This talk presents the design sprint, a 4-day process for structuring innovation while accounting for user, business and technology needs. Born in Google and based on design thinking, it relies on a tight coupling between an idea and the data that allow to verify or discard it, ensuring that a product does at the same time match the business needs of the company and the needs of the final user. The advantages of this approach include a quick validation of new ideas before committing to a strategic project, the alignment of different stakeholders on the objectives and challenges to be faced, a structuring of creative thinking through visual representation, and an iterative verification of actionable outcomes.

1. DESIGNSPRINT
FAST PROBLEM-SOLVING THROUGH COLLABORATION
SILVIA BORDIN, PHD

2. Design sprint
4-day process developed in Google
Ventures that leads to the rapid
validation of an idea (improving a
service, creating new products,
redesigning a process…) before
starting a strategic project

3. design thinking = people + technology + business

4. TYPICALPROBLEMSADDRESSED
Cross-functional teams
fi
nding it hard to align with common business objectives
Teams working towards unclear goals
as project scope changes repeatedly
Teams lacking real data to ground business decisions,
instead relying on endless internal discussions / meetings
Teams pressured to be ‘innovative’ but not knowing where to start
Exceedingly long product development cycles,
causing teams to lose enthusiasm and focus

5. Why a
Design Sprint?
quick validation of new ideas before
investing in an actual project
alignment of stakeholders on the
objectives and challenges to be faced
structuring of creative thinking mainly
through visual representation
iterative veri
fi
cation of actionable
outcomes

6. THURSDAY
Use feedback from
testing to create
clear next steps
Test the prototype
with 5 real users
WEDNESDAY
Recruit users and
schedule tests
Design and build
the Prototype
TUESDAY
De
fi
ne the
prototype with
a storyboard
Curate and vote on
best solutions
MONDAY
Produce a mass
of solutions
De
fi
ne the
challenge
WORKSHOP
WORKSHOP
(usually in 2 iterations)
DESIGNSPRINT:THESTRUCTURE

7. De
fi
ne the
Challenge
1. Expert Interviews
-> HMWs
2. Long-Term Goals
and questions
3. Map
Produce
Solutions
1. Lightning Demos
2. Concept Sketching
MONDAY

8. Expert Interview
(HMW = How Might We…?)

9. Map
(customer journey as-is)

10. Lightning Demos
Lightning Demos help you frame the problem you are addressing
through a comparison with similar situations without jumping into a speci
fi
c solution
solving the right problem > solving the problem right

11. 11
Concept sketching
(in steps)

12. Vote on
Solutions
1. Heat Map
2. Solution
Presentation
3. Voting
Create
Storyboard
1. User Test Flow
2. Storyboarding
TUESDAY

13. 13

14. Market requires addressing digital transformation to continuously adapt to change, making
decisions fast, and continuous improvement and delivery
Design sprint offers a key, versatile instrument to manage and drive this evolution
It adapts the principles of design thinking to the time constraints of modern organisations,
providing a valuable and standardised process to validate the viability of an idea by
accounting for different stakeholders and before investing in a full-
fl
edged project
The approach can be applied to different sectors and bring fast, shared innovation in the
company at different levels (software, business, and organisation) while reconciling
the needs of users, the potential of technology, and the requirements of business.
INCONCLUSION