by Fawnia Cahyani BA (Hons) User Experience Design – An Indonesian designer living in London and going through the ninth month of placement year as a Design Intern at IBM iX, London. In my professional practice, I have been improving digital prescription experience for British citizens on the NHS App. In the past eight months, my evenings have been a place of passion, where I can let my ideas, intrigues, and innovation flow without restriction. Professionally applying my discipline, User Experience Design has taught me the importance of side projects, whether self-initiated or externally driven, to preserve and remind myself the reason I first dive into the world of design: tackling wicked problems with sense-making and through the design of daily interactions. This revelation was probably innate in my mind, but it was made clear when I was developing my Self Initiated Project during this Diploma in Professional Studies year. Finding the topic to explore, keeping in mind that I have no rules to adhere to, was exciting, yet overwhelming at first. In my leisure time, I tend to immerse in multiple interests, whether it be watching the latest series on Netflix or going through critically acclaimed films I was missing out on, scrolling through Pinterest and archiving striking pictures of inspirations into limitless categories, reading through latest design books, or following threads of mobile application developers on social media, like X and Threads – all while scheming that I would, too, do that sooner or later. I have always stored project ideas, digitally or on a piece of receipt when I am sat in a restaurant. This year, I was given the opportunity to choose one, commit, and put in the time to make them into reality. Part I: Defining focusAs a user experience design student, it is a journey towards rediscovering agency to be able to direct a project without any restriction, e.g., marking rubrics or design briefs. For context, having my professional responsibilities as a design intern at IBM iX throughout the day enhances the novelty of this context even more. Defining my own inclination in design means to present my true identity as a practitioner. Consequently, these questions kept my feet on the ground: Where in the sphere of social and environmental context do I want to be in this problem finding process? What kind of user experience designer do I want to be after finding and proposing the solution to the said problem? The answer came to me, as you might expect, at an unexpected and serendipitous timing; stemming from thoughts I have throughout my daily routines. When I commute to and from work using the Northern Line, I have always noticed the polluted air and resist myself to breathe as much as possible, though I can not do anything with my exposed skin. Before buying a new sunscreen, I create a Miro board to compare and contrast the advantages and disadvantages of each option. No matter how dark the day is in winter, I always use the FDA recommended thickness of 2 mg per cm squared (Julian et al., 2022) or approximately around 2 fingers worth of sunscreen. All of this led me to the idea of a project centred around skincare, and specifically, to remind people to reapply sunscreen every two hours with a widget on their phone’s home screen. Part II: Questioning the focus From just reading the previous paragraph, it might seem obvious that there is incoherence in the conclusion of my idea. However, this was not apparent to me, until I discussed the idea to fellow skincare users. I would wear sunscreen before my make-up, but I can’t be bothered to reapply throughout the day because it’s inconvenient and I don’t think I need it. In my one-to-one session with my DPS tutor, Steph McLaren-Neckles, she added a pivotal question: which community am I trying to solve the problem for? Delving deeper into the topic, I found that unless a person is outdoors consistently or is under medical advice to do so, this behaviour is not necessary (Chien, 2022). As seen on Figure 1, I cultivated more context and dimension to the idea and found myself again in square one: finding a direction. This process is called iteration, as Nielsen amused in the context of user interfaces (2020): “... it is virtually impossible to design a user interface that has no usability problems from the start.” I have now found that besides user interfaces, ideas in itself can go through a refinement process through evaluation methods, such as user testing. Especially, when the intention is to have an idea that speculates what the world needs and future-proof with design. Reflecting back, I recognise two methods to hinder premature conclusion to a solution:
Through a workshop in the BAMBUU incubator program, I stated the big idea to my project as “to protect skin despite climate change and its implications.” Looking back into it, protecting skin can mean different actions depending on the person and climate change in itself is a wicked problem, affecting communities on different levels depending on their personal, geographical, or economical context. Therefore, the consciousness of “who” we are interacting with in the design process is crucial. My observation of the lack of community involvement in the early stage of design aligns with Costanza-Chock’s findings (2020) as Figure 2 illustrates. The diagram analyses eight design projects. In the beginning of the design process, three demonstrate a weak degree of participation, four having mediocre engagement, and only one achieves relatively strong involvement of people from the communities most affected by the design project. Part III: Regaining focus Through an online interview with Budi Tanrim, a senior designer who currently focuses on building his own product, I discovered a framework to choose a focus from my extensive idea list: to ask Why? and to test the idea with users as fast and cheap as possible. In the process of answering the “why”, I discovered a deeper sense of purpose and a distinction to my practice, which helps to position myself in the discipline: a designer of experiences to incite climate-aware behaviours. This area continuously grew my curiosity during the process of prototyping the solution as shown in Figure 3, putting together the home page, collocating climate information with skincare recommendation and synthesising its information architecture of which content should go first were challenging. I have now deduced that this was due to the very few examples of best practices in the intersection of User Experience Design and climate change. There are endless possibilities to the niche, which I observed in at least two practitioners in my field:
Compared to the two practitioners, my practice distinguishes itself by helping people, specifically their skin, stay healthy through the intersection of digital interaction and the display of meaningful data. Within the diverse and ever-evolving field of UX Design, I have found new agency and self-discovery through my SIP. Taking everything into account, from diverse research methods, insights, and most importantly, time management skills, this project has personally contributed to my confidence in pursuing independent research and developing innovative solutions. Professionally, the acknowledgment of iterative design process through empathy and moving through the design process with reflective manner is an invaluable skill set as a designer and innovator. Ultimately, the ability to present a cohesive synthesis of my interdisciplinary interests between healthcare and design will be a crucial foundation in successfully addressing my proposed thesis question: “How can UX design principles and methodologies be applied to improve the delivery of interventions in the preventative, curative, and rehabilitative measures to stunting?” in my final year at LCC. Bibliography
Benson, L. (2024) Studio Pi-A’s breathing app inspired by science and Design, WePresent. Available at: https://wepresent.wetransfer.com/stories/studio-pia-lungy (Accessed: 01 May 2024). Chien, A.L.-L. (2022) Sunscreen and your morning routine, Johns Hopkins Medicine. Available at: https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/sunscreen-and-your-morning-routine (Accessed: 01 May 2024). Costanza-Chock, S. (2020) Design practices: ‘nothing about us without us’, Design Justice. Available at: https://designjustice.mitpress.mit.edu/pub/cfohnud7/release/4 (Accessed: 01 May 2024). Fessenden, T. (2019) Assumptions: How to track them in the UX design process (video), Nielsen Norman Group. Available at: https://www.nngroup.com/videos/tracking-assumptions/ (Accessed: 01 May 2024). Hale, L. (2024) About, Luke Hale. Available at: https://www.lukehale.com/about (Accessed: 01 May 2024). How to use a sunscreen product: Paula’s choice tips (no date) www.paulaschoice.co.uk. Available at: https://www.paulaschoice.co.uk/how-should-you-use-a-sunscreen-product (Accessed: 01 May 2024). Julian, A.K., Tribby, C.P. and Perna, F.M. (2022) ‘Visual AIDS for Sunscreen Application: A mixed methods study’, Photodermatology, Photoimmunology & Photomedicine, 39(1), pp. 21–26. doi:10.1111/phpp.12794. Lupi, G. (2025) About, giorgialupi. Available at: https://giorgialupi.com/about (Accessed: 01 May 2024). Lupi, G. (no date) Plastic Air, giorgialupi. Available at: https://giorgialupi.com/plastic-air (Accessed: 01 May 2024). Nielsen, J. (2020) Iterative design of User Interfaces, Nielsen Norman Group. Available at: https://www.nngroup.com/articles/iterative-design/ (Accessed: 01 May 2024). Pia health (2024) Pia Health. Available at: https://www.piahealth.co/ (Accessed: 15 May 2024).
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