design patterns for fantabulous collaborations [ux london, april 2011]

UX London 2011 • April 2011

Kate Rutter Experience Designer, Adaptive Path

[email protected] @katerutter

Creating engagement & buy-in through participatory sessions { workshop }

Design patterns for fantabulous

collaborations


Your name!

A skill you bring !

to the room !

5 minutes


In the next 3 ½ hours...

Learn about patterns for UX Collaborative Workshops

Practice by planning an awesome collaborative session

Explore ways to plan fantabulously effective sessions.


1 } One person acts as LEADER The leader manages the group’s time.

2 } One person acts as RECORDER The recorder captures key information such as outputs and decisions.

3 } One person is the STORYTELLER The storyteller shares the work with other groups.

3 } All other participants are GROUP MEMBERS. Group members participate fully.

For each activity, rotate these roles so that everyone has a chance to participate in a new way.

F O R E A C H A C T I V I T Y

Rules of the road

Getting started


1 } Working individually, jot down 3 things you’ve seen work well in collaborative sessions. Write each on a stickynote.

2 } Now write down 3 things you’ve seen fail.

3 } Discuss as a team & sort/cluster.

4 } Identify the 3 top items in each group & write them on stickynotes.

I N S T R U C T I O N S

Activity : Mining our Experience

10 minutes

Getting started


Your guideposts Post the notes on a big flipchart page for reference.

Share your top items with the team next to you.

2 minutes

Facilitation awesome! !

Facilitation FAIL !

Team Monarchs !


Getting people to work together in a way that furthers the goals of everyone in the room.

Collaboration


Making it easier to move forward together.

Facilitation


Facilitation “ A process in which a person...who has no substantive decision-making authority diagnoses and intervenes to help a group improve how it identifies and solves problems and makes decisions, to increase the group’s effectiveness.”

~ Schwarz, Davidson, Carlson, Mckinney et al. The Skilled Facilitator Fieldbook

“Facilitation helps leaders of group process guide people through complicated collaborations, with the goal of drawing out the best of each member, sharing understanding and building commitment to the team outcomes.”

~ The Grove Consultants International Best Practices for Facilitation


Involving the people we’re serving through design as participants in the process.

Participatory Design

~ Liz Sanders, Pioneer in Participatory Design MakeTools


As a collaboration facilitator, your role is to provide a guiding star. • Help the participants do new and unfamiliar activities • Help participants work together, often with new or

unfamiliar people. • Feel confident that their contributions are important and

in support of something meaningful.

Worksessions


Fantabulous collaborations come alive with...

Worksessions

A clear purpose

The right people

Guidance through the process

Full participation

Creating meaningful outputs

Staying open


Things that work time after time.

Patterns

A pattern consists of: • A problem or situation • The context in which it happens • A proposed solution that has worked over time

* Collaboration patterns are specific to groups of people or organizational cultures.


Pattern : Opening a room UX Collaboration 101

Introductions

Needs & expectations

Skills in the room

Superpower

Human Infographics *

* Jared Spool

Activities :


Our plan of action

Practice

Purpose Why you’re there & what you need to accomplish.

People Who’s in the room, why, and what they bring.

Process The experiences and activities that will deliver the outcome.

Patterns Reoccurring solutions that work.

Tools To use for planning, making, sharing.

Basics Only critical stuff that’s unavoidable.


Our plan of action





Purpose statement The Big Picture. The biggest, broadest “why” statement.

Purpose

Experiences & perceptions


Objective for the session

What you need to accomplish in the session together.

Artifacts What you will make together. The session outputs.


The basics Purpose

Framing

What are we here to accomplish? • Ideas? • Debate? • Consensus?

What will we be doing together? • Activities? • Making things? • Generative work? • Refining work?

* Thanks to Cennydd and James

Objective for the session


The basics Purpose

Outcomes

What are we going to make? • Sketches? • Models? • Flows? • Plans?

Artifacts


Our plan of action




✓


Questions?


Our plan of action





The basics People

Outcomes

What are we going to experience? • Conversation? • Co-Creation? • Debate? • Decision-making?

What will the perceptions be? • Empathy? • Understanding? • Visibility? • Trust?

Experiences & perceptions


People

Envisioning their experiences & perceptions

Participants


Getting the right group and the right-size group.

Identifying attributes and hypothesizing about behavior.


Basics: Getting the right group People

Who needs to be in the room?

• People responsible for the results

• People responsible for making the thing

• People whose work is impacted by the decisions

Most often informed by organizational roles • Decision-making responsibility • Operational responsibility • Design responsibility


Basics: Getting the right group People

What’s the right-sized group? • Creating 5 – 50 exploration, representation

• Direction-setting 2 – 25 diversity, decisions

• Resolutions 3 – 10 making decisions

More than that? You’ll want separate sessions and a summarizing session.


Tool: Participant Card People

Simon Broadstreet !VP of Product Marketing!Shoes Division !

Captures key information about a potential participant in a session. It helps you remember collaborative behaviors and allows you to use card-sorting to curate worksessions.

• Likes to be involved with every step.!• Yellow-Pen person!• Advocate for UX!• Hard to schedule time with (3+ weeks out)!

Name Title Area

Helpful tidbits


Tool: Participant Archetypes People

* http://www.tompeters.com/cool_friends/content.php?note=010280.php

Dan Roam’s Pen people

Black pen “Hand me the pen” They jump up and draw or write.

Yellow pen “I can’t draw, but...” They add to, highlight and annotate existing work.

Red pen They sit back saying nothing until frustration hits, then they overwrite everything with a red pen. The hard-core, left-brain, business analytic type is often a red pen.


Tool: Participant Archetypes People

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_Thinking_Hats http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTED_07.htm

de Bono’s Six Thinking Hats ®

Considers “what are the facts?”

Yellow hat

Black hat

Red hat

White hat

Green hat

Blue hat

States feelings and emotions, listens to instincts and gut reactions.

Points out flaws and barriers and applies logic to seek inconsistencies

States positive elements, identifies benefits and seeks harmony.

Makes contributions that are provocative and investigating, seeing where a thought goes.

Thinks about thinking.


Tool: Participant Spectrums People

Mapping the Attributes

Thinking Making

Planning-oriented Action-oriented

Hands-on Direct / delegate

Extroverted Introverted

Risk-averse Adventurous

Work in a team Work solo

Simon

Broadstreet !


1 } Working individually, create cards for potential collaborators at your work. Assign them a colored-pen archetype (Dan Roam.) Aim for 3 cards.

2 } As a team, share your cards and look for similarities and themes.

3 } Identify 2 über-archetypes, and create a new Participant card for each.


Activity : Make Participant Cards

15 minutes

People

Simon Broadstreet !

VP of Product Marketing!

Shoes Division !

• Likes to be involved with every step.!

• Yellow-Pen person!

• Advocate for UX!

• Hard to schedule time with (3+ weeks out)!


Your participants Introduce your 2 über-archetypes to the team next to you, and meet their über-archetypes.

2 minutes

Simon Broadstreet !

VP of Product Marketing!

Shoes Division !

• Likes to be involved with every step.!

• Yellow-Pen person!

• Advocate for UX!

• Hard to schedule time with (3+ weeks out)!

Eleanor Rigby!Information Architect!Apparel Team !• Quiet and observant!• Black pen person!• Yellow-hat !• Structured thinker, uncomfortable with !

ambiguity !


It’s really about this... People


Pattern : Group dynamics UX Collaboration 101

Rules of engagement

Activity within the first 10 minutes (5 is better)

Roles

Grouping people, changing groups

Confidencing

Activities :


Our plan of action




Simon Broadstreet !VP of Product !

• Likes to be involved with every step. !

✓


Questions?


Breaktime!

15 minutes


Our plan of action





Process


Experiences & Activities What activities are we going to do? • Design Studio? • Mental Model? • Stickynote clustering? • Sketchboards?

Artifacts What output are we going to make? • Sketches? • Models? • Flows? • Plans?


Process

Artifacts


Purpose

People

Activities


Basics: Finding effective activities Process

Top go-to books



Top go-to-next books



Other inspirations

IDEO Method Cards http://www.ideo.com/work/method-cards

Grove Strategic Visioning Agenda Planning Kit http://store.grove.com/product_details.html?productid=4



Old Faithfuls, the melba-toast of participatory sessions

Design Sprints : Rapid ideation and concepting 1 – 2 weeks

Sketchboards : Sketching + review activities ½ day to 1 week

Design Studio : Sketching workshops ½ day to 3+ days



Old Faithfuls, the melba-toast of participatory sessions

Dot-voting

Stickynote Freelisting + Cluster


Pattern : Templates UX Collaboration 101

Print & provide

Have participants draw them / make them

Activities :


Tool: Activity Framework Process


Tool: Activity Framework Process

Helps identify and capture effective activities for group work. Highlights target areas for participatory group work. Use this to jot down potential activities and their role in the session.

Sweet spots for participatory activities

Scaffolding for the session

Session info


Tool: Session Planning Template Process

Helps capture all the knowledge to date. Provides a place to see the whole session in one view. Supports logistical planning and time-boxing.

Sketch out the timing in blocks.

Session info

Fill in what you already know.

Jot down activity descriptions

Identify estimated next steps


Pattern : Timing Issues UX Collaboration 101

Break planning

Time to share

Transition time

Rolling outputs

Activities :


Pattern : Share-outs UX Collaboration 101

Partner pairs : people or tables

Pitch

Volunteer groups

Round robins

Gallery tour

Activities :


Our plan of action




✓


What it looks like Process


Questions?


Let’s put it all together.


Today’s scenario You’ve been invited to lead a new, big project for your company, an athletic gear retailer. The new initiative is to create an online training program people new to running.

You have 1 week to come up with a plan that everyone can get behind.

Your strategy needs to answer: • What’s the product called? • What are the key experiences it delivers? • How will it make money? • What will it look like? • What features will you launch with?


Today’s scenario Some Givens: The Purpose is: Create an online training program people new to running in

order to better support new customers and to build a new product revenue stream.

The Objective is: [pick one]

Strategy: Define the strategy and key elements of the offering, including: • Core features for V1 launch • Illustrations of key moments in the experience • Potential revenue models.

Design: Illustrate key elements of the offering, including: • Key interactions for V1 launch • User flows • 3 options for the Home Page, including content and layout


1 } Working as a group and using all the tools at your disposal, plan a worksession for a day-long product planning/design collaboration.

2 } As a team, choose either the strategy or the design workshop to plan.

3 } Come up with the artifacts and a workshop plan for the collaborative session.

3 } For the people, Use the Participant Cards that you developed earlier.


Activity : Plan a Worksession

30 minutes

All together now


Your Worksession Update: The CEO has asked you to give a pitch of the workshop plan to the entire board. Today.

You have 3 minutes to make your team look like rock stars.

Pitch to the team at the next table.

6 minutes


Pattern : Capture Outputs UX Collaboration 101

In-flight blackbox

Photography

Group summary

Activities :


Our plan of action




✓ Simon Broadstreet !VP of Product !

• Likes to be involved with every step. ! ✓ ✓


To foster open, participatory processes that enable teams to work together more effectively, more enjoyably and more honestly, so that they can deliver inspired products to the world.

The real goal


To foster open, participatory processes that enable teams to work together more effectively, more enjoyably and more honestly, so that they can deliver inspired products to the world.

The real goal

PURE

AWESOME


I Hate Sports But I Love Kickoffs. Presentation, IA Summit 2010; Kevin Hoffman, Happy Cog http://www.slideshare.net/kevinmhoffman/i-hate-sports-but-i-love-kickoffs-how-to-create-a-successful-project-culture-from-the-first-meeting

Discombobulation, Fire-Breathing Dragons and Wet Noodles: Creating Productive Workshops in Scary Situations Presentation, IA Summit 2011; Beth Koloski http://www.slideshare.net/bkoloski/discombobulation

Good Design Faster Design Workshop Adaptive Path, Brandon Schauer & Leah Buley,; 2009 http://www.slideshare.net/webwallflower/good-design-faster-slides-failcon-2010

Towards an ontology of collaboration patterns. Jonas Pattberg, Matthias Fluegge; 2007 http://subs.emis.de/LNI/Proceedings/Proceedings120/gi-proc-120-007.pdf

IDEO Method Cards http://www.ideo.com/work/method-cards/

Liz Sanders, Participatory Design; http://www.maketools.com/

The Grove Consultants; www.grove.com

Readings & Reference Rapid Problem Solving with Post-it® Notes David Straker, 1997

Gamestorming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers Dave Gray, Sunni Brown & James Macanufo; 2010

Best Practices for Facilitation David Sibbet, The Grove, 2005

Innovation Games Luke Hohmann; 2006

The Back of the Napkin Dan Roam; 2008; http://www.thebackofthenapkin.com

Visual Meetings : How Graphics, Sticky Notes & Idea Mapping Can Transform Group Productivity David Sibbet; 2010

Undercover User Experience Design Cennydd Bowles & James Box; 2011

A Pattern Language Christopher Alexander, Sarah Ishikawa & Murray Silverstein; 1977; http://www.patternlanguage.com/


thanks! Selected slides from the deck

will be on slideshare at: www.slideshare.net/intelleto

Kate Rutter, Experience Designer [email protected] www.adaptivepath.com twitter : @katerutter @adaptivepath

Credits to Leah Buley for selected sketches and to the Adaptive Path folks who shared their project work.


Resources


T H E C R E A T I V E P R O C E S S!

Collaboration planning : handy terms & concepts

Purpose !The big picture. What are we trying to accomplish in the broad sense. What does this effort serve?

Objective !Action plan for the session. What are we trying to accomplish today. What are the outcomes of our time together?

Artifacts !What will we create together?

Patterns !Recurring themes for how our organization collaborates best. Often dependent on specific people and personalities at first, but over time can become how the organizational culture behaves in general.!

GENERATIVE! EVALUATIVE!Creation of ideas, concepts, thinking outputs. Focus on possibilities, exploration, openness and quantity of outputs.

Mindset:!• Oriented!• Critique!• Analytical!• Clear!• Results-driven

Examples: Increase customer loyalty through social media. Increase real-time sales data by design & building an iPad app for our sales force.!

Examples: Sketch possible social media interactions. Identify data and tasks for iPad features.

Examples: sketches, mind maps, lists, models....

Refinement, synthesis, evaluation and prioritization. Focus on refinement, directions and quality of outputs. !

Mindset:!• Open!• Generative!• Synthesis!• Exploratory!• Free of constraints


K E Y!

Collaboration planning : handy terms

Frame !As in, framing the problem. Set the context for the session. Give the purpose, the big picture and a high-level view of the process. Follow with the objective for the session.!

Inform !Deliver information. Could be background on the problem or challenge, known needs or constraints.!

Expose !Introduce new and unfamiliar information. This could be prior work done, new concepts or terminology. Anything that might be unfamiliar to people.!

Educate !Teach. Use sparingly. Teaching tends to blend into preaching, and shifts the dynamic of the session from collaborative to presentation.!

Instruct !Used specifically in collaboration sessions to mean giving instructions for an activity. !

Brainstorm !Opening up ideas. Follow the rules of brainstorming. It makes a big difference in how it goes.!

Explore, !Any activity that is a means of making. Tangible, visible methods work much better than open conversation.!

Synthesize !Combining ideas and revealing patterns and themes. Difficult for a new group to do, but very powerful when done together. Often needs guidance.!

Prioritize !Ordering items by importance. Every prioritization activity needs a criteria to guide the process.!

Summarize !Wrapping it up clearly and concisely and connecting to what comes next.!

!

✓

✓

✓

✓

Talk !When a facilitator or session leader is speaking.!

Discuss !Conversation in the group. Most important way to share thinking, but can easily get out of hand. Group discussion: The whole group Distributed discussion: Breakout groups. Need to keep in mind that each group will have itʼs own experience.!

Make !The creation of things, making of ideas. Tangible, hands-on methods work best. Depending on the group, making can be independent, group-informed or co-created.!

Decide !Make decisions. Dot-voting is your friend.!Capture !Document & sharing the contributions,

insights, ideas, decisions and process. Crucial to developing trust in participatory activities, tracking progress, identifying collaboration patterns and articulating results. !create &

refine

!

✓

✓ !

✓

!

The collaboration sweet spot. Areas that set the stage and guide participation. Focus time & effort here.!

Important to do well. Keep clear and concise.!

Common traps. Things that undermine full participation and group action.


Collaborative Session Template

P R O C E S S!P U R P O S E! P E O P L E!

t i m e l i n e!

P A T T E R N S!

l e a r n i n g s!

N E X T S T E P S!

s e s s i o n n a m e & d a t e!

o b j e c t i v e!

a r t i f a c t s!

+

-


TALK!

A C T I V I T Y!

Inform!

Expose!

Educate!

Instruct(directions, etc.)!

Brainstorm!

Explore, create & refine ideas!

Synthesize!

Prioritize!

Summarize!

DISCUSS! MAKE! DECIDE! CAPTURE! R O L E!

!

✓

✓

✓

✓

Frame!

Collaborative Session Activity Framework


! ✓ ✓ !


TALK!

A C T I V I T Y!

DISCUSS! MAKE! DECIDE! CAPTURE! R O L E!

Collaborative Session Activity Planning Framework


! ✓ ✓ !


How might we...!

What about this could be true?!

What would be the impact of this? What would change as a result?!

Letʼs take 10 minutes and draw out what that could look like.!

Why?! (and why?)! (and why?)! (and why?)! (and why?)!

Letʼs not be afraid to talk about the risks.!

Thank you for your candor.!

Let me make sure that I understand what you mean. (then summarize)Is that correct?!

What are your thoughts? (to a participant who has yet to contribute.)!

What would increase confident in this choice?!

Letʼs flip it around. What are 3 ways we can ensure this fails?!

Jedi Mind Tricks : Amazingly helpful statements for collaborative sessions.

design patterns for fantabulous collaborations [ux london, april 2011]

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