Z. Yang, M. Karry, T-W Su, M. Hall
University of California, Santa Cruz,
United States
Keywords: generative AI in innovation, user experience research and design, innovation process, organizational innovation, innovation framework
Summary:
In this information-driven world, incorrect decisions in future investments and technology development can lead to great market losses for organizations. To mitigate these risks, organizations rely on innovation projects to transform emerging AI technologies into marketable products. Traditionally, innovation processes have focused on advancing technological capabilities. However, how do organizations determine which technologies will benefit humanity and which could potentially cause harm to end users? Therefore, there's a growing significance of integrating User Experience and Design (UXRD) principles into early innovation processes. The lack of integration can lead to high failure rates and substantial delays in the development and implementation of innovation projects. This study aims at uncovering challenges and resistance in integrating UXRD into the innovation process. By addressing these barriers, the study aims to provide actionable insights to inform new innovation processes. Additionally, we aim to assess the values of UXRD and apply a user-centered design approach to assess current innovation processes. This research provides a comprehensive overview of existing barriers within the current organizational innovation processes. We also conducted semi-structured interviews with 15 participants from various organizations specializing in innovation work. Our qualitative findings identified that the principal obstacle is the lack of effective interdepartmental collaboration in large organizations and limited resources for user experience research in smaller organizations, which can lead to significant delays and misalignment with stakeholders in downstream product development phases. Based on our findings, we provide recommendations for integrating UXRD and Generative AI into the innovation process to help organizations build more effective innovation processes and cultivate an environment conducive to innovation.