Session 2

Problem Framing

The Step Teams Skip

It is tempting to start building before the problem is clear.

A fast start on the wrong problem is not progress.

Quick Poll

"Build a robot."

If I handed you this as your whole assignment, what would you need to know before you could start?

What's Missing?

None of these have answers yet:

• Who is it for?
• What do they actually need it to do?
• What can't it cost, weigh, or take longer than?
• How would you know if you'd succeeded?

The 4-Part Framework

• User — a specific person or group, not "people"
• Need — stated as a problem, not a solution
• Constraints — cost, size, materials, time
• Success Criteria — how you'd know it worked

The 4-Part Framework

Worked Example

VAGUE: "Build a robot."

PRECISE: "Design a device that lets a user with limited hand mobility press an Xbox controller trigger independently."

What Does This Sentence Actually Cover?

• User — named: a person with limited hand mobility
• Need — named: press a trigger independently
• Constraints & Success Criteria — only implied so far — still need to be spelled out (cost, size relative to the controller, must not interfere with other buttons, must work one-handed)

Even a good-sounding sentence can still be missing two of the four parts.

Guided Rewrite #1

VAGUE: "Make something to help someone."

What we learned by asking questions:

• A student uses forearm crutches
• Both hands are occupied while walking
• Lunch must travel from the counter to a table
• No glass; under $20; washable every day
• Success means no spill and no adult assistance

Guided Rewrite #2

VAGUE: "Design a better backpack."

What we learned by asking questions:

• A seventh grader walks one mile to school
• A shoulder strap slips under a 12-pound load
• Must fit the existing locker; no battery; under $30
• Success means completing the walk without stopping to adjust it

Real Clients Don't Talk Like That

Nobody hands an engineer four labeled boxes. They hand you a person talking.

The four parts are in there. Out of order, unlabeled, and one of them is barely there at all.

Part A — Read a Real Brief

Your group gets one client brief. Another group has the same one.

1. Read it all the way through first
2. Pull out the four parts
3. Mark each one stated or inferred
4. Combine into 1–2 sentences

The Solution in Disguise

Every client in these briefs tells you what they think the answer is.

The object they request is not the Need. Find the problem underneath without letting the client's first idea choose your solution.

Part B — Same Brief, Two Groups

Find the other group with your brief number. Trade worksheets. Compare row by row.

You read identical words. You did not write identical tables.

Where you differ is the interesting part.

Prediction

One row will cause most of the disagreement.

Which one, and why?

Count how many boxes each of you marked inferred. That's your answer.

Part C — Broken Briefs

Three short briefs. Each has a different primary failure.

• Don't fix them — the information isn't there
• Name what's wrong
• Write one question you'd ask that client

"Can you tell me more?" is too broad. A useful question is specific and answerable in a sentence.

Common Traps

• Copying the client's proposed solution into the Need row
• Marking a row stated when you actually inferred it
• Constraints too vague to check ("cheap," "fast")
• Success criteria two people could disagree about

One More Thing: Start Your Notebook

Engineers document the process, not just the final result.

Today's problem statement is your first entry.

Every Entry Needs

• A date
• Your problem statement
• A sketch of the problem — not a solution yet

Every Entry Needs

Format

Physical notebook or shared digital doc — your instructor will tell you which this class uses.

Either way, every entry follows the same structure, and every entry gets a date. No exceptions.

Next Time

Session 3: Design & Ideation

Time to sketch actual solutions to the problem you just documented.

'F' → Fullscreen

Build

Four parts today. Parts A through C are group work; Part D is yours alone.

You need your individual worksheet and one reusable group reference packet from your instructor. The packet contains one client brief and all three broken briefs. Do not write on the packet.

Part A: Read a Real Brief

Your group gets one of three client briefs. It is a real person talking about a real problem — not a labeled form. All four parts are in there somewhere. None of them are labeled, the order is whatever order the client happened to say things in, and at least one part is only implied.

Read the whole brief before you write anything. Clients circle back. The constraint that kills your idea is frequently in the last paragraph.

Step A1 — Pull out the four parts

Fill in the four-part table on your worksheet, quoting or paraphrasing from the brief. Then mark every row:

• Stated — the client said it, and you can point at the line
• Inferred — you worked it out. Legitimate, but you will be asked to defend it

Step A2 — Find the solution in disguise

Every client in these briefs tells you, at some point, what they think the answer is.

That is not the Need. Quote the line where your client proposes a solution, then write what the actual problem underneath it is. If you skip this step, the client's guess becomes your Need row and you have framed their idea instead of their problem.

Step A3 — Combine into a problem statement

Merge your four parts into 1–2 full sentences, not a bullet list. Read it aloud before you write it down — it has to hold together as a sentence a real client would recognize.

Part B: Compare & Contrast

Find the other group holding your brief number and trade worksheets. Go row by row and mark agree or differ.

You read identical words. You will not have written identical tables, and that is the whole point of this part. A disagreement here is not one group being wrong — it is evidence that something in the brief was underspecified.

Then answer two things on your worksheet:

1. Which row did you disagree on the most?
2. Why that row? Count how many boxes each of you marked inferred.

Do not average your answers together. You are comparing two readings, not merging them into a compromise nobody would defend.

Step B2 — Record your revised working brief

Return to your own worksheet. Use the comparison to revise your four-part table and problem statement. Then copy the version your group will carry into Session 3 into the Revised Working Brief table.

Keep anything you inferred labeled as an assumption. A useful assumption can guide a concept, but it does not become something the client said just because your group agrees with it.

Part C: Broken Briefs

Now three short briefs, and every one of them is broken. They are each built around a different primary failure.

You cannot fix these, because the missing information does not exist on the page. Read from the reusable packet and record your group's conclusions on your own worksheet. For each one:

1. Name what's wrong — be specific about which part fails
2. Write one question you would ask that client to get the missing piece

A good question is answerable in a sentence. "Can you tell me more?" is too broad — it is a request to redo the brief, and a busy client will not do it. "What's the most you'd spend per unit?" is a question.

Finish by ranking the three from easiest to rescue with one phone call to hardest, and say in one sentence why the hardest one is hardest.

Part D: Start Your Design Notebook

Your instructor will tell you whether this class uses a physical notebook or a shared digital doc. Set it up now, labeled with your name and this class period — every student keeps one, even though today's problem statement came from your group.

Write your first entry with all three required parts:

• Date — today's date
• Problem Statement — your group's revised Part B statement, copied into your own notebook
• Sketch — a quick drawing of the situation your brief describes: the client's problem as it happens, in their room, with their people in it. Not a solution.

None of this needs to be neat. It needs to be honest and dated.

Checkpoint

Before you submit, check your work against these questions.

Then check your notebook entry for all three required parts.

This entry is graded on completeness only, not quality — all three parts present is a full score.

Reflection

Answer these on your own. Reflections are individual, even when the rest of the session was team work.

1. The other group's table had something in it that yours didn't. Name it, and say what you changed in your own four parts because of it. If you changed nothing, say what would have had to be different for you to change something.
2. Do you already have a solution in mind for your brief, even though we haven't started Design yet? Session 3 is where you'll test that instinct — are you willing to consider other ideas before committing to it?

Submit

Submit your worksheet and your first notebook entry. Return the reusable reference packet to your instructor.

Activity Complete