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One of they key ingredients when doing something is understand what you are trying to do in the first place. If you do not know what you believe your project should be and what you care about, it is almost impossible to make decisions around those. Working without a sense of clear direction will be meaningless, so make sure to understand what the goal is and agree as a team on it.

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During this part, you should lay out exactly what is it you are trying to build, the reasoning behind it and the meaning of the project.

Why are you building this?

To start with answer the following question: Why are you building this? Think about why this project is important to you personally. If it has no meaning or the answer is vague, either you have to look deeper or change project. Maybe you want to learn electronics, or software, or UI/UX design, or about rockets, etc. or the project solves an issue you are affected by personally, or you just think it is cool. There are hundreds if not thousands of reasons, but make sure that reason matters to you.

Who is this for?

Who will be the core user of your project (if any). Is it you? Your friends? People with disabilities? This question should help you answer a lot of design questions down the line. If you product will be used by people over the age of 70, maybe you have to take into account certain things you had not considered.

Draw what the project should look like

This is the key and one of the most important part of this section. If you do not know how you project will look like, starting from blank and trying to create something is incredibly difficult. A drawing helps align your team around a common view of the project. Forget about measurements or any specifics at first, just draw what you want to build.

There are two types of sketches:

• Drawings: Which give you a rough idea of what the project looks like, without any measurements or specifics
• Schematics: How the project works more specifically. What components the project has and how they interact with each other, the size and measurements of all parts of the project. etc.

Tips:

1. It does not have to be perfect. Forget about perfection.
2. Think of all the things that it has to do and either create a diagram or write them down.
3. Create a material list, even if incomplete, to see what it will take to build this thing. If parts have to be ordered, this list is very important to have ASAP
4. Think about what knowledge/skills you need for this project that you have or don’t. Write that down and make sure you think about that and find someone or somewhere to learn that. Start learning these ASAP.

How it would feel like to use this project?

This is a favorite of mine, as it makes you think about the user experience of your product/project. This will help you understand what parts you may need to focus on beyond key functionalities. Is the product easy to use or is it confusing? Do I have to turn it off after I use it? Is the spinning of a part automatic or do I have to turn it on? Do I need a button for something?

Make a list of features, parts, anything that you care about that your project should have/include. These are the main things you care about and work towards. On this list, select three that should be “main” and the rest should be add-ons. Any work that goes into others than the main three, are distractions unless you have time to do them all. Do not try to do everything at once!

Reevaluate your choices

Every now and then during the development of your idea, check that list of features you chose as the main things you care about. Does these still feel like the most important ones? Do you think priorities have changed/the project has changed/you learnt something you didn’t know and now have to change the main focus?

It is fine to change direction, but keep this in mind: Changing direction takes time, is doing something slightly different better right now? Check with mentors and get some opinions. If the change is drastic, it might be too much to handle depending on how much time you have left.