Designing for service: Co-designing with people affected by asbestos related disease
Using Service Design methods over a series of research workshops we were able to build a small community of people affected by asbestos related disease willing to share their ‘lived’ experience. Through the visual evidence created in the workshops and the graphic designer’s development of the work in between workshops, this community co-designed a place to share knowledge and experience, irrespective of where the people affected by asbestos related disease lived in Australia, in the form of a website prototype. This co-designed platform allows further input by others.
This is a second phase research project based at Swinburne University’s Centre for Design Innovation. Julie is the Research Lead and Janine is the Service Designer. The purpose of this research is not to produce a model online community based upon what researchers think is required, rather it is to co-design and co-produce an online community of relevance and real value to people affected by asbestos related disease.
In this presentation, we will take you through the process of the workshops to show how the service design methods worked to inform the website prototype and create the community. The methods included: mind mapping, affinity mapping, personas, presentation, user journeys, sticky notes, storyboards, and storytelling on video. Although these are simple and well-documented methods we will show you how we used them to allow inclusion, shared understanding and continuity across workshops and different participants.
We will also touch on the importance challenges of building relationships and actively engaging with participants, particularly when approaching sensitive subjects (terminal disease and death) and not having a client organization defining constraints or ongoing responsibility.
