Thinking Inside the Box

Harvard Interview (Thinking inside the box)

Critical Summary

In this interview Kevin talked about "Thinking inside the box", anyway there is nothing wrong with "thinking outside the box" and it's true that people can have new idea when they try to think outside the box. But when we talk about "thinking outside the box", there is no limitation of thought. People can think and create product in many ways. It can be black or white, can be small or big. So the idea might be shutdown when there are too many ways we can do but we don't know which one will be better. So instead of letting people think outside the box, better to give them the box and let them think in as long as that's different box. The meaning is giving people structure and encourage them with new idea, and let them think or find solution from structure and knowledge that you give them. Kelvin developed 250 example questions that we can consider as a box to let people think in. In the interview, they showed us 5 examples of question that can give us some idea about "thinking inside the box". There is one good example that they talked in this interview to make us get the idea of "thinking inside the box". The question is "How would a product changed if we can customize for every user?". Kelvin gave one good example answer to explain this question, The answer is about financial plan. In the past, it's existed only for wealthy people. But now, bank can customize financial plan for any customer base on their salary, financial stability and etc.

Above is the example of the box that we can create and let people think in, so we can have new product within the scope or structure that we set. This idea is good for both product's owner and designer. Product's owner can get the new product in the scope that they set or they want and designer doesn't need to worry if the product won't be matched with owner's requirement because they've already set the scope for designer.

Actually the idea of "thinking inside the box" in this interview is using both concepts of "thinking inside the box" and "thinking outside the box". It's started from someone need to use the concept of "thinking outside the box" to design and create new box for people to think in. When people has box or structure, they use concept of "thinking inside the box" to create or design new idea (product) within structure that they got, so in the final we will have it all in the same way. And also it makes work to be easier for people who need to think or design.

Reflections

There is one example question from