A fun how to guide for running design sprints. Whether you are a seasoned design strategist or new to design, sprints are a must have technique for achieving speed when required.

1. Design Sprints
S p e e d i n g T h r o u g h P r o d u c t D e f i n i t i o n
Ron Gagnier, 2018

2. Finding Ron
Web: www.rongagnier.com
LinkedIn: https://ca.linkedin.com/in/rongagnier
Twitter: @rongagnier
Email: rongagnier@yahoo.com

3. Ron's Experiences

4. A Design Sprint is a rapid, repeatable process
for unpacking a problem, producing ideas,
deciding priorities, rapidly prototyping ideas
and evaluating those ideas with customers.

5. A Design Sprint used by Google Ventures
Day 1 Unpack the Problem
Sprint Planning
Action Planning
Generate Ideas
Decide on Ideas
Build a Prototype
Evaluate with Customers
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5

6. Organizing a Design Sprint:
Key Tasks
1) Find a Sprint Master!
2) Plan the sprint materials
3) Pick and invite the right people to participate
4) Locate and schedule a room
5) Schedule customers for prototype evaluation
6) Buy supplies and snacks

7. Choosing a Sprint Master:
The Key to Design Sprint Success
Cat Whisperer Shepherd Used Car Salesman

8. Sprint Materials: Your Research!
Market research
Competitive analysis
User feedback
User research
Usage analytics
Portfolio planning
Gather and Review

9. People: Pick the Right Team!
1 Sprint master *
1-2 Product managers
2 Developers
2 Designers
1 Marketing OR Sales
1 Customer support
Need a dedicated team of 6-8
Avatars courtesy of Phil Whitehouse

10. Space: Pick the Right One!
Available!!!
Comfortable (room to move around)
Well lit
Whiteboards
Wall space
Need a dedicated space

11. Customers: Schedule Early!
1-1.5hrs of time
Aware/involved in the problem
Represent your ideal user
Schedule 1-2 weeks ahead
Need 4-6 users for evaluating your prototype:

12. Let's take a closer
look at the details of
a Design Sprint

13. Day 1: Unpack the Problem
Unpack the business goals, technology
Everyone in the sprint gets 5mins to describe
what they know about the business goals and
technology
Unpack the competition
Review 3-7 competitive products and
illustrate the key features (5mins/product)
Unpack the user
The persons closest to the customers describes the
key industries with an example customer for each
(10mins/industry)

14. Day 1: Unpack the Problem - continued
Map the user's journey
Working as a team on a whiteboard, discuss and
draw a model of user's experience (30 mins)
Tell a story about the user
Break into 2 groups and craft 1-2 scenarios that
model the problem and possible goal fulfilment
Unpack your product
One person walks through the primary workflows
of your product
Recap & connect
Recap what was covered in the day and get ready for day 2

15. Day 2: Generate Ideas
Craft the message
Each person takes 3mins to craft the first social
media post about your product
Crazy 8's,
Each person sketches 8 separate panels with a
new idea in each panel, then presents each to
the team
Big Kahuna
Each person sketches 1 idea in lots of detail
What's old is new
Old ideas are presented 2mins, take 2 mins
per idea to sketch an improvement to it.

16. Day 2: Generate Ideas - continued
Storyboard sketch
Each person sketches a story board that
illustrates how a user problem is solved
Super vote
Special power is given to the product owner (typically
the product manager) to vote again for the ideas they
like best
Recap & connect
Recap what was covered in the day and get ready for Day 3
Silent critique
Each person is given voting dots and silently
applies them to ideas posted on walls

17. Day 3: Deciding on Idea(s) to Test
Gut check
Everyone needs to own up to their opinion
about what ideas move forward.
Conflict corral
During day 2 the sprint master will have
corralled ideas that conflict with one another
these need special attention to test
Prototype storyboard
White board the details of the story board
that will drive the prototype
Recap & connect
Recap what was covered in the day and get ready for Day 4

18. Day 4: Building the Prototype
Divide and conquer
Divide up the prototype work into meaningful
chunks and assign those out to the team.
Write a testing protocol
Write out the sequence of questions you will ask for
the test
Status check
Look at where you are at and what
was planned, adjust accordingly
Recap & connect
Recap what was covered in the day and get ready for Day 5

19. The Greatest Prototyping Tools EVER!!!

20. Day 5: Testing with Users
Run the tests
Walk through the concepts with the pre-scheduled
participants. Have the team observe.
Setup an observation room
Use a web collaboration tool to share screen & audio
remotely
Test run
Run through the protocol and
prototype to get some practise

21. Post Sprint: Findings, Actions
Run more design sprints?
Sometimes running a design sprint raises new
questions and issues that require doing more work.
Capture the actionable findings
Things that worked, things that didn't
Action planning
Develop a plan of what to do next. It might
include crafting a draft release plan or
scheduling additional design sprints

22. Value of Design Sprints
Fast
Inclusive
Repeatable
Accurate
Reliable
Fun
Not Simple
Requires dedicated time
Requires a committed team

24. Typical Questions
Aren't sketches too superficial, leaving necessary details out?
How does a design sprint account for technical feasibility?
How can you possibly think up meaningful ideas that
quickly?
What does this process replace?
How does this fit with Agile development?

25. Design:
Evaluate Ideas When the Cost is Low
Bill Buxton: Sketching User Experiences