Members of newly formed design teams have different framesimplicit values, goals and assumptions -each of them hold about what problems are important and how they are best addressed. In the early, informal phases of design projects, these frames, and the degree to which they are shared within the team, have substantial consequences. However, little is known about the interactions and activities that reveal frames and support frame sharing in teams. Our study follows 22 newly-formed multi-disciplinary teams through the early phases of the design process in a New Product Development course. We used a mixed method, interdisciplinary approach to understand the dynamic process through which design frames are socially negotiated and shared. We identified core framing activities of design teams and propose a framing cycle of pseudo-frame setting, making individuals' frames explicit, making frame conflicts salient, and building a common frame.
New product development (NPD) classes based around problem-based learning and mediated by design coaches from industry provide an effective vehicle for authentic learning and realistic design experiences within the constraints of academic settings. Little is known, however, about what students actually learn in these courses or whether the learning corresponds to what is required by industry. To address these questions, we: (1) analyzed data from a structured “lessons learned,” or self-reflection, exercise performed by NPD students in a graduate, multidisciplinary NPD class at the University of California, Berkeley each year for the past 6 years; and (2) conducted interviews with our industrial partners who coached the students’ projects. We present an analysis of over 2300 lessons learned and compare the students’ views with the reflections of the industry coaches. In the lessons learned analysis, students highlighted skills for working in multidisciplinary teams as their most important learning experience, and secondarily, within lessons about the NPD process itself, identified the gathering and analysis of customer and user needs. Students commonly referenced skills that are not part of a traditional engineering design curriculum: listening, observation, and performing research in context. The interviews with the design coaches largely confirmed the importance of both the realistic teamwork experience that accompanies NPD and user research skills. Our findings reinforce the importance of providing students with real multidisciplinary team experience for NPD projects and suggest that greater emphasis be given to the teaching and practice of “softer” skills, such as listening, negotiation, empathy, and observation. The research also indicates that more guidance, tools, and frameworks are needed to assist student product developers in the complex task of gathering, managing, and applying user needs.
The most powerful scientific advances are propelled by creative ideas that cross disciplinary boundaries. Few fields exemplify this as thoroughly as nanoscience, which promises to benefit humankind by delivering radically new technologies-if scientists from different disciplines can work together creatively. Unfortunately, initiating interdisciplinary conversations can be a costly undertaking in the context of academia, where disciplines are separated by entrenched physical and social structures. We present a new method, called 'speedstorming,' designed to improve the process of teaching and initiating creative collaboration. Early results show great promise for accelerating the rate of collaboration formation in the field of nanoscience. We found that for teaching and forming creative collaboration, speedstorming is more efficient and more effective than group brainstorming. This article explores the rationale for using such a method in nanoscience research and education and details the steps to conducting speedstorming sessions to achieve several common aims in a variety of settings. Limitations and unanswered questions regarding the method are also explored.
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