As a creative problem-solving approach, the human-centered design was born and took root due to an increasingly emerging problem that creators and designers had to contend with: the exponential growth in the complexity of systems and products.

As more complicated solutions were built on top of each other to address increasingly complex problems, we witnessed a growing divergence between the solutions and their usability. This divergence had two root causes: (a) failure to involve the human perspective and understanding the context of use, and (b) a lack of regard for human cognitive strengths and limitations.

Objectively-improved functionality does not necessarily create better outcomes. Solutions need to cater to people’s explicit and implicit needs even if it is not the most logical path to follow. This is because it is the people that define the problems in the first place—problems are shaped by how people perceive reality.

Human-Centered Design vs User-Centered Design

Human-centered design may be defined as the process of developing systems or products that are profoundly influenced by the broad inherent qualities of human psychology and perception. Accordingly, the concentration on human needs is of high priority.

User-centered design can be defined in the same way as they are often used interchangeably. However, by delving deep into the semantics, we see a slight difference in focus on the user as a target audience in marketing terms. The focus on demographic characteristics such as age, gender, education level, and household income is more pronounced in user-centered design.

However, there is this notion that the term “user” disregards the human element and reduces it down to a mere system component. This further widens the gap between the solution and the people who depend on it and undermines the empathy we are trying to achieve. Implications and semantics aside, we can generally say they are two sides of the same coin.

Pillars of Human-Centered Design

To be able to put the human at the center of our problem-solving process, we need to keep 3 things in mind at all times. These concepts all pertain to a mindset that designers and developers need to adopt rather than technical milestones that they should aim to achieve.

Create with People, Not for People

As early in the process as possible, designers need to get out of their ivory towers and get involved with the people they want to provide solutions for. Understanding the full context in which problems are experienced needs direct engagement with the users. As opposed to system-centered design which only focuses is on specifying requirements and organizing functionality at the initial phase of the project, human-centered design is participatory and requires interacting with users for the entirety of the project.

A tool that is often missing in other problem-solving methods is observation. This simple yet effective tool helps designers build empathy by putting them in the user’s shoes to really understand what the user experiences in various situations and what their pain points are. Other research tools such as interviews and questionnaires help solidify the observations by taking the users’ direct input for a better context analysis. In human-centered design, there is no room for guesses and personal opinions. Every design decision must be validated based on information acquired through real interactions with the users.

Divergent and Convergent Thinking

Understanding the problem and the context of use is only half the challenge. The other half is coming up with a solution (or solutions) that is both useful and usable. In human-centered design, ideas are generated based on what is learned from the observations. The process incorporates divergent and convergent thinking where first, ideas are freely explored, and then the best candidates are critiqued and reflected upon.

This concept is known as the double diamond framework which is widely used in the UX industry by experts like Vudu Digital. In this model, the process consists of 4 stages: Discover, Define, Develop, and Deliver. In the first phase, the focus is on expanding the range of solutions outward and generating as many ideas as possible without judging their validity. In the define phase, the ideas are evaluated and the circumference of focus is tightened on a few viable options. These options are once again expanded in the Develop phase as the design team tries to come up with different ways by which the selected options can be developed and utilized. And finally, in the deliver section, the best approaches are selected and prototyped.

A prerequisite for this ideation process is the inclusion of a diverse group of people from multiple disciplines. Involving all team members from different backgrounds and expertise adds more perspectives to the mix, helping us think out of the box.

Evolution Through Iteration

Human-centered design is an iterative process in which the produced design solutions, i.e., prototypes, are constantly evaluated against the initial requirements synthesized in the research phase. Through usability testing, designers observe real users interact with the system (e.g., a website) to see if it functions the way it should.

As points of confusion and friction are discovered, the team goes back to gathering more data as to how the system is deployed and tweaks the prototype accordingly. Sometimes, designers and developers miss certain aspects that would be uncovered later on during testing and depending on the team’s proficiency at communicating with the users, many prototypes could be scrapped until the optimal solution is reached.