The 6 Sprint Stages
The whole process is iterative, time-bounded and user focused — kind of like agile development fordesign thinking which can be used to teach design principles for new form factors in a hands on, collaborative way.
Stage 1 — Understand
Understand Objectives — Clarity on the product, user needs, the market, and technical possibilities.
Before design sprint participants can build anything, you need to understand:
- Design principles — How is this form factor different from others?
- Design challenge — What problem are you trying to solve?
- Personas — Who are you designing for?
Understand Methods
Addressing the Gap
What is the team missing at this point that’s critical? What is the riskiest decision or hypothesis you want to test with users?
For example, new projects lack a clearly defined target user group or user value proposition. This means you may have to focus the sprint on testing features against a few different groups and testing for the best fit.
Early stage products versus late stage products tend to have different “gaps.” For early stage startups, you need to first find the gap by identifying
a) Target audience
b) User value proposition
c) Use cases
Gap Analysis
If you find a gap — rejoice! You can now design the sprint to address that gap.
Competitive Analysis
How many of you have done a simple competitor analysis before the start of every project?
I believe not many do as we are afraid of facing the reality. The truth that your idea is just a sub feature of an app existing out in the market place.
Worse still , it’s just another “Me too” idea!
It’s not the most pleasant realization to discover before the start of your project but it will definitely save you lots of time and effort.
Don’t be discourage even yours is another “Me too” idea. Flipkart is the equivalent of Amazon in India.
There are many types of idea. Some are already success stories. So which category does your idea belong to?
Anyway, a brief review of 3–10 similar projects can be a great way to kick start the sprint.
For example, if the team is working on a online store experience, you might want to visit the sites, such as Google Play and list what you like and dislike.
UX Questions
Ask yourself these questions while you walk through the user journey of your competitors’ projects.
Describe its user experience, focusing on how the product makes you feel as you perform different tasks.
- the tasks you attempted
- how the product did and did not help you
- how you felt along the way
- any design elements you feel contributed to your experience