CLEAN ENTRY
Fall 2020, UC Berkeley Human-Centered Design, Academic Project
In this fast-paced, single semester course, the class was divided into teams that each tackled a unique design problem. The course brought us through the entire design process, from identifying an opportunity, user research, concept generation, prototyping, and realization. With the COVID-19 pandemic drastically affecting the daily habits of numerous individuals arounds the world, my team sought to solve the opportunity to reduce germ and virus transmission through door surfaces in public spaces. Our final product is Clean Entry, a customizable kit that allows users to control their existing doors with proximity sensors for a touchless, sanitary experience. For more information, check out our team's project page on Behance.
PHASE 1: IDENTIFY
In the first phase, we explored the role of doors in public and challenged our perspectives on the experience. We brainstormed potential open-ended product opportunity statements that would be the basis for our semester-long project. Initially, the problem statement that we received was related to the dirtiness of public restrooms, which inspired the idea of contactless restroom doors. The rise of concerns over the cleanliness of public surfaces during the COVID-19 pandemic further supported this idea. We did not want to narrow our scope too far as to not limit creativity and applicability of the solution, especially in a novel pandemic, so we brainstormed other potential related ideas. Then, we created an Affinity Map from the opportunities and discovered eight categories:
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Health and Cleanliness
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Energy and Environment
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Economy
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Technology
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Security
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Structural Innovation
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User Experience and Privacy
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Others
The top six ideas were selected via dot voting, and those ideas were rated on a final weighted matrix based on availability of resources, room for creativity, enough basic knowledge, solvability within the class time frame, interesting, and potential impact. The final product opportunity gap (POG) that was selected based on the matrix was to prevent the spread of germs and viruses through contact with doors in public spaces.
This opportunity had the potential to reduce fears and anxieties about going to necessary public spaces, assist the differently-abled community in accessing public spaces alone, reduce economic strain on hospitals and healthcare-impacted entities, and technologically incorporate high-tech solutions like the internet of things (IoT) and data collection on traffic flow.
PHASE 2: UNDERSTAND
In this stage, we performed in-depth user research via one-on-one interviews and observation to form product requirements. The team conducted eighteen interviews via Zoom and observed natural behavior in public from safe distances away from individuals. Key insights included:
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Many essential businesses place hand sanitizer at the door to ensure that germs transferred from the surface are eliminated after use
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Restaurants often keep their doors propped open
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People had various workarounds to avoid touching doors:
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Disposable gloves
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Elbow or shoulder to push doors
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Tissue between hand and handles
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Clothes between hand and handles
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People do not like touching public doors in fear of germs
Insights from user research were compiled via Open Card Sorting, in which we saw seven categories emerge:
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People's ideas of an ideal door
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Visual Cues
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Convenience
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Intuition in Design
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Workaround to Avoid Touching
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Cleanliness
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Security
These categories helped us create personas of typical public door users and facilities managers, and to determine our Value Opportunity Attributes (VOAs) in the categories of Emotion, Ergonomics, Aesthetics, Identity, Impact, Core Technology, and Quality. These VOA defined the foundation of our product requirements. We also identified competitors and their VOA ratings as compare to our target VOA for our product. For example, traditional automatic doors require large amounts of space, power, and infrastructure to install. Foot pedal door openers are not usable by the differently abled. From this point, we knew we desired to create a product that would limit the spread of germs and viruses, not obstruct the flow of traffic, and be operable by a single individual no matter their ability.
PHASE 3: CONCEPTUALIZE
In Phase 3, we brainstormed and refined a set of designs to yield a sanitary and convenient solution. We employed concept generation tactics such as Forced Analogy, Attribute Listing, Biomimicry, Design Heuristics, and team Brainwriting 6-3-5, to generate over eighty concepts.
The final concept was determined through multiple rounds of reduction:
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Initial Filtering via Dot Voting
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Categorizing: Door Replacement, Door Augmentation, and User Augmentation. Door Augmentation was chosen to address the more neglected spaces such as those without the infrastructure to accommodate a full replacement
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Pugh Chart with a Datum of a tradition swivel door
The final concept is an integratable door kit for existing swivel doors. The kit consists of a robotic arm actuator, latch disengager, and proximity sensor modules that can be configured as the property manager desires. For example, the module can be integrated into an automatic hand sanitizer dispenser to link the door opening to cleaning one’s hands.
We performed rapid prototyping on this idea using Wizard-of-Oz and cardboard stand-ins for each component of the device to gather user feedback. The idea was well-received and users thought it was innovative and a good idea to have public door users sanitize their hands. Other users responded positively to the customizable aspect of the door kit.
By the end of Phase 3, we determined that our concept was a useful, usable, and desirable product that satisfied our product requirements.
PHASE 4: REALIZE
In the final stage, we developed a functional scale model prototype to determine the technological feasibility of the concept.
Though not possible during the pandemic, we would ideally be able to build and test a full-scale version of this to gather accurate data. In the end, we achieved a solution, the door kit, that prevents spread of germs and viruses, is conducive to use by the differently-abled community, maintains security of the door, and does not inhibit the freedom of entry or exit.
REFLECTION
Through this semester-long project, I learned a lot about the product development process and how to create something that people will want to use and be excited about. My role on the team was a contributor to the technical work and assignments, while also acting as the product manager. I created a file structure for the team to collaboratively share documents and media in an organized way, and set up recurring Zoom meetings to keep our team moving with steady progress. I also kept the team aware of deadlines by creating documents for the team assignments with the due date clearly listed. Later in the semester I was able to employ my CAD experience to design an enclosure for the high-fidelity functional prototype. While the earlier coursework tasks were split among the team equally, team members began to specialize more in their areas of expertise for prototyping. The diversity in the backgrounds of our team members significantly helped us in building our functional prototype.
The biggest challenge that the team faced was working on a project completely remotely, such as having meetings with team members 16-hour time difference and building tangible prototypes with microcontrollers and physical parts. However, some tasks were actually easier and preferable to do online, such as Affinity Mapping and Card Sorting with digital tools like virtual stick notes on Mural. This course in a remote setting also reinforced the importance of teaming. For example, mental proximity and shared goal with quality communication is paramount for a successful team. We made introductions via “Individual Profiles'' describing our personal interests and backgrounds, but we didn’t get to have the interactions that a typical team taking this course would have together in Jacobs Hall. Regardless, over the course of the virtual semester, I still felt that I did get to know my teammates through Zoom, and we worked well with one another.
We were able to still create effective prototypes using methods like Wizard-of-Oz. And, we were still able to build functional prototypes by organizing no-contact drop offs for team members in the Bay Area, allocating other work to others who were not able to or too far to receive packages quickly, and assigning tasks to people who had the resources local to them. For example, I sent my 3D CAD files for my teammate to 3D print on his home printer and assemble with his scale model door, which was subsequently dropped off to another team member who had access to microcontrollers and embedded electronics experience. Overall, we played to our strengths to overcome the challenges brought upon us by COVID-19. We were able to build awesome prototypes that gathered actionable insights and showed off our individual skills while we learned more from one another in the process. Overall, I am incredibly proud of my team. We were able to achieve something larger than anything that we could individually accomplish alone.
Thank you to my team, Jung Ahn (MS Mechanical Engineering 2021), Andrew Barkan (PhD Mechanical Engineering 2021), Chunyu Jin (MEng Mechanical Engineering 2021), and Jason Torres (MEng Mechanical Engineering 2022)!