Increasing employees’ sense of belonging

Design of an intervention to stimulate meaningful chats in offices

Master thesis (2021)

Authors

J. Wang Industrial Design Engineering

Contributors

A.J.C. van der Helm Design Conceptualization and Communication - IDE (mentor)
S.E. Colenberg Design Conceptualization and Communication - IDE (graduation committee member)
Faculty
Industrial Design Engineering, Industrial Design Engineering
Copyright: © 2021 Jun Wang
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Published Date

14-10-2021

Language

English

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Faculty

Industrial Design Engineering

Abstract

This project aims to improve employees’ social well-being in offices through informal interactions. It consists of 3 phases in total, context research, idea generation and concept development. Experiencing prototyping was mainly used in the design process.

In the first phase, observation and interviews were conducted in 2 offices in Beijing to know about the context and discover problems and design opportunities. Another round of research was carried out in StudioLab for verification of the insights from Beijing offices. The results, combining with the results of the literature review, led to the design goal defined.

Then the project started to focus on stimulating meaningful chats among employees to increase their sense of belonging. Ideas were brainstormed and selected, prototypes and storyboards were made to let participants evaluate the concepts through interviews. After 3 cycles of idea generation, the final concept direction was defined.

After that, 2 cycles of concept development were conducted to iterate the concept. Again, prototypes were made and interviews were done to evaluate the concept and get feedback from participants. In the end, the final design was defined, final prototypes were made and final evaluation was conducted.

Overall, it is a design project exploring solutions for solving one of employees’ social problems in offices, lacking the sense of belonging.