User-centred design methods: Co-creation and human-centric solutions

Industry 5.0’s approach to developing new smart-production systems is characterized by user-centric design approaches. User-centred designs centralize the end-user by prioritizing their needs and experience, and this is captured by involving the end-user in different stages of product development. The involvement of end-users in the design process serves two key functions. Firstly, it helps capture end-users’ needs and expectations of the product, alongside factors such as product usability and accessibility. Secondly, it allows end-users to give their perspective and ideas for the product’s design. This can be very helpful as technology developers and designers can benefit from the fresh and relevant perspective that end-users provide.

CONVERGING aims to implement a user-centred design approach in its development of smart-technological solutions, as it is an effective way to uphold Industry 5.0’s human-centric character. By involving the operators in development of CONVERGING’s solutions, we can not only capture operators’ feedback and perspectives on the smart-machines and collaborative robots being developed, but also increase their familiarity with the project’s ideas.

The method of user-centred design we employed is known as co-creation. Co-creation workshops are sessions designed to specifically enable end-users to engage in knowledge creation, innovation and design, thereby making them co-designers. Our workshops began by asking the operators to discuss what they liked and disliked about their current task that they performed manually. Following this, we asked them if they were aware of any smart-assistive technologies that could help them in performing the task. We then introduced a design activity that involved using stickers of smart assistive technologies (collaborative robots, smart pen, tablets, AR headsets, etc.), to design their vision of what their future task could look like. Their discussion revealed how the CONVERGING solutions met their expectations and how they could be further improved. The CONVERGING solutions were then demonstrated to the operators, and their feedback regarding the solutions was discussed. At this stage, the operators were encouraged to use their previous designs and redesign it to depict what they liked and disliked about the projects’ solutions and also use it to present any ideas they had for improvement or change.

While the workshops generated useful feedback specific to each industrial use-case, there were some common insights applicable to all use-cases. These included operators’ expressing a need for more clearly defined safety areas, requiring on-site training opportunities to familiarize themselves with the new technology to build confidence and trust, and encouraging task division where manual, repetitive work was performed by the robots or machines.

Since user-centred design is an iterative process, these workshops will be held again in the future. The next round of workshops will aim to present working prototypes of the solutions and gain in-depth operator feedback and ideas regarding usability and user-experience.