Contextual design

It incorporates ethnographic methods for gathering data relevant to the product via field studies, rationalizing workflows, and designing human–computer interfaces.

In practice, this means that researchers aggregate data from customers in the field where people are living and applying these findings into a final product.

This immersion in the data for an extended period of time helps teams see the broad scope of a problem quickly and encourages a paradigm shift of thought rather than assimilation of ideas.

After completing the wall, participants "walk" the affinity diagram to stimulate new ideas and identify any remaining issues or holes in data.

In visioning, a cross-functional team comes together to create stories of how new product concepts, services, and technology can better support the user work practice.

A vision includes the system, its delivery, and support structures to make the new work practice successful, but is told from the user's point of view.

Storyboards work out the details of the vision, guided by the consolidated data, using pictures and text in a series of hand-drawn cells.

[8][9] A more lightweight approach to contextual design has been developed by its originators to address an oft-heard criticism that the method is too labor-intensive or lengthy for some needs.