DESIGN SPRINT
Kickoff
To kickoff the design sprint, part of Icalia’s team and MonMex’s team had a short meeting to introduce each other. In this meeting it was also explained what is a design sprint, how it works and what would be the deliverable at the end of the sprint, as well as the follow up steps after the sprint.
Day 1 - MAP
Map out the problem and pick an important area to focus.
Ask the experts + “How Might We”
The first activity of day 1 consisted of interviewing experts from MonMex, listening to what they had to say and capture HMWs when hearing something interesting.
The interviews with the experts were one by one, each session was 30 minutes long, and the facilitator (in this case the project manager) led the conversation and conducted most of the questions. There were 4 people capturing the answers of the experts into HMWs, 2 stakeholders from the MonMex team, 1 product designer and me (lead product designer).
These are the HMWs collected from the sessions with the experts:
Organize HMWs
The second activity of day 1 was to prioritize and organize the HMWs in categories. For this, we took our HMWs and organized them in categories.
After the HMWs were organized, we voted on the opportunities we considered the most important. Each person had 5 votes.
In the following image the categories in which the HMWs were organized can be seen, as well as the top 3 most voted HMWs.
Goals
The third activity of day 1 included determining what were the short term and long term goals after we finished the design sprint.
We separated the goals by time, goals in 6 months, 1 year and 5 years. And after that we voted on the one that we considered the most important in each time frame.
These are the most voted goals:
Make a map
The last activity of day 1 consisted in combining our ideas into one single flow. For that we took our most voted HMWs and arranged them and complemented them in a flow that made sense.
After having the flow we voted on one target customer and one event that would represent the main focus on the experience.
Day 2 - IDEATE
Sketch out competing solutions on paper.
Lighting demos
The first activity of day 2 was to look for great solutions (similar to what we were trying to solve) from a range of companies. Capture good ideas with some screenshots and add any thoughts with sticky notes.
During this activity the team reviewed a wide variety of solutions, not only single screens but full flows from some companies.
Solution Sketches
The rest of the day we worked on the solution sketches. To get to them we started by getting some sheets of paper and writing down notes about what was on our brain regarding the problem. The notes were personal and were not shared.
Following the notes we did the crazy 8 activity, each person sketched 8 ideas, 1 per minute. This activity was really fun to do with the team because of the time limitation. The crazy 8s results were not shared.
After these two small activities it was time to work on the actual solution sketches. Everybody on the team dedicated 45 min to work on their solution sketches, one solution per sheet of paper, and the concept had to be super clear and self explanatory. The sketches were shared the following day.
Day 3 - DECIDE
Make decisions and turn your ideas into a testable hypothesis.
Art museum + Speed critique
We started day 3 by taking 20 min to look at all the concepts on the solution sketches silently. After the 20 min we created a heatmap by adding dots to the ideas we liked. There was no limit on the number of dots we could use.
Following the heatmap the team discussed standout ideas in a structured way.
Divide winners from “maybe-laters.”
It was time to move the sketches with the most votes together and decide if they fitted in a single prototype.
The team decided that the sketches fitted together and moved on adding more sketches to build a more complete prototype draft.
Use a TASK to plan your prototype
The third activity of day 3 was to plan the prototype by creating a task flow. We started by defining the goals, then deciding the opening scene for that goal and at the end deciding the steps needed to get to the goal.
Fill out the storyboard
The last activity of day 3 consisted in using the task flow and the solution sketches to complete our storyboard and be ready to create the prototype.
To start we took the flow step by step and separated them. Then we took the solution sketches and paired them with the step they fitted the best. We also added some additional steps.
Day 4 - PROTOTYPE
Hack together a realistic prototype.
Prototype
As a designer, day 4 was the day to shine. Me and the other designer focus the whole day on designing the screens required for the flow and connecting them to build the prototype.
Me and the other designer working on this project kicked-off the prototyping day with a short meeting to align our ideas, decide how we were going to proceed and divide the work.
We started by defining our UI kit (colors, fonts, logos, buttons, navigation bar, etc.) on Figma so we could work faster and our design would match. After that we went on our own way to work on the screens assigned to each of us.
Communication was key during this process. Each of us was mostly on our own but if we had questions we were always available for each other on slack and if it was necessary we jumped on quick calls.
After all day working on the screens assigned we had a meeting to pair-prototype all the screens and see if anything was missing.
We ended up with a prototype consisting of +40 screens that showcased the main flow perfectly.
Day 5 - TEST
Get feedback from real live users.
User testing
During the first part of day 5 the team met to prepare a guide for the user testing interviews. The facilitator was the one leading the user interviews and the designers participated as note takers, to hear feedback on the prototype first hand and also to troubleshoot if it was necessary.
We interviewed 5 people, all of them were current MonMex clients. The user testing consisted of giving them tasks and asking them to think out loud while performing the tasks. At the end we asked for additional feedback or any concerns.
User feedback
We collected the user feedback and ordered it by screen.
SPRINT END
The following Monday the team had a meeting to present the results of the design sprint and to discuss the following steps.
During that following week me and the other designer worked on refinements to the prototype implementing the feedback from the user testing. At the same time the facilitator worked with project managers and developers on the user story mapping.
At the end of that week we presented the final prototype.
