Week 12: Mapping a user’s journey

Picking up from where I left off last semester…

I guess this is the first time (and hopefully not the last time) I will be saying this: I think have some newfound clarity with my thesis (whaaaat). Things are beginning to finally come together in a way that makes sense.

I did a lot of reflecting and zooming out this past week, and here are some updates (more coming next week):

1. For my users, I’m still deciding between undergrad/grad students vs working professionals, but either way, my target audience will be people who lack self-awareness (the way psychology describes it ), don’t have exposure to positive psychology concepts, and don’t go to therapy or understand it. My customers will be universities or businesses depending on my users.
2. Based on my work last semester, I found that tackling the inner critic was a three-phase process — general awareness (learning about the problem concept) → self-awareness (understanding how the problem relates to you) → change (what you can do about it). I have decided to scope down and lean into the first and second phase for my solution concept. I will cover all three phases as part of my final proposal but build only for the first two — a more realistic approach for our project time frame. The goal of my solution will be to act as a trigger for one to want to tackle their inner critic, and hence to look inward and become more curious about their mind.

Find below a basic, WIP customer journey for my new proposed experience. I will be fleshing this out further as I evolve my solution concept in the coming weeks.

What could go wrong…

The above sketch shows the ideal journey for the user, but of course, things could go wrong. Here are some challenges I’ve preempted, turned into questions for me to think about:

• How might we keep the user hooked so they participate in the entire experience?
• How might we make the experience of learning about the inner critic interactive and exciting?
• How might we make it easy for the user to understand the inner critic accurately?
• How might we create AHA moments for the user?
• How might we ensure the efficacy of the experience?
• How might we measure the impact of the experience on the user?

That’s all for now, coming up next… some ideas for my proposed experience!