This document discusses the challenges and lessons learned from a UX designer's experience working on a remote team to develop an MVP within a 60 day deadline. It describes how the designer initially planned to follow agile and lean methodologies but found they did not work well. Through collaborating with the team by sharing ideas and prototypes, they were able to quickly create concepts and a functional prototype. This unexpected process led to positive feedback, new customers, and transformed the company culture into one focused on empathy.
5. • UX isn’t being done “the right
way”. Where’s the user
research?
My product manager and/or team
doesn’t understand UX.
What do you mean the deadline is
tomorrow?!
7. • Yeah, but there’s a reason why
the filter is supposed to filter.
• No. Why would our customers
want to automatically buy this
without them confirming they
want it?
• A journey map is important,
that’s why I’m working through
lunch.
8. We know what needs to
be done for our
customers and their user
experience.
9. so we go ahead and explain
user experience to the
product teams, and set
expectations of what needs to
happen in steps moving
forward.
23. None of these are 100% correct,
nor will they get you to where you
need to go 100% of the time. If
anything, they’re guidelines. What
is needed is a base foundation
36. “We ALWAYS perform some
kind of analysis first.
ALWAYS. We need to
understand our users first.”
37. “Card sorting, mind mapping,
journey mapping, creating
personas, Emotion maps,
user feedback maps. You
name it!”
38. What if I told you that you could
jump straight into a real working
prototype with out having to
perform analysis, and know
exactly what you’re building?
39. “I’d say you’re crazy. But
what about scope? You still
have to collect requirements
and scope out the product.”
55. …Why Can’t the developer
white board, the business
guy come up with a good
design idea and maybe a
coding solution….
56. ….Why not you, as
UX, decide to help
plan a business road
map?
57. When we look at a process, we
as UX experts should not be
thinking only of our process, and
our rules that fit within our own
vision when trying to drive
execution of a project.
58. • We should understand the end goal of the MVP
The affect it will have on our user base
The Journey getting there
Which helps us understand each others languages
Makes us both adaptive and empathetic every step of the
way.
59. It’s about creating a
MVP and Iterating on
that MVP until you’ve
reached the goal set.
68. Things that will always be the same
when iterating over a MVP
• Living and Breathing designs, documents, and
prototypes
• Story Telling
• Empathy
• Discovery
• Receiving Stakeholder and User Feedback
• Your Expertise
69. “Alright, so what about the
MVP end goal and the
user need? Those would
stay the same too, right?”
72. Which means you change,
your team changes, your
process changes, your roles
might even change a little bit.
73. You are forced to become adaptive,
and when you adapt, you
automatically become empathetic
because you’re already thinking
about the users new need.
74.
75. This is why the users
need should drive the
MVP, and drive the team.
96. Sure, I could have easily prototyped
this out, on my own. But I realized
that in order to create a solid product,
listening to my team first … having
empathy was key… in order to reach
that success.
97. So I asked Rachel Weissman, another designer
on my team..
“What are your thoughts on the home
page of the Sonder site?”
98. I wasn’t sure what else to
start with since I had already
mapped out a lot of the app,
but figured she may know
something that I don’t.
99. She responded with..
“Oh! I already have something created, but
I would love to get your thoughts on this
too.”
122. I think this is great. We know
how important the experience
is when it comes to having
happy customers.
Business to Design
Having customers are key.
You guys have done well with
this.
123. Back-end Development to Design
Thanks for this, I think it’s
something that we need.
Especially so we know this
will scale over time.
124. Front-end Development to Design
This is great! This paints a
better picture for us when
working on the front-end.
131. That would be really good if
we could have something
more to show. Anything helps
when trying to win customers.
Business to Development
Hey that’s a great idea! We
actually have a demo to a new
potential customer.
132.
133. Design to Development & Business
Well, why not? Nothing hurts
more than to just try it. Hey,
maybe we could just create some
hi-fidelity blue sky concepts too,
just to engage them?
134. Sean, we actually need the dashboard re-
designed, could you use that as your blue
sky concept? We also need a University
Profile page, and a type of marketing
based page, for the universities.
Business to Design
That would be awesome! We
would love to see what you
come up with!
135. Internal Design discussion
That sounds great! I’ll do it tonight!
Rachel, would you like to do the
university profile page and the
marketing page?
Sure! It sounds like fun! I would
love to put my own blue sky
concept on it and see what we
come up with.
136. We had gone completely out of any
kind of process. What about User
Research? What about sketching?!
What about my project tracking!
174. The User Experience does not
belong to a process, a business
decision, a CEO, a Product
Owner, A Principal Architect, or an
over bearing designer with some
crazy ego, who’s full of pride.
184. Credits - Thank you for
helping make this happen.
Brian Sullivan
Jayneil Dalal
Chris Moezzi
Jarrod Ausborne
Michael Flatt
Rachel Weissman
David Mathews
Eric Cornelius
Jason Snodgrass
Rob McDiarmid
Mackenzie Taylor