The Missing Link
The Missing Link is a design thinking project centered on simplifying the decision-making process for students planning their future careers. Extensive research and user-centered design were employed to create a series of innovative solutions that empower students to make informed and confident decisions about their paths.
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During this study, we used multiple research tools such as:
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Contextual Research Plan
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Surveys, Interviews & Observations
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5 Human Factors
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Symmetric Clustering Matrix
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Semantic Profile
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Opportunity Map & Innovation Funnel
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Persona's & Concept Scenarios
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Prescriptive Value Web
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This project was a collaboration between
Naqiyah Mustafa, Aqeela Virgee, & Ayesha Al Hashimi.
Introduction
“No matter what you do in your life, no matter what career path you take, the ability to make the right choice when it really matters is a skill that will serve you well for the entirety of your adult life.” For this project, we decided to focus on a topic that was relevant specifically to us as college students, the process of decision-making. We initially realized that students found it difficult to make decisions, specifically long-term decisions that had a large impact on their futures.
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As university students ourselves, we specifically used the design thinking step of “empathy,” because we understood the challenges that these students were facing. We realized that the one commonality amongst us all was our academic institution, and so we decided to focus on academic choices in particular, specifically in regards to the degree selection process.
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Thus we began brainstorming with a problem statement in mind: To create a holistic experience for current and potential AUS students that enhances their degree selection process, that, in turn, helps them make long-term educational choices. From there we used various tools and methods to achieve our final solution, a way to integrate the three main touchpoints to create a more user-friendly system that benefits both potential and current students.
Brainstorming
Primary & Secondary Research
For this project, our topic revolved around decision making amongst university students. The general area that we needed to study revolved around these students, their everyday lives and the decisions involved. To conduct extensive research we did both Primary & Secondary research. For Primary Research we conducted Surveys, Interviews & Observations while for Secondary information we obtained news articles, academic journals & books from the library,
Tools Used
In this course we used the book "101 Design Methods: A Structured Approach for Driving Innovation in Your Organization" as a guiding aid to create our Design Thinking Project and thus learned and experimented with multiple different tools. These tools taught us how to collect and analyze data in interesting ways and opened our mind to the posibility of different scenarios. What we thought initially would be the route we would take was far different from what we ended up doing.
5 Human Factor Tool
Symmetric Clustering Matrix
Innovation Funnel
Prescriptive Value Web
Vision Statement
Vision Statement is a method that forms an overview of the solution’s results and how it could be implemented. It aims to summarize all the research’s analysis and express it in a clear manner for the stakeholders to understand.
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This tool was relevant to us because it helped us explain our solution in a clear and simple manner for the stakeholders to understand. It helped us organize the solution’s implementation processes and methods in detail. For instance, we reviewed and summarized the project’s key results. Then, created a vision statement outline by including customers, needs, opportunities, new values, and risks. We even formed a title with a supporting phrase, short descriptions of challenges and solutions, and a diagram of key benefits of the solutions.
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We choose to use the Vision Statement to form an outline for our solution and explain it in a clear and organized way. It helped us understand our target audience needs and wants better, in which we were able to add and form new benefits and values for our solution’s processes.
Conclusion
This paper explored Design Methods through a structured 7-mode framework, addressing the challenge of helping college students make better long-term decisions. It began with Sense Intent, where tools like brainstorming and intent statements identified the topic of decision-making difficulties among AUS students. In Know Context, a research plan was developed using secondary sources to establish credibility and structure. Know People, emphasized primary research through surveys, interviews, and observations to gain deeper insights into students’ struggles. Data from these modes was analyzed in Frame Insights using clustering and profiling tools to uncover patterns and opportunities for innovative solutions.
The subsequent modes focused on transforming insights into actionable outcomes. In Explore Concepts, creative tools like Personas and Innovation Funnels generated potential ideas to address the problem. These ideas were analyzed in Frame Solutions, where systems and flow diagrams evaluated their feasibility and impact. Finally, Realize Offerings culminated in a user-friendly solution to enhance AUS students’ degree selection process, built through the Vision Statement tool to ensure its innovation and efficiency. The step-by-step approach enabled the development of a comprehensive solution within a limited timeframe, demonstrating the effectiveness of the Design Methods framework in tackling complex, real-world problems.