In DEMETER, we advocate a multi-actor approach which aims to make innovation fully demand-driven. As part of this, user journey mapping exercises were conducted by members of the consortium. Dave Hearne of Walton Institute outlines some of these activities below.
To fully understand how all of the different components work together in DEMETER, a user journey workshop was undertaken. This workshop involved internal DEMETER partners representing the main stakeholder groups that will interact with the components (farmers & software providers)
The first step was to discuss the proto-personas developed through the previous steps in the multi-actor approach (workshops, surveys and interviews). This process was used to familiarise the workshop participants with the end users of the platform. During this exercise the stakeholder groups’ characteristics, needs and concerns were discussed in an open format.
Figure 1 Proto Personas
Once everyone had a good understanding of the stakeholders, the participants were split into 2 groups, “Team Farmer” and “Team Tech”, both teams were tasked with creating goals for each stakeholder they were representing. Each team was given 10 minutes to create as many goals as possible, the next task was to group these goals into meaningful groups to capture the main goal.
For example, Find a solution represented some of the following goals:
- Access / learn about new technologies
- Find sustainable solutions
- Use tech to day-to-day decisions
Figure 2 Goals Exercise
When the groups of goals were defined, the participants were given the opportunity to vote on groups to decide which were most important to discuss in the following workshop steps.
The was achieved using the ‘dot voting’ technique; each participant received 5 red dots to place on the goals that they considered most important to discuss. The goals with the most votes moved to the next section of the workshop; user journey mapping.
A user journey map is a visual representation of a user’s experience using a product. It can represent each touchpoint that a user interacts with from start to finish when completing a goal. It is a useful exercise to identify any pain points that a user may encounter through the journey and all gain points, or areas of refinement that can be introduced to improve the overall journey.
For DEMETER, there are multiple different components that a user will interact with to complete a goal. When and how these interactions take place is an important aspect to identify when combining these components into a user friendly platform.
The journey mapping exercise was completed from the perspective of the farmer by “Team Farmer” and from the perspective of the technology provider by “Team Tech”. During this exercise, each component, how the user interacts with them and how these components link together was discuss in detail. Each team identified pain points and gain points and posted these on the workshop board.
The teams reconvened together after these exercises were complete. Common pain and gain points were discussed and evaluated together. This concluded the workshop and the results were collated and shared with the wider consortium and technology teams responsible for each component.
