Time in the Jungle

The longer I practice as a designer, the more value I place on what IDEO calls cross-pollination. I have learned many times over that I am incapable of becoming an expert on everything, so I try to make it a point to seek out folks who are experts to work with. Tom Kelley's Seven Planting Tips in The Art of Innovation are really great reminders to always be observing and learning to recognize opportunity. His statement to "become an expert at watching people perform even the smallest tasks," is something I must continually remind myself to do. Busyness always creeps in and tries to steal my ability to observe my surroundings, so I'm trying to be more mindful of that. I also really enjoyed advice he gave under the CHANGE HATS section. "The best new products are like shoes someone else has broken in. Smart folks have already anticipated likely problems and opportunities." I must make certain that my product goes through testing by all the different "hats" possible before releasing it to the world.

My big plan for research these past two weeks was to go out and interview chefs, restaurant owners, and kitchen and wait staff for one side of the issue, and fellow gluten-free diners for the other side of the issue. I sat down multiple times to develop some questions for each group and gradually realized that I didn't know WHAT to ask them. I wasn't really even sure where to start with my research, despite being so close to the problem. Or maybe BECAUSE I'm so close to the problem. I frequently have to remind myself that many people have no idea what it means to follow a gluten-free diet, and most folks have no reason to know that or feel that it is an important issue.

Task #1 then, seemed to be giving folks a reason to care - particularly the chefs, restaurant owners and staff. With that in mind, I decided to leaf through the IDEO method cards to see if David Kelley & Co. could provide other ideas of where to begin with my research. Naturally, they came through. Here are a few of the cards that helped me get started this week.

Secondary research really began a few weeks ago when I was trying to decide between three items on my bug list. At that point, I checked into many of the options currently in the market to assist gluten-free diners. There were the chemical test strips and a wide variety of apps and websites designed to help the gluten-free make informed choices when dining out. I continued that research this week by searching for certification programs that restaurants can participate in to gain endorsements from certain gluten-free/celiac advocacy groups.

Although I really didn't need to conduct any anthropometric analysis (yes, I did have to Google that word to see exactly what it meant) this IDEO card did inspire me to conduct some demographic and market research to get back to the idea that restaurants are going to need a good reason to care and to want to participate in some type of change. While I'm sure that many of our local restaurants would love to help every special interest group, change has to make sense when it comes to the bottom line for any business. Hopefully they show concern for the triple-bottom line, but asking restaurants to make adjustments will have to make financial sense for each of them. When I finally sit down with restaurant owners, I KNOW that catering to gluten-free diners is important and a good idea, but the intuition of a complete stranger will likely not inspire great confidence. I'll need real evidence. Here are some highlights of the research that I'll expound upon in class:

• 1 in 133 Americans has Celiac disease
• An estimated 1 in 20 Americans has Non-Celiac Gluten Sensitivity
• 15-25% of consumers are currently looking for gluten-free products
• Currently, only about 5% of celiac sufferers are diagnosed. It is expected that the level of diagnosis will reach 50-60% by 2019.
• The National Restaurant Association named gluten-free one of the top 10 industry trends of 2010
• The National Foundation for Celiac Awareness and the Gluten Intolerance Group are two major organizations that provide training and grant seals of approval to restaurants. Between these two organizations, only one restaurant (chain) in the state of West Virginia has sought and received approval.

Finally, I used a combination of Activity Analysis and Flow Analysis to map out the average experience of a gluten-free diner and the restaurant personnel that they interact with. Currently, this experience varies quite a bit from one restaurant to another, but I tried to find the average or the most likely experiences and map those. I used social media to request general input from fellow gluten-free diners when it came to the existing environment, but so far I've received very little feedback. I plan to make another attempt and readjust my map if necessary.

My hope is that analyzing these pieces will start to shed light on the best opportunity for improvement, as well as arm me with solid information and questions that I can discuss with local restaurants.