Think of it like this: If you want to help someone, you don’t start by guessing their age, job, or hobbies. You start by asking, “What are they struggling with?”
Road Bump. Photo by Henry & Co. on Unsplash
We are living in an age where convenience seems to be our goal. Autonomous cars drive us to work, and smartphones allow us to access information at the touch of a finger.
Regardless of the activity, companies are continually thinking about how such opportunities can be improved, designing products or services to be faster, better, more accessible and encouraging consumers to pay more for items that will save them time and effort.
Convenience, in itself, is not a problem. However, it’s important to know when this convenience is actually detrimental to our well-being or the environment. Companies offer convenience to society in forms such as fast food, online shopping, and grocery delivery — yet this is at the expense of data privacy, anxiety, decreased fitness, and an increase of our carbon footprint.
We are no longer learning how to do things for ourselves, subsequently missing out on the satisfaction and life skills that come from such endeavours. As modernised lifestyles have caused many people to accept convenience as the norm, our perceptions have skewed to believe we’ll always want things faster, even though taking a shortcut isn’t always better than doing something manually.
In crafting a customer experience, the phrase “convenience is king” tends to get thrown around a lot, as it emphasizes how beneficial time/effort savings can be. Many people do not think of how something inconvenient — that is even a hindrance — can, in fact, be your valuable ally in the design process.
I first stumbled upon the work of Hiroshi Kawakami by watching his appearance on an NHK television show where he discussed the benefits of inconvenience. His points led me to consider whether convenience is always a good thing and how deliberate inconvenience helps one to focus on something different and come up with a better solution.
I had never heard anyone speak on the issue before. Out of curiosity, I decided to incubate some thoughts around his concepts.
Hiroshi Kawakami highlighted how a certain amount of inconvenience can be introduced into a well-practiced system with positive results. It seems contrary to reason at first, but in many ways, it makes sense when you consider how ingrained habits can become over time and the benefits they may hold when applied judiciously or in moderation.
How to make systems inconvenient
One of the examples that was mentioned is the prime number ruler, sans standard increments, forcing one to devise a new way to measure objects. It also helps to reinforce math lessons in a creative way by giving a different dimension to the lesson itself.
Prime number ruler
Although Google Maps offers us a convenient means to find our way around, it is degrading our ability to navigate independently. Highly dependent on our mobile devices, we have forgotten how to read a map or get to know the area better by exploring the streets on foot, etc. Hiroshi Kawakami created a navigation app where the map disappears over time — forcing people to rely on their memory of the roads and not their devices.
A navigation app where the map disappears over time
Hiroshi Kawakami identified 8 types of benefits that can be gained when people experience inconvenience. One of the most convincing benefits of which is how it can inspire and motivate people’s creativity, forcing them to step out of their comfort zones, learn how to do things differently, and/or help them retain old skills.
8 benefits from inconveniences
This inspired me to look a little closer, and I found, surprisingly, inconveniences can benefit individuals in unexpected ways and also deliver positive economic outcomes.
An example of this would be when the local mall management changed the direction of the escalator in the shopping mall. This caused initial inconvenience to all the patrons, but it helped increase traffic flow to other shops, helping shop owners gain more exposure and revenue.
Escalator in the shopping mall. Photo by XVIIIZZ on Unsplash
Another case is designing an office space where the water cooler isn’t in a convenient spot. This gently forces employees to take a short 20-minute “quick trip” to the water cooler, which helps to alleviate office stress and gives people no excuse not to chat with fellow employees.
This idea sent my wheels spinning. It made me think about whether the ultimate point of good product design is really about delivering an all-encompassing concierge service where each request and delivery could be made without encountering any unnecessary friction.
Scene from Wall-e where all request from a user is delivered instantly
Take, for instance, the mobile app for mindfulness, where AI-driven meditation programs are personalised for users to stay mindful on the move. If one still constantly needs the mobile app to stay fully present, this somehow contradicts the essence of being mindful…
Should we care about the users and think about what is right for them instead of delivering what they need without question?
A great analogy here is to place ourselves in ‘the parent’s shoes’. For the most part, parents avoid spoiling their child with total convenience because if they did, such children could grow up to be dependent on the parent and live in an adverse environment if the parent were not around.
So, instead, the parent tries to nurture and support their children as much as possible while they are growing up so that the child can learn how to be self-sufficient and independent.
Now, let’s place the product owner in the role of a parent.
Instead of satisfying all the needs of the user with the goal of convenience, the product owner could choose a middle path by placing deliberate inconvenience within the user experience to benefit the user in the longer term while the product could still fulfil its main purpose. Just like how we would care for and hope our kids grow up to be: Independent and self-sufficient.
Photo by Possessed Photography on Unsplash
Technological advancements have improved efficiency levels significantly over the years. AI and robots will inevitably improve our lives beyond imagination, where all our requests could be met with just a single thought.
However, here is a table for your consideration:
Our vision for the future should not be solely about having a full personal-service concierge with the goal of convenience.
I believe what is needed here is ethical design thinking: a focus on using technology in a collaborative and learning manner where our growth and well-being could improve independently rather than having the essence of a human being degraded with the advancement of technology over time.
We must use ethical design thinking to shape a future where humanity has grown due to (and perhaps despite) technology and not devolved because of it.
Screenshot of I Am Mother where a robot named Mother grows a human embryo and cares for her over several years.
