Design Script – An Un-Classical Framework for Product Design

The premise of the talk is to introduce a new framework for product design called “Design Script” which unfurls from an uncanny similarity between a well-directed movie and a well-designed product. For example, while writing movies, a lot of time is spent polishing the plots and nourishing the characters. Likewise, while designing products a huge chunk of time is spent understanding the problem at hand. However, in movies, once the gist of the movie has been conceptualized, it is converted to a script which encompasses every nitty-gritty detail associated with the plots right from acting instructions to scene directions. Going forward, script acts as a source of truth for all the stakeholders, not that it cannot evolve but it is something that everyone is on board with before starting the movie.

Drawing parallels with a movie script, to streamline the design process the concept of “Design Script” has been formulated which is a framework to transform research findings to an actionable plan which acts as a source of truth to align all the stakeholders.

Any Design Solution can be broken down as a function of Story and Outcome, represented as – Design Solution = lim(n→∞) Function (Story, Outcome)

wherein,
Outcome – refers to goals that need to be accomplished
Story – refers to the optimal path that helps you achieve those goals
n – refers to the number of design iterations done

Researchers, Designers, Engineers, and Product Managers collaboratively create a Design Script for every problem they tackle and it helps to keep each one of them focussed and aligned to one common north-star.

This talk will deep dive into nuances of Design Script, and an outline to craft it using real examples.

Key takeaways from the session:

1. Corollaries between a well-directed movie and a well-designed product
2. Nuances of Design Script framework and what makes it effective
3. A live walkthrough of how to craft a Design Script through a real example