Design, Develop, Create

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Design Development Creativity (MIS40120) - Syllabus 2025

Notices

1. Note that the first class is to be held in QUINN-118, UCD Belfield, on Thursday 11th September, from 14:00 to 17:00. This is a temporary change of location to allow us to access some specialised teaching resources in the Quinn building, UCD Belfield Campus. Map link for the UCD Lochlann Quinn School of Business:
The remaining classes will normally be held each Thursday in GSB-E117 UCD Blackrock, from 14:00 to 17:00. Map link for the UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate School of Business: 

2. Please prepare for the first lecture by listening to the following podcast recordings:
3. Please obtain a copy of: Tracy Kidder, (1981) The Soul of a New Machine (e.g. ISBN 0316491977). 
4. For this class we adopt the fiction that we are all members of "DDC", a product design  consulting company. At DDC we employ a range of research methods to create evidence driven design briefs for new product designs and existing product/service enhancements. [this ruse helps us to adopt the correct attitude for conducting original research for the new or updated project design project "My Game Design Evaluation"]

Overview

Welcome to Design Development Creativity (MIS40120)

Purpose & Overarching Content

Digital design and development activities are the innovation engine of technology enabled organisations. However, the collaborative design, development, production, deployment and operation of robust technological systems presents significant challenges for management and teams. This module introduces contemporary methods, practical techniques and skills for managers, developers and contributors - focusing on techniques and processes for managing software design and development to deliver value. We review the challenges of managing distributed, virtual, team-based software design and development. We will talk about different strategies for managing the collective creative process, ranging from traditional sequential engineering methods through to agile, lean, and adaptive approaches and develop theoretically informed understandings of personal, team, and organisational practices. We will ask how socio-cultural practices, lifecycles and methodologies are understood, how they are intended to work, and how they act in practice to both resolve and produce challenges as we strive to engineer products for use and respond creatively to people's needs.

The class covers topics such as: the requirements process; the dynamics of creativity; producing shared understandings; communities of practice, knowledge, communication, and performance in teams; and consider methodologies ranging from agile to waterfall.

On completion of this class you will have a practical appreciation of the value of organisational practices and contexts and should be able to understand and work productively within an corporate software development, operations, and sustainment complex.

Learning Outcomes

  • Identify processes and practices involved in software design and delivery (Context)
  • Describe software lifecycles and frameworks, covering historical and emerging management approaches to design and development (Management tools)
  • Interpret theoretical foundations of design, development lifecycles, and frameworks (Theoretical interpretation)
  • Critically evaluate the processes, activities, and practices necessary for design and development (Critical perspective)
  • Competently analyse, assess and act in industry cases; adapting methods, processes and practices to problematic situations (Research/analysis)
  • Acquired skills and tools to foster processes of joint design, development and quality assurance (Management skills)

Assessment

10% Group Work Assignment. A defined group activity delivered at an agreed date during term. (P/F)

25% Reflective Assignment. Designated homework completed during term. Plus a reflective writing combining readings, learning and observations due at the end of week 12. (Grd)

65% Assignment. Present a term paper describing an original research project defined by the individual student and conducted during term. This will be comprised of a Term-Paper (5,000 words) + Presentation (video up to 4 minutes max). The presentation video of your project-in-progress is due end of week 11. The final Term Paper is due end of week 12. (Grd)

Self-Paced Learning Resource (not for credit)

Access to DataCamp for 5+ months. DataCamp offers a range of self-paced on-line courses that are well suited to prepare students, both novice and experienced programmers to learn to code and use a range of technologies to create new software, design digital business processes, tools and approaches to investigate, process and analyse data.

You will receive an invitation to join via your UCD Connect email. Register using your UCD Connect email address.

Decorum and Teaching Materials

All communication and interaction with each other should be respectful, professional, and comply with university protocols. You must abide by the provisions of the "UCD Student Code" and all of your work, whether individual or group, must comply with UCD policies on "Academic Integrity" and "Plagiarism". 

The course slides and files are accessed from the module in UCD Brightspace https://brightspace.ucd.ie/ (login required). And please be advised that the organisation of this course, the readings, exercises and other aspects are reviewed continuously and may change.

Syllabus (subject to revision)

The syllabus contains key information about your learning outcomes, the teaching schedule, content and the assessments. Please familiarise yourself with the syllabus and let your teacher know if you have any questions. It will regularly be updated as needed.

Teacher

  • Allen Higgins

Required Book

Please obtain a copy of: Tracy Kidder, (1981) The Soul of a New Machine (e.g. ISBN 0316491977). Part of our class time will spent in a Bookclub format where we read and comment on "The Soul of a New Machine". We read this book from cover to cover. It is ~283 pages long and should take 8-10 hrs to read (a limited number of copies are available to borrow from the UCD library).

The remainder of the readings for this class will be freely available via the UCD Library in digital form or published online (courtesy copies may be shared in the readings section in our Brightspace instance (access controlled).

Teaching Methods

This class combines experiential learning exercises with intensive discussion and debate informed by your own writing and reflections, having read selected articles and researched topics independently.

Some of the following activities may be run in class as experiential learning exercises.

  • Experiential empathy - wheelchair and visual simulation
  • World Café - a method to learn from and harness the power of groups.
  • Timeless issues for software - NATO conference proceedings (group research) 
  • Researching for designing - the research methods exercise (IDEO cards)
  • Guindon design activities
  • A standup meeting
  • Construction & design (build bot race)
  • Creative problem solving part 1 & part 2 (programming a robot)
  • Retrospective
  • Requirements design trade-off
  • Estimating user stories
  • Battleship - planning
  • Sutton's creative strategies
  • Creative workplace assessment
  • Design sketching
  • The Avalanche case - system description
  • Group reading
  • The Deep Dive video

Schedule [version dated 04/09/20254]

Session 1 : Introduction – The Zeroth Requirement

·       The Soul of a New Machine [1] - book club. Prologue
·       Exercise - Experiential empathy - wheelchair and visual simulation
Discussion: 
· Listening homework
·       From Design Thinking to Inclusive Design | Design Talk [2]
·       Shift Left Design with Pat Clark | Design Talk [3]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session
· Media consent form signed 
· Independent activity: Podcast media - two ideas (music, cover art)

Session 2 : Design Values - Build the right thing

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapters 1 and 2
·       Exercise - World Café
·       Exercise - Writing and citing for research
Discussion: 
1.     Expressing Experiences in Design [4]
2.     4 Common Ways Companies Alienate People with Disabilities [5]
3.     The design movement: Two case studies from the edge of the discipline [6]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session 
· Independent activity: A photo - design 'in the wild'

Session 3 : The Product Perspective

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapter 3
·       Exercise - The Deep Dive video
Discussion:
1.     Empathy on the edge: scaling and sustaining a human-centered approach in the evolving practice of design [7]
2.     Usability Evaluation Considered Harmful (Some of the Time) [8]
3.     The Little Book of Design Research Ethics [9]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session 
· Independent activity: A short (<60 second) time-lapse video of technology 'in-the-wild'

Session 4 : Design Processes 

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapters 4 & 5
·       Exercise - The Avalanche Case – A product owner’s perspective
Discussion:
1.     Big Ball of Mud. [10]
2.     Insights from expert software design practice [11]
3.     Managing Development of Large Software Systems [12]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session 
· Independent activity: Conduct a cultural probe

Session 5 : Frameworks for Control

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapter 6
·       Exercise - Sketching User Experiences
Discussion:
1.     No Silver Bullet Essence and Accidents of Software Engineering [13]
2.     They Write the Right Stuff [14]
3.     Chapter 1 - What Is Software Engineering? [15]
4.     The Principles of Scientific Management [16]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session 
· Independent activity: A 'first draft' proposing your research topic

Session 6 : Parameters of Development - Build the thing right

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapters 7 & 8
·       Exercise: The Guindon design experiment
Discussion:
1.     Iterative and Incremental Development: A Brief History [17]
2.     The Chaos Model and the Chaos Life Cycle [18]
3.     Chapter 2 - How to Work Well on Teams [15]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session 
· Independent activity: Test a protocol for a chosen research method

Session 7 : AGILE - The great disruption

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapters 9 & 10
·       Exercise - Unfocus Group using LEGO Serious Play (LSP)
Discussion:
1.     Embracing Change with Extreme Programming [19]
2.     Agile Base Patterns in the Agile Canon [20]
3.     Voyage in the Agile Memeplex [21]
4.     Chapter 3 - Knowledge Sharing [15]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session 
· Independent activity: Create an Appendix with initial data

Session 8 : Harnessing Creativity - Design cultures

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapters 11 & 12
·       Exercise - Standup meeting - your own research project
·       Exercise - Sutton's creative strategies
Discussion:
1.     How Pixar Fosters Collective Creativity [22]
2.     When Collections of Creatives Become Creative Collectives: A field study of problem solving at work [23]
3.     Adopting design thinking in novice multidisciplinary teams: The application and limits of design methods and reflexive practices [24]
4.     Does group participation when using brainstorming facilitate or inhibit creative thinking? [25]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session 
· Independent activity: Research and review 2 relevant references

Session 9 : Design Communities

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapters 13 & 14
·       Exercise - Requirements/Design Tradeoffs
·       Exercise - Battleship
Discussion:
1.     Scaling agile@ spotify with tribes, squads, chapters & guilds [26]
2.     Kanban and Scrum-making the most of both [27]
3.     The Dangerous Dogmas of Software Engineering [28]
4.     Chapter 4 - Engineering for Equity [15]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Readings for next Session 
· Independent activity: Post audio file (mp3) of a personal statement "Design is..." (approx. 30s long)

Session 10 : Managing as Designing

·       The Soul of a New Machine - book club. Chapters 15, 16 & Epilogue
·       Exercise - Estimating User Stories (the Planning Game)
Discussion:
1.     Brainstorming variants to favor creative design [29]
2.     Designing routines: On the folly of designing artifacts, while hoping for patterns of action [30]
3.     Software development teams [31]
4.     Chapter 5 - How to Lead a Team [15]
Homework to be completed before the next class:
· Independent activity: Post an updated version of your CV with new skills

Session 11 : Always be Designing

·       Exercise - Standup meeting - progress on your own research project 
·       Exercise - Build a Robot Challenge

Session 12 : Video Presentations & Wrap-up

·       Video presentations
·       Course review

References

[1]   T. Kidder, The Soul of a New Machine. Back Bay Books, 1981.

[2]  Episode 0020 - From Design Thinking to Inclusive Design | Design Talk (dot IE), (Jan. 01, 2021). Accessed: Sep. 05, 2024. [Online Podcast]. Available: https://shows.acast.com/design-talk/episodes/0020-from-inclusive-design-to-design-thinking

[3]  Episode 0219 - Shift Left Design with Pat Clark | Design Talk (dot IE), (Mar. 28, 2024). Accessed: Aug. 27, 2024. [Online Podcast]. Available: https://shows.acast.com/design-talk/episodes/shift-left-design

[4]  B. Moggridge, “Design: Expressing experiences in design,” interactions, vol. 6, no. 4, pp. 17–25, 1999.

[5]  C. Noone, “4 Common Ways Companies Alienate People with Disabilities,” Harvard Business Review, Nov. 29, 2021. Accessed: Aug. 27, 2024. [Online]. Available: https://hbr.org/2021/11/4-common-ways-companies-alienate-people-with-disabilities

[6]  R. Price and K. Straker, “The design movement: Two case studies from the edge of the discipline,” Des. J., vol. 20, no. sup1, pp. S4565–S4574, 2017.

[7]  K. Battarbee, J. F. Suri, and S. G. Howard, Empathy on the edge: scaling and sustaining a human-centered approach in the evolving practice of design. 2014.

[8]  S. Greenberg and B. Buxton, “Usability evaluation considered harmful (some of the time),” in Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, 2008, pp. 111–120.

[9]  IDEO, The Little Book of Design Research Ethics. IDEO, 2015.

[10]  B. Foote and J. Yoder, “Big Ball of Mud,” Pattern languages of program design 4, vol. 4. Addison Wesley, pp. 653–692, 2000.

[11]  M. Petre, “Insights from expert software design practice,” in Proceedings of the 7th joint meeting of the European software engineering conference and the ACM SIGSOFT symposium on The foundations of software engineering, 2009, pp. 233–242.

[12]  W. W. Royce, “Managing Development of Large Scale Software Systems,” in IEEE WESCON, TRW, 1970, pp. 1–9.

[13]  F. P. Brooks Jr., “No Silver Bullet Essence and Accidents of Software Engineering,” Computer, vol. 20, no. 4, pp. 10–19, 1987.

[14]  C. Fishman, “They Write the Right Stuff,” Fast Co., no. 6, p. 9, Dec. 1996.

[15]  T. Winters, T. Manshreck, and H. Wright, Software engineering at Google: lessons learned from programming over time, First edition. Beijing [China]: O’Reilly Media, 2020.

[16]  F. W. Taylor, The Principles of Scientific Management. Norwood, Mass. USA: The Plimptom Press, 1917.

[17]  C. Larman and V. R. Basili, “Iterative and Incremental Development:A Brief History,” Computer, vol. 36, no. 6, pp. 47–56, 2003.

[18]  L. B. S. Raccoon, “The chaos model and the chaos cycle,” ACM SIGSOFT Softw. Eng. Notes, vol. 20, no. 1, p. 12, 1995.

[19]  K. Beck, “Embracing Change with Extreme Programming,” Computer, 1999.

[20]  D. R. Greening, “Agile Base Patterns in the Agile Canon,” in 2016 49th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 2016.

[21]  P. Kruchten, “Voyage in the Agile Memeplex,” ACM Queue, vol. 5, no. 5, pp. 38–44, 2007.

[22]  E. Catmull, “How Pixar Fosters Collective Creativity,” Harv. Bus. Rev., vol. 89, no. 9, p. 9, 2008.

[23]  A. B. Hargadon and B. A. Bechky, “When Collections of Creatives Become Creative Collectives: A field study of problem solving at work,” Organ. Sci., vol. 17, no. 4, pp. 484–500, 2006.

[24]  V. P. Seidel and S. K. Fixson, “Adopting design thinking in novice multidisciplinary teams: The application and limits of design methods and reflexive practices,” J. Prod. Innov. Manag., vol. 30, pp. 19–33, 2013.

[25]  D. W. Taylor, P. C. Berry, and C. H. Block, “Does group participation when using brainstorming facilitate or inhibit creative thinking?,” Adm. Sci. Q., pp. 23–47, 1958.

[26]  H. Kniberg and A. Ivarsson, “Scaling agile@ spotify with tribes, squads, chapters & guilds.” 2012. [Online]. Available: URL: https://ucvox.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/113617905-scaling-agile-spotify-11.pdf

[27]  H. Kniberg and M. Skarin, Kanban and Scrum-making the most of both. Lulu. com, 2010.

[28]  P. Ralph and B. J. Oates, “The Dangerous Dogmas of Software Engineering,” ArXiv Prepr. ArXiv180206321, 2018.

[29]  N. Bonnardel and J. Didier, “Brainstorming variants to favor creative design,” Appl. Ergon., vol. 83, p. 102987, 2020.

[30]  B. T. Pentland and M. S. Feldman, “Designing routines: On the folly of designing artifacts, while hoping for patterns of action,” Inf. Organ., vol. 18, no. 4, pp. 235–250, 2008.

[31]. S. Sawyer, “Software development teams,” Commun. ACM, vol. 47, no. 12, pp. 95–99, 2004.