We had the distinct pleasure to interview award winning designer Gissoo Doroudian about their original and creative Plugin design work. Gissoo Doroudian is an award-winning service designer, that makes our world a better place with their original plugin works.
Gissoo Doroudian ("GD") answered Design Interview ("DI") questions about their award-winning work Weave Plugin . Interview questions prepared by Frank Scott.
GD : To create and increase transparency and ethics in collaborative processes of user interface and user experience designers and software developers
GD : A common ground for designers and developers on which they can collaborate and a shift of focus in their current workflows to help bridge the gaps that currently exist.
GD : Motivated to help resolve the current design-development disconnects and the positive responses from the Design and Software Development communities I would like to collaborate with a team of engineers and begin with building a beta version of Weave and continue with iteratively making improvements through users' feedback.
GD : This project was derived from a series of personal experiences and observations of the gaps that currently exist in designers' and developers' way of thinking, approach, workflow, and language.
GD : I intend to produce this work by myself through a collaboration with a team of engineers who may use it in the future.
GD : Today, there is a lot of focus on the types of technologies and tools that can help us face complex systems and issues. However, there has been very little focus on how we face complexity within our own workflows and ways of thinking when collaborating within our teams, and this important because, after all, any tools, technologies, and solutions that we propose are shaped by the decisions we make driven from our conversations, collaborations, and workflows.
GD : The main individuals that helped influence this design through their way of thinking are: Gordon Pask, Author, Inventor, Educational Theorist, Cybernetician and Psychologist Paul Pangaro, Cybernetician, Design Educator, Researcher and Entrepreneur Ted Nelson, American Pioneer of Information Technology, Philosopher and Sociologist
GD : User experience designers, user interface designers, and software developers that work together within organizations that create digital products and follow the agile product development methodology with product release cycles of six months or shorter.
GD : Its focus on a behavioral shift and redefining the term, "Collaboration" within current workflows, as well as its focus on specificity in language, contextualizing information, and bringing in transparency and ethics more holistically into the picture.
GD : The term, "Weave" further stresses on the creation of a common ground for collaboration that would support both designers' and developers' workflows, i.e. weaving a true collaboration into their current workflows using their current workflows.
GD : Sketch, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop
GD : Its invitation to redefine how we currently perceive "Collaboration" when building it into digital tools and in our own processes from it being more based on giving and receiving feedback through written comments to fitting it into the appropriate areas of our workflows where both sides have the expertise to equally contribute to the collaboration.
GD : I collaborated with individuals with expertise in software engineering, user experience design, user interface design, as well as within design strategy, systems thinking, and entrepreneurship. The main participants who contributed through the primary research and usability testing phases are experts within software development, and user experience and user interface and work together within agile environments.
GD : The technology used in this design helps with supporting the higher level goal which is the behavioral change. Specifically, natural language processing is used to help increase the specificity of language when collaborating, and integrations with design and management tools act as environments through which users can more easily adapt to Weave without having to shift from their current tools that satisfy wider range of needs.
GD : Yes, I conducted one round of secondary research, where I learned about the current tools and their goals and how they perceive collaboration as well as how others perceive these tools. I also conducted one round of primary research with 12 individuals, as well as 4 rounds of usability testing with 39 individuals.
GD : The main challenge of this project was how it could be framed so that its significance wouldn't be overlooked, mainly because it targets such a specific issue and set of workflows which are often not thought of as specifically and systematically.
GD : My intention for submitting this design to an international design competition is to invite the design community to a conversation on rethinking and redefining "Collaboration" and its significance in the solutions and the decisions that we make for larger complex and systematic issues.
GD : I became more agile and more iterative through the actual process of the project considering some the complexities involved with learning about and testing various approaches with information mapping. I also became more systematic in my way of thinking by focusing on increasing user adaptability and taking into consideration that Weave can be more valuable when and if it allows its users to begin their experience with it at multiple points of their process.
GD : I would like to thank everyone who helped me in the process of this project.
