Engage and understand target participants

This is a key step in any design process; drawing on different sources and undertaking user research to discover who the target participant is – their likes, dislikes, barriers and motivations. The ideal scenario is to engage directly with participants and empathise with and learn about them, in particular, delving into the pain points or issues they have with engaging in sport experiences. These are the key insights to take forward to the next stage.

You need to look at how the offer can address people's needs and wants and be something they value. This is the case if you are designing a new product offer or addressing an existing product issue. This helps you start out participant-centred and keep that as a key focus throughout the approach.

Questions to ask

1. Who will be/are the target participants and what are their barriers to participation? ​
2. What are our target participants pain points? What are their problems or issues?
3. What is the value we could provide the target participant? What do they need and want from our product and why will or do they choose our product?​
4. What are the moments that matter to the target participant?
5. What have we learnt through feedback from current and lapsed participants?  ​
6. What have we learnt through observing the participant product experience?

Use your own resources as input to this action, for example:

• Member satisfaction survey results​
• Post-product surveys (participants, parents etc)​
• Informal participant feedback (verbal, interviews, group sessions etc)​
• Observation notes on participant product experience.

Sport Australia and VicHealth resources as input to this action:

• Participation across life stages
• AusPlay
• Youth participation (understanding disengaged youth and the secondary school demographic)
• VicHealth: How to co-design, opens in a new tab
• Leisure Networks - Power to Pedal: Designing your program, opens in a new tab (using the Doing Sport Differently, opens in a new tab Principles from VicHealth)
• Count Me In: engaging young people from migrant and refugee backgrounds in sport, opens in a new tab

Methods to consider for this action

• Conducting user research can take different forms such as contextual enquiry (interviewing and observing people in their environment), observation, focus groups and interviews. Different techniques can be used depending on situation, timeline, resources etc.
• A persona and empathy map can help you understand the participant - their needs, goals and the things they say, do, think and feel.
• User insight statements can help create compelling and actionable insights to help explore ideas and solutions
• Use the VicHealth: How to co-design, opens in a new tab resource to explore methods to use for this action.

Output

Identified target participant/s and the value you could provide to them

Design-Canvas.pdf