Who, What, Where, Why
What is the Who, What, Where, Why card?
Summarise existing knowledge before you start coming up with ideas.
This method is also useful for highlighting any gaps in your understanding of the problem space, giving you clear questions to answer or assumptions to test.
How to use the Who, What, Where, Why card
1. Before starting this exercise, define your problem or creative challenge using Perform the Problem or How Might We?
2. Present the problem/challenge to your group and explain that we’ll be exploring it along four dimensions. Give everyone 10 minutes to list what they know (or assumptions to test) under the following headings:
• Who is affected by the problem?
• What is the underlying user need?
• Where does this problem happen?
• Why does this problem happen? Why is it worth solving?
3. Look for themes or overlaps across people’s responses, and cluster them accordingly.
4. Ask each participant to explain their answers, and what (if any) evidence they’re based on.
If any themes seem important, but lack evidence, it may be worth spending some more time on research before you dive into ideas. Alternatively, make a prototype to learn whether your assumptions hold up.
Optional: if there are conflicting interpretations of the problem, or competing priorities that emerge, use Invest Your PipCoins to decide where to focus your creative efforts.
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Who, What, Where, Why is one of 54 ideation workshop cards inside the Idea Tactics card deck.
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