Collectively, the program of research will be divided into two general themes, the first
concerning the user, the second concerning organisations. Within these themes we have identified
six research strings – each with its own hypothesis – through which the work will be conducted. We
use the term ‘string’ to indicate that the investigations stretch concurrently throughout the centre
lifetime, whereas collaborative company projects are shorter and will engage researchers across the strings.
Supporting user innovation
Through the in-situ study of people and contexts, the first triad of research strings
will provide an understanding of how people innovate, how their skills can be deployed
in user-driven innovation projects, and how user-driven innovation can be expanded
through the understanding, adaptation and application of users’ methods and interactions.
These strings will generate a theoretical understanding of users with respect to their
skills, innovation processes and the construction of values in context, as well as
methods and tools to feed this understanding back into innovation processes.
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Skilled innovation
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Understanding skilled users as producers (rather than consumers) of
technology, and how tools can empower people to build skills (Ingold 2000),
both in ’use’ and ’innovation’ of technology.
Aims:
Understand how knowledge and skills that users rely on are realised in
their processes of innovation.
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Methods:
- Research through design
- Participant observation
- Video analysis
(DA, ID)
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Anticipated Results:
Products, services and toolkits that support and sustain users’ ability to innovate-in-use.
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Values in action
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Values are observable in the ways human beings in interactions treat
themselves, each other, the environment and artefacts. As cognitive
phenomena, values can be considered as stable features of individuals
that guide their behaviour.
Aims:
Unpack the complexity of settings of use and use this understanding to
guide Consumer Behaviour studies; scrutinise how the identification of
‘values’ is tied to methods of investigation.
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Methods:
- Participant observation
- Video analysis
- Conversation analysis
- Breaching experiments
- In situ interviews
- Surveys
(CB, IA, UCD) |
Anticipated Results:
Strategies for the design of new technologies, and comparative understandings
of the relationship between innovation and the creation of value for users.
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Horizons of imagination
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Whereas users may consider a future time horizon of 2-3 years, and so-called
leadusers possibly 5-7 years (von Hippel 1998), many technologies need more
time than this to mature.
Aims:
Evaluate how businesses depict and forecast technological progress and the methods people use to imagine futures.
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Methods:
- Technology life-scale
- Ethnographic study
- Technology projection
- Comparative analysis
(IM, ID, Theatre) |
Anticipated Results:
Successful matching of breakthrough technologies and user needs with
a longer time horizon than the existing user innovation methods offer.
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Organising user-driven innovation
In parallel with the study of users and use contexts, it is essential to
critically examine the management and organisation of user driven innovation,
particularly as the uptake of user-driven innovation in industry has been
slow. This theme will focus explicitly on the organisation of user-driven
innovation in practice. Each research string addresses a different aspect,
in a cumulative effort to make user-driven innovation a realisable option
for business enterprises. The research strings concern the re-evaluation of
use and participation, the particular innovation capabilities of SMEs, and
the provocation of existing corporate assumptions that ethnography may
facilitate. Taken together, these three research strings will provide a
comprehensive understanding of current approaches to and shortcomings of
user-driven innovation from the perspective of company operations, and a
suite of approaches to marry the theory of user-driven innovation to the
practical reality of daily business practices.
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Dynamic Participation
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Broaden the notion of ’use’ by expanding the way UCD thinks of
participation, appreciating that companies orient their operations
to multiple accountabilities to stakeholders and others involved
in their processses of production.
Aims:
Map the relations between the variety of participants in the value
network, understanding the negotiation inherent to processes of innovation.
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Methods:
- Action research
- Performative tasks
- Video analysis
- Ethnographic study
- Improvised theatre
(B2B, UCD, Theatre) |
Anticipated Results:
Methods, tasks, activities and re-presentations to involve
stakeholders of all types in the innovation process.
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SME Aptitude
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Existing user innovation methods are a poor fit for small and medium
sized enterprises, both because they may require extra competencies
and also because they do not build upon the special aptitudes of SMEs.
Aims:
Examine SMEs innovation capabilities and develop a framework for adapting UDI approaches to SMEs.
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Methods:
- In-situ field studies
- Comparative analysis
- Action research
(IM, DA) |
Anticipated Results:
Approaches to user-driven innovation that are sensitive to the conditions
of SMEs with an associated cost/benefit understanding.
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Ethnographic Provocation
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User studies have the potential to provoke the organization to see
itself in the light of its customers and question assumptions and corporate
values, if taken beyond expressed user needs or product problems (Anderson 1994).
Aims:
Employ and assess the use of ethnographic studies to provoke existing
assumptions of development processes involving users.
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Methods:
- Organised provocations
- Participant observation
- Interviews
- Conversation analysis
- Improvised theatre
(DA, IA, Theatre) |
Anticipated Results:
Novel practices that encourage revelatory discussions of user perceptions
in organizations and highlight organisational capacity to respond to
ongoing change.
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