Every project is different, and that means you have to start at the beginning each time.
We’re not afraid of getting our hands dirty in the pursuit of understanding the context or people central to the challenge. When developing a new claw for Milk-rite we even had a go at milking to ensure we understood the challenges facing farmers in the milking parlours.
In other instances the challenges aren’t with users but are far more technical. We’re equally comfortable hitting the books as well as doing practical hands-on research to ensure we’ve grasped the confines of any design challenge. We can’t be experts in every area, but we’re happy to find those who are where projects have highly technical requirements.