People Over Process: Turning Assumptions into shared understanding

Every project is based on a number of assumptions. Assumptions about our users and assumptions that our team has a shared vision of what we are building and why we are building it. The longer we hold onto these assumptions, the greater we increase the risk of not meeting our users needs and ultimately, our project fails.

This talk will be about how we ensure we are meeting our users needs. In addition to learning project workflow, we will cover specific techniques that you can use to ensure that the user is at the center of our design and that you create a shared understanding among your team.

Transcript

1. Thank you for helping refresh the Baltimore tech community since January 2013!
4. MICHAEL JOVEL - @MJOVEL JAVIER RIOS - @JAVIERIOS PEOPLE OVER PROCESSES: TURNING ASSUMPTIONS INTO SHARED UNDERSTANDING
10. AFPIMS American Forces Public Information Management System
11. 3 Years + $$$ = ???
13. 2008 2010
16. Waterfall Document Design Develop Test Launch
17. Exhaustive Specifications
18. History of the World Part I
20. That Is Not What They Wanted
21. Everyone has a plan 'till they get punched in the mouth. Iron Mike Tyson
23. http://visual.ly/lean-startup
24. MVP Minimum Viable Product
25. The version of a product that brings the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort. MVP
26. MVP Minimum Valuable Product
27. M P Minimum Lovable Product
28. LDP Least Dreadful Product
29. ITERATION
30. Where Do We Start?
31. Focus On The Problem
32. The Answer Is Yes. Now What Is The Question?
33. “People don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill. They want a quarter-inch hole.” - Theodore Levitt
34. Create A Sign-Up Form Instead of: Outcome Increase User Subscriptions
35. Redesign Report A Problem Page Instead of: Outcome Reduce the amount of time it takes for a user to report an adverse event with medical products
36. Hypothesis
37. A Tentative Assumption Made In Order To Draw Out And Test Its Logical Or Empirical Consequences merriam-webster
38. Why Hypothesis • Rather than make assertions it puts forth a question which must be validated • Engages Team Creativity
39. Risk • What assumptions do you have that if proven false will cause your solution to fail?
40. Basic Hypothesis We Believe ___________ and if this is true we should see __________
41. Prioritize
42. Get Out Of The
    Building
44. Low Inventory
45. http://www.carolinabarcode.com/choosing-barcode-inventory-software-a-45.html
46. Design Idea Inventory • high number of unvalidated design ideas leads to large deliverables • leads to lag in production as team awaits deliverables • maximizes the risk as there more time between creation and validation
47. Pattern Libraries
48. Pattern Library • Library of UI Patterns that developers can use (i.e. buttons, fields, etc. • Library of UI Components composed of multiple patterns (i.e. forms, video player, etc.)
49. http://patternry.com/ http://rizzo.lonelyplanet.com/styleguide/
50. Focus On Experience Instead Of Just UI
51. Helps Developers When Prototyping
52. http://styletil.es/
53. http://danielmall.com/articles/rif-element-collages/
54. Design Studio
55. http://designforamericayale.wordpress.com/
56. Supplies • Butcher paper, painters tape, sharpies and stop watch, grid template sheets • Build small 3-4 person teams composed of designer, developers and business team. • Give each team a persona to focus on
57. http://500px.com/Twitter
58. Sketch • 8-10 minutes to sketch individually • Could be flow diagrams, wireframes, etc.
59. Individual Pitch • 3 minutes to pitch team
60. Critique • Each member lists 1 or 2 ways in which sketch achieves goal • Each member Lists 1 or 2 ways in which sketch fails to achieve goal
61. Team Sketching • Team takes 10 minutes to iterate on best aspecs of Sketch
62. Team Pitch • Team selects one member to pitch teams solution to larger team
63. http://500px.com/Twitter
64. That Is Great But We Are A Distributed Team
66. http://popapp.in
67. http://www.fiftythree.com/paper
68. Ux Is Not A Department, Agency Or Team Role
69. Raise Unicorns
71. Unicorn? Mythical user experience designer with an advanced and adaptive skill range. Outstanding skills in graphic design, rapid prototyping, front end development, user testing, technical specifications, marketing and branding. It does not have an opinion, it has a process, and will harmonize with any environment.
 http://uxunicorn.com/
72. Promote Code Literacy
73. Literacy Is Not Fluency
74. Promote Design Literacy
75. The days of designers simply pushing pixels are long gone. Leading design means building a design culture, designing for the future, and adapting constantly.
76. Designers need to help build a company culture that values design by not only producing a well designed product but by helping other team members understand and respect design.
77. –Stewart Scott-Curran, Creative Mornings “The designers that actively seek out opportunities to contribute and influence other areas of the company become the leaders regardless of title. They are the people that others look to when problems arise or if an expert opinion is required”
78. Promote Business Literacy
79. Designers need to get better at articulating their ideas through direct business communication. We need to show that our thinking is grounded in logic and produces results.
80. Learn to quickly absorb and synthesize feedback should push us to take action. We need to learn to fail fast and make adjustments
81. Pair Designing
82. Benefits Of Pair Design • Make sure designers and developers spend time working together • saves time on implementation • promotes ownership
83. http://500px.com/Twitter
85. Validation • send multi-disciplined team to meet with customer • take a copy of the MVP to visit customers • have one members lead the interview while the others observe and record
86. Where Lean UX Has Struggled
87. The Traditional Agency/ Consultancy Model Won’t Survive
88. Great products require investment across many different parts of a business, so we put a bigger effort on collaborating with our customers.
89. It doesn't change the organizational dynamics or shift the way people think about building great products.
90. Death To Agencies/ Consultants?
91. Invest clients into the work and focus on smaller deliverables to create momentum. Dedicate a small group across the entire product development cycle, thus providing value beyond just wireframe flows.
92. WORKFLOW UX Design Development
93. WORKFLOW UX Design Development
94. http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/07/23/sports/olympics/the-fastest-baton-to-the-finish-line.html?_r=0
95. EXCHANGE AREA UX Design Development
96. TAPERING UX Design Development
97. DIVERGENCE UX Design Development concept by Daniel Mall
98. DIVERGENCE
99. Don’t Get Caught Up On Process
100. “It’s easier to ask forgiveness than it is to get permission” - U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Grace Hopper
102. THANK YOU! Questions? MICHAEL JOVEL - @MJOVEL