Design studio: A team alignment secret weapon - Modev MVP Conference

A Team Alignment Secret Weapon: The Design Studio

Psychology + User Experience + InnovationBrilliant Experience

John Whalen, PhD UX Lead, Brilliant Experience

President, UXPA-DC

Amee Mungo Senior Product Manager, Digital Card

Capital One

Agenda‣ Introductions ‣ Why Design Studios? ‣ Detail Design Studio Components ‣ Introduce Today’s Problem & Complete Components ‣ Design Studio Details, Tips & Tricks

Introduction

John Whalen, PhD UX Lead, Brilliant Experience

President, UXPA-DC

Amee Mungo Senior Product Manager, Digital Card

Capital One

Brilliant Experience Psychology + User Experience + Innovation

If you follow exactly the steps we outline

Warm Up

How do we “cross the chasm”?

User InsightsGreat Experience,

Successful Product

InsertMagicalProcess

Here

Not recommended

Hard to find

Let’s play: Name that methodology

User Stories

1

Design & Develop

2

Feedback

3

User Stories

1

Design & Develop

2

Feedback

3

Agile

Build

1

Measure

2

Learn

3

Build

1

Measure

2

Learn

3

Lean Startup

Lean Startup

Copyright © 2012-2013 Brilliant Experience

1 2 3 4

Empathize with the audience you are designing for.

Brainstorm possible designs

Build a representation of one or more of your ideas

PrototypeIdeateResearch

Test your ideas for feedback

Test

Copyright © 2012-2013 Brilliant Experience

Empathize with the audience you are designing for.

Brainstorm possible designs

Build a representation of one or more of your ideas

PrototypeIdeateResearch

Test your ideas for feedback

Test

Design

Thinking

1 2 3 4

Design Thinking

We believe these methodologies are not enough!

Success lies beyond the product development process

Product Development Team Development

Empathize with your audience Determine management alignment

Baseline measurement Evaluate the team

Design studio

Exploration of solution space Intensive training

Partner designers / developers Support team

Two Tracks



Two Tracks

What do they say? do? think?

Consumer! Lawyer! Banker!

Neuroscien2st! VAD7Nurse! Drug7Researcher!

Farmer! Federal7Administrator! Mom7/7Chauffeur!

Stakeholder Alignment

Two Tracks




Baseline Testing

UX Lead Technical Lead

User Researcher

Usability Expert

Front-End Developer

Front-End Developer

Interaction Designer

UX Strategist

consultantemployee

Evaluate The Team

Two Tracks




Design studio

Two Tracks




Design studio

Exploration of solution space Intensive training

Partner designers / developers Support team

Design Studio

Why have a design studio?

CEO: “I know you had an agenda, but let’s just sketch our ideas anyway…"

Design Studio Origins‣ Design school

- Intensive group critique of work

- Learn through criticism

- Take chances and learn through experimentation

- Everyone learns through design.

Design Studio Evolution‣ Rapidly align team on: ‣ Internal business goals of project

‣ Prioritized audiences

‣ Audience goals and scenarios

‣ Relationship between business and audience needs

‣ Possible solutions space

‣ Early concepts

Design Studio - Side Benefits‣ Understand team dynamics - See the team working together

- Understand the personalities, roadblocks, willingness to learn, try new things

‣ Allow a safe environment to explore new ideas

- Get executive permission (demand) to change

- Give permission to brain storm possibilities

- Provide rare chance for cross discipline interaction (marketing, development, UX, design, sales)

- Align team on way forward, even if underspecified

Design Studio - Side Benefits‣ Let other team members understand UX and Users - Challenge other teams to think like the user

- Force prioritization of audiences

- Get those team members to role play as a user, develop empathy

- Demonstrate the challenges of interface design

- Allow other teams to empathize with the challenges and needs of the UX team

Design Studio - Side Benefits‣ Get feeling of accomplishment - Create immediate decisions and deliverables

- Ensure that the team have built something together, for once

- Create a pact between UX, Execs, Developers, Marketers (when does that happen otherwise?)

- Build team camaraderie

Design Studio Introduction

Goals‣ Collaborate

‣ Generate ideas

‣ End up with several good ideas

Guidelines for the next two days.

1. Minimal phones, tablets, or laptops - we need to focus on the project

- We will give you breaks to get your fix

2. We must generate a lot of ideas quickly

- We will have deadlines to get things done

3. We are not in the idea- or ego-squashing business

- We succeed through a breadth of perspectives

Today, we will create the foundation for a winning WMATA strategy and design direction through a strategy workshop & design studio.

Introduce the design studio process, our goals and activities.

Prioritize business goals. Ensure we are aligned on our goals for the project and desired outcomes.

Prioritize your audiences, define them create the scenarios in which they would use this product.

Audience NeedsEnterprise NeedsIntroduction

Flesh out best ideas. Get the team to agree on promising conceptual directions through presenting concepts to the team.

Design Studio

The Process

1 2 3 4

Schedule - Day 1

Time Activity & Description

12:30 – 1:00 Kickoff & Introduction

1:00 - 2:00 Elevator Pitch

2:00 - 2:10 Brief Break

2:10 - 3:00 Prioritize Business Objectives

3:00 – 3:20 Prioritize Site Audiences

2:30 - 2:45 Brief Break

3:30 – 4:30 Create & Present User Personas

4:30 - 5:00 Summary & Wrap Up

Schedule - Day 2

Time Activity & Description

8:00 - 8:20 Day 2 Kickoff

8:20 - 8:30 Stakeholder Comments on Day 1 Findings

8:30 – 9:20 Create & Present User Scenarios

9:20 - 9:30 Brief Break, Design Studio Setup

9:30 – 9:45 Feature Brainstorming Session

9:45- 10:00 Introduction to Conceptual Design & Design Studio

10:00 – 11:15 Homepage Design Sprints

11:15 – 11:45 Group Presentations of Designs

11:45 – 12:00 Wrap up

Samples of Each Step

Elevator Pitch

Prioritize Business Needs

Prioritize & Create Personas

Scenarios

Customer Experience Journey

Early Ideation

Sketching & Prototyping‣ We were the first of the cleanup crews ‣ Primary subcontractor spent 2 years and built close to nothing that could be approved for launch

(issues with usability) ‣ SWAT team brought in to fix: IDEO, Brilliant ‣ Arrived at first meeting and learned that the problem needed to be fixed in two weeks with the first

review due in three days ‣ Drove to my nearest relative’s house (father), removed all art and photographs from the walls, and

got to work

Sketching & Prototyping

Today’s Workshop Challenge

Meet the Lemieux’s, “speak English little bit”

Lemieux’s plan for Washington DC

Meet the Washington Metro

Qu’est-ce que c’est???!!!

Excusé moi?

Will it take my children away from me?

Are there any signs?

Challenge: Use the design studio to figure out how to make it easier to get a family through the Washington Metro using their mobile phone(s).

Elevator Pitch

Elevator Pitch‣ The elevator pitch is a quick assessment of team alignment. The goal

is to briefly describe your new product as if you were in an elevator pitching it to a key stakeholder.

‣ We want each individual to describe its audience, their need, the product’s category and biggest benefit, and how it uniquely serves your audience.

Elevator Pitch‣ Work independently

‣ One Post-It note per space


‣ Consider the user journey, from initial thoughts and concerns to completed goals.

‣ How would they try to tackle the problem? What would be each step?

‣ What might be their typical needs for that step?

‣ What questions would they want answered?

Review our work‣ Recognize priorities, top audience needs, promising design possibilities.

Congratulate the Team!Congratulate the Team!

Design Studio: Procedural Details

Duration of Meeting‣ How long have yours been?

- Mine: 1/2 day to 3 days

- 1/2 day - well defined app

- 1-2 days - typical for larger group that needs to achieve alignment

- 2 days enough to allow for true design studio - detailed design and critique

- Sometimes need longer when there is detailed information about the users available

Selecting Features‣ Elevator Pitch ‣ Affinity Diagraming ‣ Business Priorities ‣ Prioritizing and building Personas ‣ Prioritizing and building Scenarios ‣ User Experience Mapping ‣ Brainstorm sketch concepts, revise concepts

Who to Invite? When to get involved?‣ Senior Executives / Executive Sponsor ‣ UX ‣ Design ‣ Marketing ‣ Development ‣ Operations ‣ Other channels (print, in-store, phone support) ‣ SMEs

Who to Invite? When to get involved?

Tools You’ll Need

If you follow exactly the steps we’ve outlined…

Thank you!

Psychology + Innovation + DesignBrilliant Experience

John Whalen [email protected]

slides and templates at: brilliantexperience.com

Psychology + Innovation + DesignBrilliant Experience

http://brilliantexperience.com

Design studio: A team alignment secret weapon - Modev MVP Conference

Design

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