Inspired by the inaugural D4D 2015 conference, librarians from Reed College and Montana State University have kept in touch to brainstorm and share ideas on design research and service design. Our projects have many parallels, yet remain unique due to our distinct work environments and goals for our respective projects. We share a common belief that the holistic approaches of design research are critically important for creating and sustaining library services. Design research and its holistic blending of the physical and digital is the next important topic for libraries. It holds great power for improving library services, but initiating and planning a project of this type comes with a unique set of challenges, including gaining buy-in; working out logistics, timing, and scope; and appropriately matching methods to research questions. This 90 minute presentation/session will start with a discussion of the different types of design and will provide attendees with points of conversation they can adapt to help build a shared understanding with colleagues and administrators of the value of design research. We will then discuss how we got started at our individual libraries and offer advice and resources for getting traction on and sustaining projects. Following the presentation section of our session, we will work through a set of exercises to help attendees practice design-focused research techniques. Presented at Designing for Digital 2016 in Austin, TX. Presenters include: Joe Marquez, Annie Downey, Kris Johnson, & Scott Young.

1. Understanding
Understanding
Implementing Design-Focused
Service Initiatives at Your Library
Annie Downey & Joe Marquez,
Reed College
D4D Conference
Austin, TX - April 6, 2016
Scott Young & Kris Johnson,
MSU Bozeman

2. Who We Are
● Kris Johnson, Montana State University,
krisjohnson@montana.edu - @askkrisjohnson
● Scott Young, Montana State University,
swyoung@montana.edu - @hei_scott
● Annie Downey, Reed College, adowney@reed.edu
● Joe Marquez, Reed College, jmarquez@reed.edu -
@joughm

3. Outline & Expectations
● Overview of process
● Activities to get everyone talking
● Case Studies from MSU and Reed College
● More activities
● Wrap-up

4. Understanding understanding
Understanding - the power of comprehending; especially :
the capacity to apprehend general relations of particulars :
the power to make experience intelligible by applying
concepts and categories
understanding - related to the user’s perception,
interpretation, need(s), and expectation

5. Understanding understanding
Put another way….
Understanding = us
understanding = them

7. Understanding understanding
The need to understand who our users are in order to
design with and for them.
It is about understanding what they know, perceive, expect
and need.

8. Why Should We Care About Design?
“It must constantly be borne in mind that the object being worked on is
going to be ridden in, sat upon, looked at, talked into, activated, operated,
or in some way used by people individually or en masse. If the point of
contact between the product and people becomes a point of friction,
then the designer has failed. If, on the other hand, people are made
safer, more comfortable, more desirous of purchase, more efficient — or
just plain happier — by contact with the product, then the designer has
succeeded.”
Henry Dreyfuss, Industrial Designer
Dreyfuss, H. (1950). The Industrial Designer and the Businessman. Harvard Business Review, 28(6), 77–85.

9. Why Does It Matter?
Services do not operate in a vacuum, but rather in tandem
with other established services.
Services are part of larger things called systems or
ecologies.

10. The Library From the User’s Perspective

11. Libraries are Tightly Coupled Systems
“A system is a set of things interconnected in such a way that they
produce their own pattern of behavior over time.” (p.2)
“Once we see the relationship between structure and behavior, we can
begin to understand how systems work, what makes them produce
poor results, and how to shift them into better behavior patterns.” (p.
1)
Donella Meadows, Thinking in Systems
Meadows, D. H. (2008). Thinking in systems : a primer. White River Junction, Vt: Chelsea Green Pub.

12. Activities

13. Think Pair Share Service Safari!
Think (one minute):
● an example of a favorite service experience
● an example of an awful service experience
Pair (five minutes):
● what made it good
● what made it awful
Share:
● the characteristics of good service experiences
● the characteristics of bad service experiences

14. KJ Technique + Affinity Mapping
KJ Technique (5 minutes)
● A silent, consensus-building method for generating shared understanding
● Thoughts are written on Post-its, then shared together
○ What is design thinking?
○ In which contexts can design thinking be applied?
○ What are the barriers to design thinking?
Affinity Mapping (10 minutes)
● Technique for identifying emerging themes from disparate sources (like
Post-its!)

17. Families of Design
Design: A plan for arranging elements in such a way as best to
accomplish a particular purpose. – Charles Eames
Photograph by Rama, Wikimedia Commons, Cc-by-sa-2.0-fr

18. Families of Design
● Design Thinking: Is a discipline that uses the designer’s sensibility and
methods to match people’s needs with what is technologically feasible
and what a viable business strategy can convert into customer value and
market opportunity. (Brown, 2008)
● Interaction Design: Interaction design, a significant part of interface
design, is responsible for designing the performance of these processes
in relation to the user over time. (Heidkamp, 2008)
● Participatory Design: Participatory design describes a collaborative
approach to the design of products, services, spaces, or systems that
includes the range of stakeholders in the creative process. (Dust &
Jonsdatter, 2008)

19. Families of Design
● Service Design: Service design is a holistic, co-creative, and user-centered
approach to understanding customer behavior for the creation or refining
of services. (Marquez & Downey, 2015)
● User Experience Design: UX design is the process of designing (digital or
physical) products that are useful, easy to use, and delightful to interact
with. (Lanoue, 2015)
● Universal Design: Universal design is not a specialized field of design
practice but an approach to design, an attitude, a mindset conducive to
the idea that designed objects, systems, environments, and services
should be equally accessible and simultaneously experienced by the
largest number of people possible. (Mitrasinovic, 2008)

20. Common Themes
● Human-centered
● Problem-solving
● Library as a system
● Everything as a service
● + Emergent themes

21. [Service] Design Mindset
● Co-Creation

22. [Service] Design Mindset
● Co-Creation
● Making the Intangible Tangible

23. [Service] Design Mindset
● Co-Creation
● Making the Intangible Tangible
● Confirming with Evidence

24. [Service] Design Mindset
● Co-Creation
● Making the Intangible Tangible
● Confirming with Evidence
● Focus on User Needs and Expectations

25. [Service] Design Mindset
● Co-Creation
● Making the Intangible Tangible
● Confirming with Evidence
● Focus on User Needs and Expectations
● Holistic

26. [Service] Design Mindset
● Co-Creation
● Making the Intangible Tangible
● Confirming with Evidence
● Focus on User Needs and Expectations
● Holistic
● Empathetic

27. [Service] Design Mindset
● Co-Creation
● Making the Intangible Tangible
● Confirming with Evidence
● Focus on User Needs and Expectations
● Holistic
● Empathetic
● Open minded, or No Devil’s Advocate

28. [Service] Design Mindset
● Co-Creation
● Making the Intangible Tangible
● Confirming with Evidence
● Focus on User Needs and Expectations
● Holistic
● Empathetic
● Open minded, or No Devil’s Advocate
● A Willingness to Evolve

29. Break!
Break:
10:45 - 11:00 a.m.

30. Case Studies

31. Service Design @ Reed College
Goal
● Understand how students use the physical library and library
services/resources.
Scope
● Defined by College Librarian
● Changed and refined over time to focus more on space usage
Timeline
● Two+ years
● Plan in fall / implement in spring / data analysis and report writing in
summer
Two groups
● Library Usability Group (LUX) = staff
● Student advisory group = users

32. SD @ Reed College Library: Phase 1
Assess space usage (SUMA + Gate counts)
● Once each semester
● What questions do you have?
● What will you do with the data?
Create student advisory group
4 meetings with student advisory group
● Pre-survey
● Service discussion
● Scenarios
● Journaling
● Customer journeys
● Reference desk prototype
● Website review
Analyze data and write final report

33. SD @ Reed College Library: Phase 2
Turning the tables….adding student advisers to Library Usability
Group
● Students create, plan, and run focus groups
● 2-3 meetings as whole team to develop plan and questions
● Students volunteered for roles
○ Marketing /recruiting participants
○ Facilitators
○ Note takers / helpers
○ Analysis (if time)

34. What did we learn from the students?
● students are creatures of habit
● wayfinding
● culture of the library
● hierarchy
● library spaces are consecrated spaces
● naming conventions
● additional services: refilling stations, printing, better website
● chairs, uneven
● small repairs needed throughout library

35. What did we learn about the process?
● Plan early
● Test often
● Get buy-in early
● Communicate about the process – explain what you are doing and
what you are NOT doing
● Don’t be afraid to ask questions
● Leave all preconceived notions about your students (users) at the
door – approach the process with an open mind

36. Design Research @ Montana State University
A process of
composing & connecting

37. Design Research @ Montana State University
A culture of
reflective practice
intellectual integration
intentional choice

38. Design Research @ Montana State University
An impact based on
Understanding
Communication
Navigation
Application

39. Design Research @ MSU: Understanding
● Users
● Colleagues
● Administrators
● Design
● Motivation for change
● Infrastructure for change
● Professional community
○ D4D 2015 generated focus and provided purpose

40. Design Research @ MSU: Communication
● Share ideas and explore new techniques
● Build shared understanding and mutual trust
● “However much time you’re spending on communication, it’s not
enough.”
● Survey the landscape and inquire, “How can we make change to
improve the Library?”

41. Design Research @ MSU: Navigation
● Form a committee!
● WCG -> UXG/PSG -> LEG + DRWG + AppDev
● Articulate mission, vision, scope
● Identify initial projects
● Explore method and application
● Communicate early and often

43. Design Research @ MSU: Application
● Build design infrastructure and capacity for change
● Success stories
○ LGBTQ+ Initiative
○ Love Letter / Breakup Letter
○ Design Consultations

44. LGBTQ+
● Safe Zone Training for Library staff
● New Webpage and Browse Collection for LGBTQ+ resources
● Diversity-focused collection development policies

45. Love Letter / Breakup Letter

46. Love Letter / Breakup Letter
“The library staff are consistently
courteous and professional.”

47. Love Letter / Breakup Letter
“The library staff are consistently
courteous and professional.”
“Thank you for all the new outlets on 3rd
floor.”

48. Love Letter / Breakup Letter
“Why are all the hand dryers have so much
mold on them?”

49. Love Letter / Breakup Letter
“Why are all the hand dryers have so much
mold on them?”
“Not stoked that the majority of the
computers are out of order... between that
and the slowest WiFi in town... we may
need to breakup. It’s not me, it’s you.”

50. Design Consultations

51. Design Consultations
● Insight. We begin our consultation with a discussion of your vision
and goals for your service or product, with a focus on the insights
you wish to gain from design inquiry and user research.

52. Design Consultations
● Insight. We begin our consultation with a discussion of your vision
and goals for your service or product, with a focus on the insights
you wish to gain from design inquiry and user research.
● Method. With your goals in mind, we then identify relevant
research methods that will generate user insights to illuminate the
experience of your service or product.

53. Design Consultations
● Insight. We begin our consultation with a discussion of your vision
and goals for your service or product, with a focus on the insights
you wish to gain from design inquiry and user research.
● Method. With your goals in mind, we then identify relevant
research methods that will generate user insights to illuminate the
experience of your service or product.
● Application. We provide guidance in applying research results for
achieving your goals and improving the design and experience of
your service or product.​

54. Activities, Pt 2

55. The Customer Journey Map
A Customer Journey Map (CJM) is a visual representation of the user journey
and experience in using a service or space.
Marquez, Joe J., Annie Downey, and Ryan Clement. “Walking a Mile in the User’s Shoes: Customer Journey Mapping as a
Method to Understanding the User Experience.” Internet Reference Services Quarterly 20, no. 3–4 (October 2, 2015): 135–50.
doi:10.1080/10875301.2015.1107000.

70. Patron Journey, Visualized

71. CJM, post-analysis

72. The CJM Explained

73. Mind Map
Guiding Questions
- How can the concepts of design be realized in your library?
- How can we apply a flexible design mindset?
- What does the design process entail?

75. Mind Map

76. Design Mindset
● Co-Creation
● Making the Intangible Tangible
● Confirming with Evidence
● Focus on User Needs and Expectations
● Holistic
● Open minded, or No Devil’s Advocate
● A Willingness to Evolve
● Empathetic

77. Thank you!
Any Questions?