Play, strategy and improv. UX Cambridge 2011

November 27th, 2011 Posted in agile, brainstorming, creativity, events, Experience design, mobile, presentation, sketching and drawing, Speed, strategy, UX
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Teams in my workshop present back to each other (UX Cambridge 2011)

 

UX has never been more relevant. As UX practitioners, we are being respected by absolutely EVERYONE. Here are a few reasons why…

We play well with everyone

Only a fifth of participants at my UX Cambridge workshop “Idea to prototype in just 180 minutes“, were UX designers, front end dev or usability researchers. The rest were made up of developers, graphic designers, business analysts, scientists, marketeers and business owners. People showed up to better understand how to embrace and work better with UX in order to create better experiences for their customers.

My design workshops are about having fun whilst tackling a very real problem a specific industry sector is facing. Not only do participants have to solve a surprise design challenge each time but they have to do it in newly formed teams with complete strangers. Team members have to quickly form rapport and trust quickly. There is no time for silly power plays. #JFID. Effective facilitation and pulling together cross functional, poly-skilled people to leverage strengths and surface ideas are the key to success. The person doing this (me in this case) needs to be well versed in all things awesome about UX.

Ryan Haney, Redgate Software also ran an amazing workshop, “Game on. Getting your organisation from game-zero to gaming in no time. “again around ways to think about solving problems using innovation game and play techniques. He had a Nerf gun that he used liberally if you were the last one to post up an idea. Dare I say we could run a whole day workshop together where creativity is a must and speed is of essence. Wouldn’t that be awesome!

 

UX strategy = Business strategy = success for everyone

We have the power and talent, so it is our responsibility now to better champion the customer. This means being sought after naturally to define what it is that businesses need to create at a strategic level. Over the last 2 years, my role as a Idea facilitator means getting together with business owners both external and internal to define the next generation of ideas to help them remain more than relevant and competitive in today’s fast-paced customer centric world.We are working collaboratively to suggest strategies that directly map to business KPIs, Value and their business model.

Business strategy is UX Strategy. Peter Drucker summed it up quite nicely when he wrote:

“What the customer thinks he or she is buying, what he or she considers value is decisive – it determines what a business is, what it produces, and whether it will prosper and what the customer buys and considers value is never a product. It is always a utility– that is , what a product or service does for him or her and what is value for the customer is anything but obvious.”

In the UX Cambridge Panel discussion I, Eewei Chen, also mention the role of the UX advocate:

“There are loads of advocates doing the work for us. We can see the resurgence of the power of design at a higher level. I mean, look at Apple’s Jonathan Ives- he’s a God! It’s about being strong and passionate, otherwise what’s the point?”

We need to start planting seeds everywhere and get other people to do the PR work for us. That way everything we design and build has a reason we had a hand in deciding makes sense from a business perspective which makes it sooooooooooooooo much easier to then deliver with a smile on our faces whilst making the smile on our customers and business owners faces even bigger.

Thank you Leisa Reichelt and her presentation on Strategic UX that really highlighted how relevant and well placed people like myself are now. Spiderman said it best:

“With great power comes great responsibility.”

Everyone likes a good story – but make sure they get it!

As a leader and workshop facilitator, I have to be able to make sense of the world and it’s problems. I also need to be able to engage our audience and participants. Improv as an art form, when done well, allows the story teller or stand up comic to frame events and issues that surround us in a way that it connects to their very soul. As a designer I curate experiences that allow customers to achieve their goals effectively, having learned or experienced something they enjoyed.

When brainstorming in a collaborative environment I make sure partipants understand why they are doing things each step of the way. Often the goal is good enough but to keep them truly engaged I outline the entire set of exercises at the start and clearly state why how each step allows us to progress closer to the end goal.

We take participants on a journey of discovery and help them see value by joining the dots. These step by step creative techniques help form the basis of good user centered idea generation that map to real business benefit.

Thank you Ian Fenn for his presentation “Love all the People: What UX practioners can learn from Bill Hicks” where he talks about Dieter Rams, Jonathan Ives and re-introduced me to the amazing Bill Hicks!

 

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My Agile 2011 workshop – How to design stuff that matters, fast

August 25th, 2011 Posted in agile, brainstorming, creativity, Design Jam, events, Experience design, presentation, sketching and drawing, UX
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That's me telling the best in the Agile world how to design fast!

If I had to sum up Agile 2011 in Salt Lake City, Utah in three words it would be, “Wow, wow, wow!” I was lucky enough to have been accepted to present, speak and run a 90 minute workshop at the 10 year anniversary of the signing of the Agile Manifesto.

Workshop attendees had to solve my design challenge in less than 90 minutes. The trick is, the actual challenge is not revealed till 5 minutes after the start of the workshop. With ‘surprise’ workshops like this it is vital for me to get participants to emotionally buy-in to the challenge from the very beginning in order to then successfully guide them rapidly through each step of my design ideation and creation techniques.

My workshops are very fast and furious. There is very little time to think. More importantly, though, there is, however, just enough time to be creative and make decisions in order to move on to the next creative ideation technique phase.

Here is are the workshop slides

My take on important factors when running a collaborative workshop where time is short and creativity needs to be high:

  1. Set the scene. Make it real and personal
    “New conference attendees who arrive in a foreign town away from home have limited knowledge about where to go and what they can do locally…”
  2. Surprise them. Issue the challenge and make sure it is interesting
    “Design a mobile app to help people new to Salt lake City & Utah explore all that the area has to offer from a ‘local’s’ perspective.”
  3. Let them know it can be done
    Show participants what each subsequent creative ideation technique phase is going to be. Give them an overview from start to finish. Giving them this visibility will help them understand what they need to complete to proceed to the next phase.
  4. Guide each step of the way
    I had to facilitate 6 teams in the workshop. Even though personal attention all of the time is not possible, I gave them hints and tips at each creative ideation technique phase on screen, then proceeded to walk round and act as a design ‘catalyst’; challenging ideas and creatively ‘nudging’ teams to help them move towards successfully completing each phase.
  5. Make it good not just OK
    Just because it is a 90-minute workshop where time is short does not mean the ideas need to be ‘below-par’. I always encourage participants to push their ideas harder and further. After all if you can’t do it when you are having fun (hopefully) when are you going to do it? Some participants are there to just observe and learn the techniques, which is great but I always make sure each teams knows they have to present back to each of the other teams. I find that introducing this low level of competition makes team members want to do a better job of their overall idea.
  6. Be passionate
    My workshop was a huge success and for me personally, I never tire of seeing how creative people and teams can be once they embrace and start sketching! I am so privileged and proud to have been allowed the opportunity to share the way I do things in the best possible way… by being infectious and work together with willing individuals to collectively create some thing from nothing in less than 90 minutes. I do this every day of my life. For me this way of agile creative ideation is part of my DNA and I hope has become part of all those who I have ever worked with.

Thank you to Darius Kumana, Darci Dutcher, Jeremy Sutherland, Anders Ramsay, Pat Kua, Martin Fowler and Jonathan Rasmusson as well as all other participants for making my day in Salt Lake City one of the best ever!

 

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Presentations need to focus on one specific example to get the message across more effectively

May 20th, 2011 Posted in agile, events, Experience design, presentation, usefulness
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I recently presented as a Key note speaker at the 21st Oxford Geek Night.

When I arrived, about 70 people were crammed into a very small space at the top of the Jericho Tavern in Oxford. Drinks were free (at least the first one was) then we quickly simmered down in preparation for the first talk: Styleguides for the Web, by Paul Lloyd, visual designer at Clearleft (slides).

There was a five minute break before Nick, my side-kick UI developer, and I went on stage to present 15 minutes on: Rapid prototyping: fast, continuous, informed design and development, by Eewei Chen and Nick Bailey, Experience Design at Thoughtworks (slides).

You can step through the slide above at your leisure but my biggest takeaway is that people want specific examples they can focus on and pick apart. Some feedback included:

  • Would be great to see how all this theory can be applied to one project from start to finish
  • Provide insight into lessons learned and how they were applied to improve the user experience and better meet customer goals
  • Break a project apart and show where low-fi all the way to coded more hi-fi prototypes aided user testing and ‘getting the idea across’ more efficient
  • List of tools and techniques was useful
  • Presentation was good but was too much to take in
  • Tell a story, take us through the highs and the lows, how you learned to adapt and improve for all to see
  • Live code was brave but we get it. We want to learn about where to integrate, how it was done well so we can apply it

I look forward to giving this presentation again but next time it will be focussed on one project touching upon all areas. Tell a story that everyone can follow and have key take aways and tools at the end.

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