Chapter 12: Reflection and personal learnings
It’s been a long road to get to the point of turning this project in. During the time I’ve encountered restrictions, both from myself and from the environment. Staying true to the Hyper Island methodology, and the outcome of this project, these are some of the reflections and takeaways from this project.
1. The “Just do it”-attitude breeds confidence…
From personal experience I find the hardest part of anything I do to be to start it, leaving me to procrastinate and wallow in anxiety about not doing what I should be doing. Also, meeting strangers is kind of scary. Because of this I decided to focus on booking my first interview in New York as soon as possible to get the ball rolling. New York is, after all, a very busy city that you can get lost in if you start. I sent e-mails left and right to people I wanted to get in contact with and found that after the more requests I sent out the calmer I felt, along with gaining more confidence with each interview I did. After a couple of weeks I felt it was second nature to approach strangers and talk about my project.
In the future I’ll start sooner and be bolder so I can feel comfortable doing what I’m doing further down the road.
2. … but I need to continue that feedback loop
After conducting all of the interviews I decided to take two weeks off and just write. Because of a heatwave I was somewhat confined to the apartment I was staying at (30°C and 80% humidity is not my cup of tea), leading me to being isolated. I got a lot done but when I got back to the stage of reaching out to people I found myself procrastinating it. Being out of the loop, for only two weeks, tore down my confidence and all of a sudden I felt very shy about meeting people and talk about the project. I felt a lot of pressure to perform and have the most amazing research project ever, in order to not disappoint all of these amazing people I met.
By locking myself in and not sharing what I worked on as I was working on it I unconsciously built up to a big reveal, instead of releasing it in smaller pieces and getting continuous feedback. This goes against my own findings and what I’m advocating for through this project.
In the future I’ll be more transparent with my work and put more drafts and “not ready”’s out in the open so I can receive feedback on it, staying true to the principles of the Double Diamond and Human Centered Design, along with the prototyping mindset.
3. Mentors and a supervisor
At the beginning of this project I was assigned a supervisor that would help me through the research process. We talked a bit during the first months, but after my extension got approved I did not reach out to this person again because I felt there was a lack of support and active listening. Instead I took on this specific project on my own, with some help from Tash Willcocks (my program manager at Hyper Island). In hindsight it might’ve been beneficial to sort things out with my supervisor, or get mentorship from another person. This might’ve helped with the procrastination and fear of being judged I was feeling at the final stages of the project, as I would’ve had someone to push me through that resistance. Now I only had myself to rely on.
However, I found some support in people I met during my time in New York and talked to those people to gain more insights and new perspectives. This was very beneficial and also helped with feeling like I wasn’t alone working on this after my two weeks of writing.
In the future I’ll communicate my needs and wants to the people I work with more openly, along with reaching out to people more to gain feedback and support.
4. Keeping things visual and tactile
I’ve read a lot of books and articles, along with analyzing all the data I’ve collected during this project. In the beginning I tried using tools like Kindle, Evernote and Mural to keep my research digital but I found it hard to adapt even after keeping at it for a couple of weeks. I found that I learn and remember things better when I have a printed copy and can make notes and highlights by hand. What I need to think about with this process is to not do too much double work, where I’ll write something on paper and then write the same thing on my computer, which is time consuming and not as shareable, which is important if I want to share my work more. Perhaps I could talk to Mathias Jakobsen, one of my respondents, about his work and approach to sharing while doing analogue things.
In the future I’ll keep my work flow analogue to enable myself to learn and remember concepts better, but test how I can quickly share it digitally.
5. Environment is important for me
I’ve always felt that I never belonged in Sweden (where I’m from) and after spending three months in New York, that feeling has grown stronger. I draw energy from going to events and meeting new people, two resources that New York has a plethora of. This, along with the anonymity that a bigger city brings and perhaps the American culture itself, enables me to be more brave and bold in my endeavors. Working in this type of context for this project has reconfirmed that I need to move abroad in order to feel satisfied, both in my professional and personal life.
In the future I’ll work in an urban environment, preferably in a bigger city like New York, where I can get energy from the city itself and the many events and people in the area.
Next: Appendix: References
Previous: Chapter 11: Conclusion
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Hyper Island — MA Digital Media Management
Industry Research Project
