38. Cocreate as a Participatory Design Methodology in Health Care

With the advent of new health-tech advancements, how can businesses consistently deliver products or services that consumers actually want? On one hand, it is crucial that the businesses create a product that meets users’ actual needs and solves problems, while on the other, it is also critical that the product/service experience is not compromised while fulfilling business goals. In most cases, the challenge ultimately trickles down to less stakeholder involvement and a lack of access in the innovation process to a wider range of voices that matter the most. Will co-creating with the stakeholders help create new paths for improved and long-lasting customer experience? Leveraging insights from projects done in healthcare, we highlight the use of the Cocreate methodology as a tool that effectively brings together a multitude of stakeholders such as customers, clinical experts, business teams, and suppliers to solve a design challenge at hand. The intent of this paper is to showcase the efficiency and scalability of this approach as a framework that builds empathy among the various stakeholders to better comprehend the ecosystem at play and achieve a desired state of being. A practice of participatory design, this technique of design thinking is customized for the user and by the user, incorporating perspectives of technology, clinical knowledge and business viability in the healthcare domain. The paper is an amalgamation of learnings from different projects and brings out a detailed understanding of the journey of Cocreate through the lens of designers. It highlights the process and its impact in the healthcare domain while emphasizing on the opportunities and learnings from various applications. Breaking the siloed way of working, this method challenges the traditional business thinking approach, minimizing complexity, stressing on and harbors innovation through a modular and versatile proposition and is specific to innovating for a complex domain-like health care.