👉🏽Before I begin, I’d want to explain why I picked ‘Physical Space’ as my problem area :-

You might be thinking, “Hey, this is a UX design case study, right?” & I am supposed to see some digital challenges and solution for digital space. But, I’d like you to pause and focus on this notion for a moment, and consider if the UX design approach can just be applied to digital items, or whether it can also be applied to other spaces around us.

Because at its core, user experience (UX) is the problem solving and emotional experience that users/consumers receive through services, products, websites, or any online communication, and I firmly believe that in everything we use in our daily lives (from the time we wake up in the morning until we go to bed, we come across numerous products such as cars, refrigerators, television sets, air conditioners, washing machines, microwave ovens, and so on), better UX design needs to be incorporated.

👨🏼‍💻Why I chose ‘Home Office’

• I enjoy how ambiguous this challenge is, ‘Improve the experience of working from home.’ Solving physical space problems was novel to me; ‘where’ should I enhance the experience, ‘why’ should I improve the experience, ‘how’ should I enhance the experience. Nothing was indicated in the problem brief; it was simply an open-ended statement disguised as a problem. Furthermore, I discovered that we as humans become so accustomed to our surroundings that we may fail to identify issues that might be fixed or modified. So all of this uncertainty piqued my interest, and I decided to look into this problem statement.
• The COVID-19 pandemic has operated as a “time machine to the future,” removing many limits that existed before to its outbreak. One of these privileges was our capacity and freedom to ‘Work From Home’ with quick technological adaptation. While the habits appeared to change, most of us have yet to figure out how to work efficiently enough for a variety of reasons. So I would love to look into those causes, investigate the pain areas, and see if I can come up with any efficient solutions to the problem.

Looking at the above images, you could be thinking, ok, we know you’ve solved the challenges people have in their workplaces, and this might be the solution. Yes, you are entirely accurate; this is the solution I developed. But this is only a snapshot of my full problem-solving process; thus, I’d want to take you on a journey of ‘How I came up with this solution’ using the design thinking method.

❓ But, What’s ‘Design Thinking’?

In a nutshell, design thinking is a technique for addressing complex problems by putting the user first. It is rooted in observing people’s interactions with their environments with empathy and takes an iterative, hands-on approach to create innovative solutions. Design thinking is a human-centered approach to creating long-term value for customers, and the technique is applicable to any complex system. Because it tries to address a specific human need, it tackles ambiguous or difficult-to-define challenges, and it leads to much more innovative solutions.

🌱 First Things First….

🚀 So, I started off solving this problem with…

🔬 ‘Understanding How People Work From Home & Their Interaction With Their Work Space’

Although I had my own preconceptions and biases about how people would work from home, I realized that I ≠ User, and I needed to unlearn and relearn this basic yet crucial perspective. Because you are unlikely to ever create a product for yourself. & interviewing or conversing with your users and listening to them is one of the most efficient techniques to determine what the pain point is.

Those pain points are insights for us as UX designers, and they represent the underlying truth about a problem, one’s wants, frustrations, and motivation about a given topic.

To conduct the 1:1 interviews, I created an interview guide with a list of questions to ask my participants. I divided the questions into three categories to keep my interviews organized and to steer myself in the right path.

While preparing this guide, I started recruiting participants through various WhatsApp and Discord groups, inviting them to have a 30/40-minute talk with me, and some of them responded. We agreed on mutual meeting times, and I finished my interviews with everyone who agreed.

After doing interviews with my users, I used to take notes on my observations and conversations. You can see my note-taking guide here, and during all of these interviews, I discovered gaps and pain points for each user I spoke. Here’s a quick look at each one:

🔎 ‘Analyze To Synthesize’

After gathering almost all kinds of necessary data from user interviews, I decided it was time to get insights and filter out the useful data.

I identified and wrote all of the problems that could be solved for all of the users I interviewed, as well as framed and expressed those problems from the users’ point of view. Because I made thorough notes and documentation during user interviews, I discovered a plethora of issues that my users were unaware of and that needed to be addressed!

🤔Find a way for the user to effortlessly transfer the table from the bedroom to the living room on a daily basis.

🤷🏼‍♂️ The main area of her home office (her bedroom) is too comfortable for Kshitija, so she pulls the table from the bedroom to the living room to avoid being lazy. The table, however, is too heavy for her to move every time, and it leaves stains on the floor as she drags it. As well as She also needs to alter the position of her table during meetings because she believes her living room’s background is too cluttered, and because the table is heavy, it is difficult for her to adjust the table’s position every time.

🤔Find a means for the user to securely put the whiteboard without relying on the support of the wall or table.

🤷🏼‍♂️ To assist with the whiteboard Kshitija must secure it between the wall and the table so that it remains stable, but as soon as the table becomes unsteady, the whiteboard slips off and repositioning it becomes difficult. In addition, when the table is pressed against the wall to hold the whiteboard, the color of the wall fades.

🤔Find a technique for the user to avoid noise and disturbance from the environment while attending meetings or completing concentrated work.

🤷🏼‍♂️ Users were too disturbed and frustrated because of two people working in the same room and interfering with each other’s work, noise from TV or music players, cooker whistles, or external factors like excessive noise from exhaust fans, nearby schools, excessive honking & blaring of automobiles from nearby road, or harsh sound from nearby construction sites, and numerous other reasons that are out of users’ control most of the time.

🤔 Find a means for the user to prevent misplacing essential objects in the drawers.

🤷🏼‍♂️ Although users have distinct drawers for each item, they misplace the majority of them, and when they want one of the things, they must spend a long time looking through all of the drawers, which is difficult for them most of the time. Furthermore, because the drawers are solid and not transparent, they must be completely opened to view the contents.

🤔 Find a way for the user to keep cords, chargers, and other objects separate while they are in the drawer or on the surface.

🤷🏼‍♂️ Either most of my users place things in the drawer alongside cables, chargers, and so on, and everything in the drawer becomes entangled, and it becomes another work for them to untangle all the wires and objects from each other, or when two people work from the same place and all the wires of all the gadgets spread across the table, making the whole table look messy & busy with wires entangling between each other, making it difficult for the users to clean & arrange the table.

🤔 Find a solution for the user to have a comfortable sitting arrangement regardless of their working style.

🤷🏼‍♂️ For users like Kshitija, Sumukh, and Naresh, the heights of their chairs and tables aren’t properly adjusted in terms of their height and ergonomics with each other, resulting in insufficient leg room space, backaches from prolonged uncomfortable sitting, and the placement of extra pillows on the chair’s base, among other things.

🤷🏼‍♂️ Users like Nikita and Tushar who work from their beds because they work with a lap table or pillows placed on their laps encounter many challenges such as leg numbness, back discomfort owing to inappropriate sitting posture, inability to alter leg posture, and so on.

🤔 Find a means for the user to organize his books, stationery, notes, and so on.. at/nearby the computer table.

🤷🏼‍♂️ Because there aren’t enough drawers/space to put enough items on the desk, users’ desks look cluttered, or they have to put their items somewhere else and fetch or retrieve those items from somewhere else to their desk & vice versa frequently, which breaks their focus and frustrates them to great extent.

🤔 Find a way for the user to easily lift the table from his lap when he wants to stand & fetch something.

🤷🏼‍♂️ It is a real annoyance for many users who work from bed to lift a heavy lap table or pillow that contains their majority of their belongings such as laptop, mouse, keyboard, etc., set everything aside, stand up and fetch something, and then repeat the steps in reverse. All of these activities disrupt their productivity and force them to reorganize everything.

🤔 Find a solution for the users to keep coffee/water or other liquids from spilling on the table while the they are working.

🤷🏼‍♂️When users work at their desks with coffee or tea on their tables, they must be careful that it does not spill on their laptops due to carelessness.

🎰 ‘Thinking Of Solutions To The Users’ Problems’

This is the stage when I started solving problems after I realized what they were and what I needed to solve. I kept the problem statements in front of me and utilized the Crazy 8s technique to come up with as many ideas as possible in 8 minutes.

👆🏼 In this way, I tried to list down as much ideas as possible for each problem in a specified time limit.

I was able to come up with total 57 ideas

👆 You can access them by clicking on the hyperlink

Out of those 57 ideas, I decided to rank them up respectively and chose the top three ideas that I would want to work on depending on how much influence the individual solution can have on the lives of my users.

Here are my top 3 ideas -

🌟 Top Idea 1 :- Multidirectional drawer (which may open along the x and y axes) with customizable compartments based on the shape of the objects (pens, staplers, books, etc.) as well as an anti-scratch glass surface over its top.

Why I chose to pick this idea :-

🌟 Top Idea 2 :- Create a configurable, portable table and chair that can be connected to a bed as required.

Why I chose to pick this idea :-

🌟 Top Idea 3 :- Create a portable noise-cancelling cabin (Made up of sound damping materials which are lightweight yet effective).

Why I chose to pick this idea :-

With limited time and the need to delve further into my users’ concerns as well as provide a strong feasible solution, I narrowed my scope and chose only one concept that I believed would have a greater impact than the others. The ultimate goal is to understand how good you are in understanding users problems.

🛠️ ️‘Building Solution’

Create a configurable, portable table and chair that can be connected to a bed as required.

❓ Why :- During my study, I discovered that the majority of users do not have a specific location such as a home office, but instead they make their available room into a home office or work from bed, sofa, etc. These areas aren’t designed to be used for work, but because users are accustomed to them despite the numerous inconveniences, I reasoned that resolving this issue would have a significant impact without requiring my users to change their behavior.

👇🏻 Prototype :-

☀️ Following are some of the features of my prototype -

1. 180 Degrees Adjustable Wheels — For many users, dragging or lifting a heavy table is difficult, so having wheels is essential. However, when the table is stationary, it is also important that the table stays in place, so having wheels that can be rotated across their handles in 180 degrees so that the base of the table’s legs become a flat surface and the entire structure remains steady.
2. Hydraulic adjusters and hydraulic knobs — Users come in a variety of demographics and geographic, with varying heights, and one size does not suit all. As a result, with the aid of the hydraulic knob, users may alter the height of the legs by spinning the knob clockwise or anticlockwise with minimum effort, as well as the height of the whole table. This function would alleviate the limitation of leg space crunch and would undoubtedly avoid the discomfort of leg strain.
3. Space for extra pad — Most of the time, users require additional areas to place their essential items alongside their laptop and main arrangement, and in such cases, this feature may assist users in placing their items side by side (their extra laptop, mobile, etc.) & when there is no such need for all these miscellaneous items, the user can easily remove that extra pad by detaching it.
4. Integral Sliding Table — Sometimes most of the items such as keyboard, mouse, etc. are placed along with desktop/laptop but that type of arrangement makes the main surface of the table cumbersome & busy & thus to address that issue the table comes with the internal slider so that whenever user wants to put items such as mouse/keyboard etc. on the table he/she can easily pull it off from the slider & again draw back the slider whenever there is no need.
5. Integral laptop stand — The problem with most laptops is that when they are placed on a flat surface, their air vents become blocked, causing the laptop to overheat. Additionally, when users look downwards at their screen, their neck and back postures become unbalanced. Therefore, having an integral laptop stand that can be part of the main desk and embedded in it so that whenever the user requires, he/she can lift it up at the required angle and work seamlessly.
6. Flexible cup holder — Most users have the issue of having to be extra cautious when there is a cup beside or on the table because if it is mishandled, the tea/coffee/water within it might immediately fall on the laptop and damage it. Since a result, by altering the size of the cup holder that is attached to the edge of the table, the user may comfortably tighten it (as various users will have different types of cups).
7. Ergonomic chair — The ergonomic chair with retractable straps allows you to attach and remove it from the main table’s handles. This function is designed for users who either want to work from bed but don’t enjoy the sloth that the pleasant atmosphere of the bed offers, or because most users don’t have a decent chair that can match the height of the table. The chair contains detachable straps that link the chair to the table’s handles to provide flexibility to both types of users. The chair also includes a chair folder that allows it to fold into a single unit or accept the user’s adjustments when he or she supports the back on the chair’s base.

📝 ‘Taking Feedback From The Users’

Solving problems isn’t just enough, it is very important that it should work! & I realized that until I test my prototype back with the users, I wouldn’t completely know if the solution would work or not.

So I organized a meeting with the users and tested the prototype. I received feedback from all of the different directions, as well as several interesting perspectives that, I would never have considered.

Here is the snapshot of the feedback I received & how I decided to act upon it : -

I categorized the feedback from users based on three parameters -

A. What did my users said?

B. What insights did I get from it?

C. What opportunity does it present for me to make my prototype better?

🎯 After getting feedback & analyzing it based on above parameters , I revised my prototype & made the required changes —

🧠 ‘While Trying To Solve This Problem I learnt’

1. More WHYs and WHATs will always be good throughout the phases since they will always drive you to focus on the fundamental problems that surface level dialogues may not disclose.
2. Asking history-based, behavior-related, and open-ended questions rather than straight — yes/no or preference-based ones will lead to more insightful and accurate outcomes.
3. Frameworks, strategies, and processes are there to advise and assist you in addressing the problem; they are not hard and fast rules that must be followed at all costs. How to implement that certain framework or approach is determined by the needs and requirements of the project.

While working on this project, I realized that I was mostly following a ‘Design Thinking Process,’ but instead of following it step by step, I realized that doing things when they are needed and applying them in the right direction will yield results that cannot be obtained by simply following a process or framework.

⏱️ ‘I Wish I Had More Time…Then..’

1. Make use of the empty space beneath the table for storage or drawers in a way that does not add to the total weight of the arrangement.
2. Automating the desk and its features using voice command or intelligence technologies, as well as expanding the possibilities of my solution.
3. Although I could explore the solution space for one problem, I would prefer to explore, iterate on the two others from the top three ideas, and see how I can address those difficulties, how prospective consumers perceive the solution, and what input they provide.

🌈 Lastly, I would like to thank my mentor Anudeep Ayyagari for supporting & guiding me throughout this project, I’m really grateful for all the learnings & un-learnings I had while doing this project & solving such problem.

🧡 Thank you so much folks who came here & spent their valuable time reading my case study, this means a lot to me. If you have any feedback please feel free to share it, I would really appreciate it. You can connect me on my LinkedInorGmail, I am up for a good conversation 👍🏻.