brown
Useful resources: books!

48. Thank you