Getting a team I could join was a struggle for me. This is because I had exams the very day the project was announced. After my exams, I read the messages on slack and figured it was something I had to figure out by myself so the struggle began. I was assigned to team ideation after hustling for people to take me in as a product designer. Ms Sophia asked us to choose a niche (medical tech, agro tech and fintech) to work on for the project. We picked medical tech and immediately held a meeting to get familiar with each other as we would be working together in the next 10days.
After we decided our niche was going to be medical tech, we still had to narrow down what exactly our product would be used for. This is because medicine, just like any other field, is so vast and would be a bit overwhelming if we didn't specify the problems we were trying to solve.
After much deliberation and contributions from each team member, we narrowed our product to mental health. The reason being that in our region, only a handful of people are aware of the mental health state. Some who are aware but seek medical counsel cannot readily afford a session with a therapist due to cost. So our product aimed at breaching the gap between people and mental health care professionals from the comfort of their home. This enhances the anonymity and confidentiality a patient would like to have about their mental health state.
The basic features of the app is to
Check the mental state of the individual
Connect the individual to mental health specialist
Give tips on how to improve your mental state
Weekly check-ins for update
Support groups and community to help and encourage people struggling
After the Christmas break, alot of people lost the zeal to carryon in the project. This made the team work flow slow because of the 12 people assigned to team ideation, only 6 people worked on the rest of the project. My own contribution to the project was to design the wireframe (low fidelity) of the product. This was a very easy task because I have done wireframing in the past and I knew exactly what do to.
These are the steps involved in the wireframe of a product:
Carryout a detailed research on the medical health tech system
Search for designs that are similar to what you want to do
Allow your eyes to feast on the designs. Carefully and critical examine these designs
Integrate all the designs you have looked at
Draw a rough sketch on how you would want yours to look like
It is worthy to note that you can sketch the low fidelity of your design on a sheet of paper instead of doing it using a software.
The most important lesson for me during this project is that people might not want something the way you do. Some people did not value this project and it actually affected our workrate. It takes extra effort to carryon even when people around is trying to quit or give up.
In all, I'm grateful for this experience. My team did not make it to the showcase stage but the lessons learnt would carry me through to the next time I find myself in a team. Excuse is never an option!