Blog Entry #2

Summary of Week 4

In week 4, we learnt about SCAMPER, which is an acronym.

SCAMPER: 

• S - Substitute
• C - Combine
• A - Adapt
• M - Modify
• P - Put to another use
• E - Eliminate
• R - Reverse

My group used SCAMPER to come up with variations in our product design such that we would be able to generate many ideas. At first, we struggled slightly trying to use the SCAMPER method since it was just newly introduced to us 😢. However, after awhile we managed to get the hang of it with the help of the guiding questions 😎. One example that we did was to modify a regular 🌊aquarium filter 🌊 such that plant trays could be added. Below is my group's attempt on using SCAMPER for our product.

I felt that SCAMPER was quite useful in our ideation process as it gave us an abundance of ideas to choose from, and much more than I would have expected as compared to if we did not use SCAMPER.

Thereafter, we used the feasibility analysis table to determine whether our ideas would be viable to be carried out.

 

We then found out that only ideas #2 and #5 were unsuitable as they were subjective to the customer's tastes and does not really change much. Afterwards, we used 

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 COWS Matrix 

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 to shortlist our ideas.

First we came up with the criteria we wanted to compare the ideas against.

Then we rated the ideas with the criteria with explanations to determine which idea would be the most suitable. In the end, we decided to choose idea #4 since it was scored the highest for the criteria with the highest weightages.

The most difficult part about using the COWS Matrix I would say is finding and weighing the criteria appropriately since there is not really a right way to rank them properly and my group was also quite indecisive too 😅😅. Moreover, with more criteria it became harder to distribute the weightages.

The overall ideation process however, taught me a lot about how to properly screen ideas and was very helpful as I would honestly not have known any of this existed if not for the lesson itself. 😮👍