My Process

Desk research

It starts with the KWHL table, this is where I create a research plan.

I list all the things I know about the brief or company.

Then all the things I needs to find out about, customers and competitors.

I'll research the sector for trends and behavioural patterns.

If there is a dominant user group, I'll research their behaviour online.

Stakeholder interviews

I identify a few key members of the project team to talk to.

Senior executives, Marketing stakeholders, Sales stakeholders and Engineering stakeholders are interviewed to get a feeling for the objectives and business goals the project is aiming to fulfil. After researching the company and doing competitor analysis during the desk analysis phase, I will have a series of questions I need to ask.

I'll start with

What’s your role with respect to this product?
What did you do before this?
What is this product or service supposed to be?
Who is this product for?
When is the version we’re designing going to be released?
What worries you about this project? What’s the worst thing that could happen?
What should this project accomplish for the business?
How will you, personally, define success for this project?
How would you like to be involved in the rest of the project, and what’s the best way to reach you?

Examples of User stakeholder interviews for 1Rebel

Customer interviews

I then identify the four different types of customer I need to target, they are Super users, Passive users, New users and users of another service. This will give me a broad base of customers, this will give a broad spectrum of opinions about the service.

Examples of customer interviews for 1Rebel

Personas

I'll create four personas from the interviews I've documented. One for the super user, passive user, new user and user of another service.

Personas created for Nexford University

Workshops

I base my workshops on the business model canvas, alongside a number of other lean canvas boards. I work through them with the team either onsite or remotely using real time boards. These are an essential part of the project and I use these as a way of getting the project team to work in a more collaborative way. I'll identify key revenue streams and who makes the most money from the company either from a persona or departmental point of view. This will help me and my team to identify where to focus our work. I record these workshops so nothing is missed. My role in these workshops is just to keep the clients talking by challenging or asking them to explain why they've made the decisions they have. This will then promote a more open forum for discussions between the project team.

2 Day workshop

The Lean startup canvasses

I use the business model canvasses to map the domain of the company. How each part interacts with each other. I then get the project team to fill in the canvas with all the knowledge they have about the business. Whats is the strategy for the next 6, 12 & 18 months, what KPI's we should be measuring to make the project a success. This will help the UX and design team to identify drivers for the business and create a roadmap to fulfil the business objectives.

The problem statement and defining the direction of the solution

Once the discovery stage has finished, I'll then define a selection of problem statements about the product or service,

What problem are we trying to solve?
How do we know this is a real problem?
Why is it important to solve?
Who are our users? What are their goals and motivations?
How will we know if we’ve solved the problem?

“How Might We (HMW)” questions are questions that have the potential to spark ideation sessions and brainstorms.

The 5 ‘W’s — Who, What, Where, When and Why

Who

Who uses the product
Who is driving the design request ( what are their motivations )
Who are our primary/secondary users?
Who other than our primary/secondary users might we affect?
Who does the problem affect? (i.e specific groups, organisations, customers)

What

What are the boundaries of the problem? (i.e organisational, work flow, geographic, customer, segments)
What is the current issue that require attention?
What is the ultimate goal/impact?
What are some background information that we need?
What does the end goal look like?
What would happen if we didn’t solve the problem?

When

When does the issue occur?
When does it need to be fixed?
When are we looking to plan, organise, ideate, design, prototype and ship?

Where

Where is the issue ( problem ) occurring?
Where do we need to focus on the most?

Why is it important that we fix the problem?
What impact does it have on the business or customer?
What impact does it have on all stakeholders (i.e employees, suppliers, customers, shareholders)

Why

It’s a strategy where you keep asking yourself “why” so that it helps you to dive deeper into the problem and force you to understand more and learn.

Method cards

I've found that using just the business model canvas it can be a little over whelming for customers not used to working in this manner. MethodKit is an analogue tool for meetings and workshops for idea development. It's a flexible framework you can use for any discussion these could be: goals, team, budget, roles & responsibilities. Using method cards and basing questions around these helps to keep the workshop focused and moving forward. I use two different decks. One for strategy and the other for development.

Using a MoSCoW I can steer the workshop to talk about the subjects that matter to the client.

Persuavive patterns

Kicking off ideation sessions can be difficult. I use Persuasive patterns to help teams to think of their websites or apps outside of the normal constraints inside their own industries.

Persuasive patterns help in google sprints to shortcut exploration or focus teams on ways they can approach problems.

Prototypes

Once the UX and approach is agreed, I'll create clickable prototypes.