More with Less: Make Better Products by Making Companies Better

When the volume of design projects steadily grows while your team's capacity remains constant, traditional design processes fall apart. You find yourself agonizing over which projects to favor and which to neglect, which corners to cut, and which precious few fundamentals to defend.

It doesn't have to be this way.

Using stories from real teams, I'll explore how overworked designers have successfully broken free from the daily grind, reinvented themselves as design facilitators and coaches, and taught their companies to practice better design at all levels.

Attendees will leave with a new way of looking at their roles within their companies, a set of collaborative design techniques and methods to explore, and a renewed belief that they can help their companies deliver good design for all projects.

Presented on March 25, 2012, at IA Summit 2012 in New Orleans, LA.

Transcript

1. Will Sansbury Making better products by making companies better #MoreWithLess @willsansbury w@willsansbury.com MORE WITH LESS IA Summit 2012
2. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess Too much work, too little time CHANCES OF SUCCESS WORK YOU NEED TO DO WORK YOU CAN DO PIT OF DESPAIR
3. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess Natural response is to lighten the design process http://www.flickr.com/photos/mashleymorgan/3862015468/
4. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess Kill the churn http://www.flickr.com/photos/brantley/5173052778/
5. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess ❝The bigger risk for most startups is building something nobody wants.❞ Ash Maurya in Running Lean: Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works
6. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess Clarity of WHO
7. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess WHO: Red flags Scope ballooned as edge cases were discovered Features were justified by anecdotes from a single customer ❝Yeah, I can imagine somebody wanting that some day...❞ ❝Personas? I think Marketing did some.❞
8. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess WHO: Solution Ad-hoc persona workshop Value alignment over accuracy
9. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess Clarity of WHAT http://www.flickr.com/photos/atbaker/2947641919/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/khawkins04/5303966478/
10. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess WHAT: Red flags Project leads couldn’t agree on priorities Requirements were poorly articulated, with too much information implied or omitted Team was easily bogged down in debates about design What we built didn’t match what we designed and didn’t meet project objectives
11. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess WHAT: Solution Product principles A set of explicit agreements to guide design and implementation trade-offs
12. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess Clarity of WHY
13. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess WHY: Red flags Estimate was much larger than anticipated Semantic arguments about requirement details were frequent Requirements were interpreted extremely literally Team’s user-centric focus atrophied Team lacked heart, drive, passion
14. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess WHY: Solutions Product or release charter Get goals agreed to, written down, and consistently visible to the team ❝We’ll know we’re successful when...❞
15. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess When a team understands WHO, WHAT, and WHY, they will create value in less time.
16. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess When it comes to strategy, how can you move from consumer to collaborator?
17. Will Sansbury #MoreWithLess Thank you! Will Sansbury @willsansbury w@willsansbury.com