STOP! COLLABORATE& STRATEGIZE Craig Spencer

Part 4: Design Sprints

UXPA 2017 TORONTO

DESIGN SPRINTs▪ XFN in nature▪ Great for actioning research

My journey with sprints

▪ I had been part of sprint’s prior to joining Google. Some were successful some not so.

▪ Completed the Google Sprint Master Training, based on the Google framework.

▪ Sprints have been a very valuable tool to getting research findings actioned.

Where did Sprints come from?

▪ The Google Design Sprint framework was created in 2010.

▪ The methodology has evolved over time and continues to be refined and tested. Remember it’s a framework, it’s up to you to apply it sensibly to your challenge.

Introduction to Design Sprints

▪ A design sprint is a five-phase framework that helps answer key product/design questions through teamwork, rapid prototyping and user testing.

▪ Sprints let your team reach clearly defined goals and deliverables and gain key learnings, quickly.

▪ The process helps spark innovation, encourage user-centered thinking, align your team under a shared vision, and get you to product launch faster. WIN!

Design Sprint process

Understand PrototypeSketch Decide Validate

What is involved at each stage?

▪ Understand - create a shared understanding of the problem▪ Sketch - think and sketch ideas▪ Decide - as a team what should we prototype▪ Prototype - build what you need to validate your ideas▪ Validate - feedaback from users

Typically sprints are 2,3, or 5 days in length. As your team gains experience and is used to sprinting often you can reduce the time needed.

Why are design sprints useful to researchers?

▪ Action your findings - you convert the research findings into a “Sprint Challenge” and have the team work on this.

▪ Steer the product - by it’s nature the sprint will be heavily rooted on your research, and will reference research throughout.

▪ Get XFN team to work together - utilising the whole team to action the research is very powerful, and will result in a practical way forward.

▪ Use when the answer is not clear, where it will take consensus to move forwards, and the problem is medium-large.

Constructing a Sprint Challenge

Clarity is important :▪ It needs to contain the timeframe e.g. in

the next year, in the next quarter.▪ It needs to contain the channel/platform

e.g. Mobile App, Website.▪ It needs to be clear & understood by the

team.▪ This is where we can rephrase a user

need as a sprint challenge

Activity time

As a team, construct a sprint challenge based on the user needs mapping you have conducted

▪ Timeframe, channel, clarity

5 mins

Pre Sprint

A lot of the Sprint Master’s role is about organising the sprint and ensuring it is setup for success.

▪ Decide who should attend the sprint (Eng, PM, UX, Mkting)

▪ Who should give lightning talks?

▪ Create a pre-read list of materials sprinters need to consume (especially your research)

▪ Set the sprint challenge & set expectations / deliverables.

▪ See here for planning advice

Understand Phase

Lightning Talks : Bring in speakers who can illuminate the topic, have important perspectives to be considered.This is where you need to utilise your research.User sessions : Bring in users to illuminate your research.

How Might We’s : As the talks are happening get your sprint team to create HMW, and cluster them after the lightning talks are over.

Understand PrototypeSketch Decide Validate

Understand Phase

What does a How Might We look like?

We then share & cluster HMW’s to highlight areas of opportunity.

How Might We

Make finding out about what is on at the UXPA conference super simple

Sketch

Crazy 8’s : Crazy 8’s is a core sprint method. It’s a fast sketching exercise that challenges people to sketch 8 ideas in 8 minutes (not 8 variations of 1 idea or 8 steps of 1 idea, but 8 distinct ideas).May also require storyboarding

Voting : After everyone has finished the Crazy 8’s exercise, it’s time for each team member to share the ideas they have generated and discuss with the group.

Understand PrototypeSketch Decide Validate

Activity time

Create 8 individual ideas, that will help answer your sprint challenge

10 mins

Share your crazy 8’s with your team

Sharing : take your teammates through your ideas.

2 mins per person

Dot vote

Individually dot vote on the 3 most compelling ideas by voting on the specific sketches (not the entire paper).

5 mins

Decide

Decision matrix : If the team can’t come to a clear consensus after Dot Voting, you can use a Decision Matrix. The matrix is a simple table or diagram that helps the team judge all the ideas based on a set of criteria that is most useful for the goals of the sprint.

Feasability

Impa

ct to

the

user

Understand PrototypeSketch Decide Validate

Prototype & test

Prototype : You are building just the minimum of what you need to make the prototype real enough to take into testing with users.

Validate : Watching your users try out the prototype is the best way to discover major issues with your design, which in turn lets you start iterating immediately.

Understand PrototypeSketch Decide Validate

Recap

Understand PrototypeSketch Decide Validate

Crazy 8’s Dot votingUser needs mapping

Resources

▪ Google Design Sprint KIT which includes case studies▪ Google ventures Design Sprint

End of partContact: craigwspencer@googlemail.com

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