What we found.
Affinitizing is a team's process to meld the perspectives, opinions, and insights of knowledgeable people about specific issues. Affinitization does not produce a magic formula for design. Instead, it serves as a road map with multiple routes to many destinations. Correspondingly, research methods serve as a set of assisting tools, not mandatory rules.
After transcribing the interviews, documenting, and organizing the data points, the research team strategized the most efficient form of visualizing the data.
Synthesis Overview:
Brief report
Primary Observation:
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21 questions covering:
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CO2 inflator
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Tire lever
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Multi-tool
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Evaluation Conclusion:
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Quantitative results on tool types, qualities, uses
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Identify/discover cyclists' needs
Stakeholder Map
The stakeholder map describes the relationships between the core target users: the mechanics and their customer base.
A shop mechanic services a diverse customer base, from pro-cyclists to amateur riders. Hence, every client presents unique challenges, while a pro-cyclist depends on their bike to do their job, on the other hand, a recreational rider sees their bike as an outlet for fitness. Thus, client to customer communication changes based on demand.
A persona's goal is to learn and empathize with the target user of a product. In other words, personas are a holistic and comprehensive breakdown of the user, which includes their backgrounds, preferences, pain points, and gain points. In the example of a mechanic, a persona considers their daily frustrations, routines, most common repairs, and essential needs. This research technique guides designers to understand their users better, thus allowing for more empathetic ideas.
Stakeholders Overview:
Shop Owner/Mechanic
Shop Mechanic
Race Day Mechanic
Pro Cyclist
Amateur Cyclist
Personas
The tool mind map's goal is to illustrate connections between data points from the interviews in a visual format. This technique assists designers by keeping all of the data points in perspective while understanding how they are related.
First, the team completed an analysis of the "job to be done" of each tool. In other words, the tasks each tool accomplishes. Next, the group took note of the tool's main functions alongside the critical factors for each of its key jobs. Then, the team laid out any essential points of data retrieved from the expert interviews.
In the map, the orange points represent a significant impact on the tool's quality and performance. The orange outlined points hold slightly less priority while still playing a substantial role in tool function. Lastly, the blue outlined points suggest somewhat fewer priority points than the above, yet still withholding essential necessities.
Tool Mind Map
The journey map serves as a big picture overview and analysis of when and how the target consumer uses each tool. The journey map carefully oversees a user's actions, thoughts, and experiences, allowing the designers to understand the usability process and identify design opportunities surrounding the user's pain points. This journey map illustrates a mechanic's tool usage during a race day when every tool from the design brief is utilized.
Journey Map
Doing: the actions of the mechanic--what he is doing
Urgency: the level of urgency indicated by the red line, the highest point of the line is where the mechanic has multiple actions in a small amount of time
Tools: the tools used during each action
Thinking: the thoughts the mechanic has during his action
Feeling: knowing how the mechanic feels
Opportunity: analyzing every preceding point can identify design opportunities
The TouchPoint map creates a microanalysis of every touchpoint to break down how a tool is used, highlighting ergonomic opportunities concerning pain points to identify innovative gains and potential process improvements.
With a torque wrench serving as an example, the team focused on specific contact points the user has with the tool and the tool's touchpoints on the bike. The red text represents pain points, while the green text illustrates possible design gains.
Touch Points
Tool Personas is a research method strategically designed by the SCADpro research team. It represents a synthesis of secondary and primary research, breaking down the tools in an empathetic manner, bringing the existing mechanism to life. The Tools Personas served as an essential guide to the designers during the development of the final tools' designs.
The research team developed the Tool Personas in three stages. The first phase served as a preliminary draft, completed by the team's pro-cyclists and researchers. In the second stage, the team added secondary research insights. In the third phase, the team combined the data points gathered during primary research.
