How (not) to approach a cross-cultural project
summary
A case study of a three-month MVP marketplace built for Pakistan in partnership with OLX, developed by a four-developer plus one-designer core team with remote Pakistani designers and no shared user research. Findings: phone-number signup, cash-on-delivery and mobile wallets are dominant; many purchases take over a day so flash-sales and crowded homepages perform well; returns are managed via customer-service callbacks rather than printed labels. Process recommendations: choose cooperation versus competition based on team/project uncertainty, require a stakeholder questionnaire, make the design process and timeline explicit, and provide weekly design updates.
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chapters (16)
- 0:00Cross-cultural project intro
- 3:16Designer as cultural user
- 5:44What is cross-cultural design
- 7:11Pakistani marketplace case study
- 10:23Cultural communication and layout
- 13:34User values and expectations
- 16:49Working with local designer
- 17:30Designer collaboration methods
- 19:16Managing project uncertainty
- 21:22Minimizing project uncertainty
- 23:27Minimizing team uncertainty
- 24:51Lessons learned
- 25:53Final project outcome
- 28:19Q&A
- 30:03Q&A: design systems and culture
- 31:25Q&A: Asian market feedback
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