Design Research: Enhancing the Designer-Client Relationship

Learn how to create a more productive relationship with your client, earn more buy-in, and ultimately strengthen the knowledge base within your design process.

Introduction

• Welcome
• Getting the most out of this course
• Course case study

1. Establish Your Foundation

• Define the problem and set early goals
• Learn your client's organization and expertise level
• Build your knowledge base
• Challenge: Initial research and assumptions
• Solution: Initial research and assumptions
• Challenge: Unstructured interview
• Solution: Unstructured interview

2. Facilitate Effectively

• Preparation: Setting the stage
• Preparation: Establish your research questions
• Preparation: Inviting the right players
• Leading a workshop
• Activities: The basics
• Case study: Creating a schedule
• Activities for case study: Insider knowledge
• Activities for case study: Case study validation
• Activities for case study: Validation
• Other activities
• Challenge: Categorize your questions
• Solution: Categorize your questions
• Challenge: Writing polarities
• Solution: Writing polarities

3. Make Sense of What You Learned

• Trends, patterns, and outliers
• Documentation: Simplify and share

Conclusion

• Next steps