Facilitating idea generation using personas

Abstract

Persona and scenario are important design tools for new concept development. Usually, scenario is used to generate ideas, and persona is for evaluation. This article proposes a new approach that embeds persona data in scenario-based design for idea generation. It includes a persona dataset, a facilitation process, and a working field. The persona dataset is a user profile collected in ethnographic research and categorized by subjects, motives, activities, goals and behaviors. The facilitation process helps designer create new ideas via re-matching the elements in the persona dataset. The working fields allow the freedom of implementing with different sizes of the designer team and persona dataset. This new approach provides a direct and effective way that materializes designers' internal experiences and persona data to create new ideas and scenarios. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.