UX Week 2007 – Smoothing the Way: The Designer as Facilitator

Session. Jess McMullin. Slides.

Value-centered design. The intersection between business goals and user goals. It builds long-term, sustainable solutions.

Remove roadblocks. Unlock potential. Break the “Review & Approve” cycle.

Define the problem so you can define the solution. Exercise: draw a house separately. Now talk about houses and draw a house together. You came to an agreeable solution, no?

New buzz word: Backcast: Envision a goal and work backwards towards achieving it.

1-Start Earlier. Iteration 0. Do a pre-kick-off.
2-Anticipate the trough of despair.
3-Near-time turnaround. Not real-time, but near-time capture & research (basically taking notes)

Co-design
Agendas need to be surfaced
Simple. If things are too complicated, people can’t participate.
Tangible. Don’t be too specialized. Use stickies, whiteboards.
Literal. Careful how literal you are.
Evidence-Based

How do you make it happen?

Get people working together. Don’t be reluctant to expose your unfinished work. It’s a challenge, but we ned to overcome the risk of looking vulnerable. The real opportunity is working at a small level and working efficiently. Start with yourself.

Peel back the layers. Get through the what and into the why.

Partner, Pilot, Publicize. Find a partner in crime on the business side and work with them to pilot a new wayof working. Then, let everyone know how successful it was.