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Appreciative inquiry (AI) is an inquiry into the “best of” what already exists in a system. Applying AI at the start of a design process gives a process that is very different from traditional design approaches, in other words “appreciative design” is achieved. The overall purpose of this paper is to explore and contribute to a process of putting appreciative design into practice.

The researchers have, in their role as educational leaders, developed and applied a process for appreciative design within the context of the entrepreneurial educational program “Skarp Åre, Business and product development” at Mid Sweden University.

The process introduced is referred to as Appreciative Course Evaluation and Design (ACED). The benefits of ACED, found in comparison to conventional practice, include higher commitment by the course participants, lower risk in the design process, and increased student involvement in the evaluation and design process.

The paper contributes in general to increasing the understanding of how the strengths and principles of appreciative inquiry can be incorporated into design processes. It is hoped that the insights presented will inspire future research and application of appreciative design, not only to the evaluation and design of higher education, but also to the evaluation and design of products, services, organizations and society.

A successful process of design concept evaluation has positive influence on subsequent processes. This study aims to consider the evaluation information at multiple stages and the interaction among evaluators and improve the credibility of evaluation results.

This paper proposes a multi-stage approach for design concept evaluation based on complex network and bounded confidence. First, a network is constructed according to the evaluation data. Depending on the consensus degree of evaluation opinions, the number of evaluation rounds is determined. Then, bounded confidence rules are applied for the modification of preference information. Last, a planning function is constructed to calculate the weight of each stage and aggregate information at multiple evaluation stages.

The results indicate that the opinions of the evaluators tend to be consistent after multiple stages of interactive adjustment, and the ordering of design concept alternatives tends to be stable with the progress of the evaluation.

Updating preferences according to the bounded confidence rules, only the opinions within the trust threshold are considered. The attribute information of the node itself is inadequately considered.

This method addresses the need for considering the evaluation information at each stage and minimizes the impact of disagreements within the evaluation group on the evaluation results.

This paper aims to propose a framework for the evaluation of artefacts in Design Science and test it using an exemplar case of a knowledge management system (KMS) developed for an Australian refrigeration manufacturing company.

The research uses Design Science research methodology in a specific case study context. The artefact studied was developed using an ontology based on an engineering design conceptualisation and created using an ontology generator, Protégé. Research data for the evaluation of the framework were collected using a combination of document analysis, interviews, shadowing and observations.

The evaluation framework developed for the research and applied to the KMS specifically built for the company was shown to be useful in determining the efficacy and effectiveness of the research outcomes in terms of usefulness to the company engineers in the technical analysis of their work, and for the CEO and COO as part of their strategic planning for the company. The evaluation framework helped the researcher and the engineers as collaborators to demonstrate the extent of improvement in the design and build processes in the company.

Prior research in both Information System and Design Science has not provided a specific, generalizable, evaluation framework for system developers to use as a guide during the systems development process. This research proposes an evaluation framework which covers all broad aspects of evaluation and efficacy, accepting that evaluation frameworks must be flexible in enabling changes to accommodate variations in the types and purposes of artefacts developed.

The study aims to introduce a cloud-based virtual reality (VR) approach and investigate its applicability and performance in aiding the remote design evaluation process by assessing the clients' convenience perception toward cloud-based VR-aided design evaluation (Cloud-based VR Approach) compared to 3D model-aided design evaluation (3D Model Approach) and rendering images-aided design evaluation (Image Approach).

A multicriteria comparative study was conducted with 26 university students using the “analytic hierarchy process” technique to compare the three approaches applied to home finishing material selection tasks based on the five “service convenience” dimensions, consisting of access convenience, decision convenience, transaction convenience, benefit convenience and post-benefit convenience.

The results indicated that the “Cloud-based VR Approach” was perceived to be more convenient than the “3D Model Approach” and the “Image Approach” based on the aspects of “decision convenience”, “transaction convenience”, “benefit convenience” and “post-benefit convenience”. The only aspect that the Cloud-based VR Approach was comparatively less convenient than the 3D Model Approach and Image Approach for the user was “access convenience”. Overall, the findings showed that the developed Cloud-based VR Approach had more potential than the conventional approaches in aiding the design evaluation process under ongoing social distancing measures requiring designers and clients to work remotely.

The disastrous impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on logistical systems have resulted in massive disruptions to the construction industry worldwide. Various construction activities have been halted and most meetings moved online. Design evaluation conducted between clients and designers is one of the important activities affected by such an impact. Thus, this study presents the Cloud-based VR Approach as an innovative means to maintain essential ongoing activities and meeting of the current design evaluation approach with respect to the social distancing measures.

The paper aims to study screening design and construction technologies of skyscrapers. Skyscraper projects provide an illustration of important driving factors (e.g. economies of scale and international expertise) when utilising a wide range of solutions, including innovative ones, in the design and construction of building systems and subsystems. The need exists for a methodology for the speedy screening and comprehensive evaluation of candidate solutions covering the complete spectrum of systems that comprise a building project and that have an impact on life cycle performance. Presented in this paper is a three-step evaluation framework directed at meeting this need, along with application of the first step to three case studies performance.

Research objectives were achieved by an extensive literature review of the current state-of-the-art evaluation tools and criteria; formulation of a three-step evaluation process for screening and ranking candidates; identification and structuring of comprehensive checklists of evaluation criteria; application of the first step of the evaluation framework to three case studies to gauge completeness and ease of use; and assessment of the framework by experienced practitioners.

The framework proposed provides a structured and transparent approach to assessing design/construction choices. It makes explicit the spectrum of criteria to be considered when assessing their feasibility. Feedback from industry professionals indicates that the framework is reflective of industry needs.

The originality and value of the approach lies in the comprehensiveness of the criteria considered, their relevance to signature building projects that draw on international expertise and technologies and their relevance to all phases of the project life cycle.

Educational leadership preparation programs are expected to train graduates who change their practice and produce outcomes for teachers and students. However, programs are challenged to produce evidence of their impact while also evaluating for formative purposes. This paper describes collaboration between an educational leadership program director and a program evaluator to construct an evaluation system that incorporated program theory, processes, and outcomes. The leadership preparation program, grounded in ethical leadership practices, had a unique design with core tenets that informed choices about the evaluation design. Decisions about data sources were informed by evaluation foci, the availability of existing data sources, and resource constraints. The complexity of the evaluation design paralleled the complexity of the program itself. Leadership content expertise, evaluation design expertise, and genuine collaboration were all essential to the successful design of this evaluation plan. Several recommendations are offered for others collaborating to design evaluations of their programs.

Databases on CDROM are one of the more complex types of facility that will be accessed by the general public, either in their home, in airport lounges and other public arenas or in libraries. These databases extend over a wide range of different media types including bibliographic, full‐text and multimedia. Interfaces include DOS‐based and GUI‐based products. This paper reviews the literature on the design and evaluation of user interfaces on CDROM, with the objective of distilling guidelines for these activities. More specifically the article defines interfaces, dialogues and interaction, and explores the diversity in and issues associated with standardisation in interface design for CDROMs. Current criteria and guidelines for the evaluation of CDROM interfaces include those of the Special Interest Group on CDROM Applications and Technology (SIGCAT) and guidelines proposed by other authors. Using this earlier work as a basis an alternative set of guidelines is proposed.

Decades of innovation in designing usable (and unusable) interfaces have resulted in a plethora of guidelines, usability methods, and other design tools. The purpose of this research is to develop ways for novice developers to effectively leverage and contribute to the large and growing body of usability knowledge and methods.

This work presents the first extensive usage evaluation of an integrated design environment and knowledge management system, LINK‐UP. Key to this effort is the central design record (CDR), a design representation meant to prevent breakdowns occurring between design and evaluation phases.

The case study results show that a design knowledge IDE centered on the CDR can help novices make connections between requirements data, design representations and evaluation data and better understand how to leverage that information to improve designs.

Future efforts are focusing on exploring the utility of this approach for practitioners—especially agile developers.

A useful process and toolset for teaching usability design to novice developers and students.

The CDR makes designs coherent and understandable, thus supporting a principled, guided development process critical for student developers.

Although brands have developed mobile applications (apps) to offer consumers new experiences, low app usage numbers indicate the need to develop a systematic, practical evaluation framework for branded app design that specifies concrete design features.

An expert review provides an overview of the design of current branded apps. On the basis of an extensive literature review, this article classifies state-of-the-art design features for branded apps according to a proposed evaluation framework that includes human–computer interaction (HCI)–related and marketing-related evaluation criteria. In an application of these evaluation criteria, the authors evaluate 73 branded apps issued by 11 top fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) brands.

The expert review identifies strengths and weaknesses that are common to the design of current branded apps. These findings inform the set of design recommendations that this article offers, which includes 14 features common to all types of apps and 9 features specific to particular types of apps.

This research offers practical implications for app designers, who need to address design dimensions contained in the proposed framework including the HCI-related (mobile, social and user experience design features) and marketing-related (branding and customer relationship management design features) to create effective branded apps.

Design elements identified in prior literature remain abstract and do not prescribe a systematic or pragmatic approach to using them in practice. This study takes a multidisciplinary perspective (HCI, marketing and design science) to establish a practical evaluation framework for branded app designs.

Firms increasingly integrate a wide range of actors in the early ideation and concept creation phases of innovation processes leading to the collection of a large number of ideas. This creates the challenge of filtering the most promising ideas from a large number of submissions. The use of external stakeholders into the evaluation and selection of submissions (i.e. open evaluation (OE)) might be a viable alternative. The purpose of this paper is to provide a state-of-the-art analysis on how such OE systems are designed and structured.

Since OE is a new phenomenon, an exploratory qualitative research approach is adopted. In all, 122 instances of OE in 90 innovation contest cases are examined for their design elements.

This research reveals that OE systems are configured in many different ways. In total, 32 design elements and their respective parameters are identified and described along the six socio-technical system components of an OE system. This study allows for a comprehensive understanding of what OE is and what factors need to be taken into consideration when designing an OE system.

Scholars and professionals may draw insights on what design choices to make when implementing OE.

The comprehensive analysis performed in this study contributes to research on open and user innovation by examining the concept of OE. In particular, it extends knowledge on design elements of OE systems.