Everything that surrounds us is the result of a creative process. This process is very complex and unique, creatives have their own way of working and thinking. That is why creativity is not so easily defined because it is so many things at the same time, it’s not a single characteristic, it’s the interaction of many traits and habits that are individual in each person.
This thesis project dealt with the complex sets of interactions in creative minds. Everybody is in some way creative, but many people need to be made aware of their capabilities.
An example of that statement is that Designers have a different workflow than engineers it’s sometimes difficult to get along while developing a new product together. This project supports communication and understanding to simplify the workflow in an interdisciplinary team. As a result of the research and surveys, a tool to better understand other professional fields in a playful way and thus benefit the development process and workflow was created. The understanding and communication can be strengthened, and new skills are learned to enrich the workflow.
All the research led to the following concept for a design solution to support communication and understanding in interdisciplinary teams and simplify their workflow. A playful tool for a better understanding in other professional areas should be created. The understanding and communication can be strengthened and new skills are learned to enrich the work process. A learning platform to bring different ways of knowledge and thinking together. It could be an extension of a work management and organization tool or a learning App. It’s a tool to get an overview of different areas and create an individual learning path. For interdisciplinary teams, people get to know the others‘ way of working and gain essential knowledge. It also helps to create more mutual acceptance and recognition for the other parties besides clearing up misunderstandings.
To test the main idea of the concept, a small workshop was created. The goal was to prove that the method of learning a new perspective can help to improve workflow and communication. Therefore a small group of people from different disciplines was asked to participate. There was a business engineer, an electronic technician, a psychology student, and a marketing student.
All the learnings from the first workshop were used to improve the Prototype of the App. It could be said that there was consistently positive feedback on the concept and the workshop. The points of criticism mentioned, such as font size or additional functions, will be considered in the future and will be implemented. In this small mixed group, the basic idea worked in the given framework and thus confirmed the concept.
The final result is a clickable app prototype. This prototype shows how the app will look and function when developed. It is kept clean and simple to not give too much input and to be able to focus on the learning process. With the QR code you can go directly to the prototype to test it.
The fact that the concept is universal allows it to be implemented in other scenarios and expand. The main idea is to bring Person A and Person B together in their working process and to simplify their communication. In the thesis, the main example have been designers and engineers but it could also be teachers and students or different departments of a university that do a project together. The example was used to make the concept and idea clearer. I think that concept has a lot of potential in many ways, and the result of the thesis is just one way to solve the problem.
