If you are new to the world of workshop facilitation, you can apply some Design Thinking principles to the process itself. ), Reverse brainstormingthis is where you focus on the causes of the problem rather than the solution, Rapid ideationeach person writes down as many ideas as possible within a set timeframe, Worst ideaask everyone to come up with their worst idea to solve the problem. When running similar workshops, Ive found that contextualizing the data into human characters has helped the participants relate to the users needs. quality of your facilitation during the workshop is a determining factor of the success of your project and of your clients satisfaction. But how can we make it easier for newbies to grasp the five stages of the design thinking process and see how they can apply them in their day-to-day work? Chances are you have. When designing a workshop, or series of workshops for participants- you might suggest that their empathize stage involves designing a cake for someone outside of the workshop group. Why, or why not? But they get disappointing results. If you end up having the time to do them, they will be incredible team-building moments amongst the participants. There are different types of ground rules. In the Ideate phase weve chosen two exercises, one expansive and one focused. There are many reasons you might hold a Design Thinking workshop; perhaps you need ideas for a new product, or maybe youre looking for ways to improve an existing one. As a facilitator, you could mention that this form of research could identify with our Empathize stage, as well as our Ideate stage. However, Design Thinking is perhaps most commonly used when a problem cannot be solved using traditional methods, and needs to be approached from a more creative or innovative angle. Start by welcoming everybody to the workshop and setting expectations. Lets consider the benefits of a Design Thinking workshop in more detail. Do they need updating or even overhauling altogether?, Although the general challenge has already been identified, nows the time to get down to specifics. For example: A busy, middle-aged professional needs an easy way of meeting like-minded people in the local area. We focus on quantity, not quality and even half-baked ideas can be contributed to the discussion. For your Design Thinking workshop, ask your participants to pair up and take it in turns to play the user. Continuing with the example of LoveFoundry, our imaginary online dating service, lets consider how you might construct the empathise phase. In this section, well explore your Design Thinking workshop agenda in more detail. Most people learn by using the process in relation to a specific problem, you dont have to use the cake baking analogy. This month, were offering 100 partial scholarships worth up to $1,385 off our career-change programs To secure a spot, book your application call today! Reflection and discussion (10 minutes): As a group, discuss what youve learned so far. Someone might say, Lets bake a chocolate sponge cake, everyone likes chocolate, and a few other people nod and murmur in agreement. Ready to run a great workshop? Our rule of thumb is "3:1". Suspendisse varius enim in eros elementum tristique. There are many tactics to facilitate a workshop, which are all well documented in the many books that have been written on the subject (shoutout to. They yearn to come up with a game-changing innovation like Apples iPod, or create an entirely new category like Facebook. What goals are we missing? For details about the different steps and activities involved, see the Design Thinking process guide. Further down, youll find more information to help you with each checklist item. Design Thinking workshops should be dynamic and interactive, so its important that participants have plenty of roomespecially when it comes to the prototyping stage. Third Rule of Design Thinking Depending on the size of the challenge and the goals and needs of the individuals taking part, a workshop can take place over a few hours or up to a week if needed and is adaptable to both remote and in-person work settings. Note the inspiration doesnt have to be apples to apples with your current project. 1. Encourage Wild Ideas: Embrace the most out-of-the-box notions. For this part of the workshop, participants will need plenty of Post-it notes and a large surface to work onsuch as a table, wall, or whiteboard. Presentation (5 minutes): What is ideation? This means aligning on what is feasible by when, and drawing a line in the sand. For example: Downloads the app, creates an account, uploads a profile photo, browses through potential matches, receives a match, sends a message. The simplest way to introduce the Empathize stage is often by reminding everyone that design thinking is human-centered and that we are always seeking to understand our end users needs. Fortunately, there are plenty of online tools to make your life easier when you need to facilitate a meeting and lead workshops. Through the idea vault process, we are narrowing our ideas down by asking a series of questions that relate to the feasibility of the design, and if it truly meets our Personas needs. As the facilitator, you then have to ask team members to list why these ideas are so bad. Dedicate the last ten minutes or so to reflection and discussion. Have you ever started a workshop where the participants are a little overwhelmed at what the buzzword design thinking means? We're here to help with this collection of simple and effective team building activities! Activitydecide on a winning approach (10 minutes): Once the user testing round is complete, stick all design solutions up on the wall. Its worth noting that before you approach the five stages of design thinking, its always helpful to consider the scale of the problem and as a group, accept the project. Follow our actionable guide for best practices, tips, and techniques, as well as easy-to-follow steps to guarantee the success of your first session. How to run the design thinking for beginners workshop How baking a cake can explain design thinking Step 1: Empathize Step 2: Define Step 3: Ideate Step 4: Prototype Step 5: Test Tips for teaching design thinking How to run the design thinking for beginners workshop Please fill out the form and the nearest person from office will contact you. Design Thinking is a human-centered approach to problem-solving. Without user personas, its very difficult to align on a shared perspective of the people who will experience the solution. Its always a good idea to kick off the workshop with an ice-breaker. The key is to deliver interesting, relevant content, followed by a practical exercise and then group discussion. For a video overview of how to run a design thinking workshop remotely, be sure to check out this guide: And for further reading, check out the following resources: Get a hands-on introduction to UX design with our free, self-paced UX Design Short Course. Despite . However, if youre new to the practice, getting to grips with everything you need to know, not to mention running your first Design Thinking workshop, can be nothing short of terrifying.. Through this process, participants will start to develop their design thinking muscles and learn how to take on bigger projects in future. Bake two small cupcake versions to taste-test with our end-user. If your workshop takes place over several days, take the time necessary at the end of each day to write down the big ideas of the day. Common approaches in Design Thinking include empathy maps, storyboards, activity networks and cluster matrices. Identify your skills, refine your portfolio, and attract the right employers. The introduction should consist of three main parts: Use a fun icebreaker to warm up the team and help them get to know each other a little better. These workshops constitute several activities that provide a solid ground for co-creation, collaboration, and team effort. To give you a helping hand, weve put together a handy list of tools and best practices you can follow to make sure you and your workshop group are well prepared for your remote workshop session.. Most often, these are conducted in person, but you can certainly adapt and conduct a remote Design Thinking workshop. The level of detail you decide to document your workshop with should be based on the scale of your project short Design Thinking sessions with a core team dont require the same level of scrutiny as larger projects with extended teams who meet infrequently. Taras Bakusevych 8.5K Followers If time permits, allow 15-20 minutes at the start of every day for icebreaker activities or energizing moments. For example, a cupcake is designed to be eaten by one person, a low-cost treat that doesnt warrant a special occasion. In the second part of the ideation phase, youll get your participants to compile a series of user actions into a timeline. Many make genuine efforts to be innovativethey spend on R&D, bring in creative designers, hire innovation consultants. Youll find that the participants better control their allotted time and are less frustrated when their time for reflection comes to an end. In our presentation at the beginning of the workshop, we outline some ways in which we might prototype our cake; As we are going for the simplest options in our workshop, we have suggested that the teams draw visual representations, adding possible recipe ingredients and flavors which they will then present to the end-user for testing. Who are we designing for? However, the process is applicable to a wide range of obstacles facing individuals and teams. Product design workshops are an opportunity for a team to untangle a problem together by going through a series of group exercises designed to get to a specific outcome. Later on, youll narrow the design challenge down as part of the workshop itself. Also, don't hesitate to delegate certain tasks to the participants. What are we working with? We rely far too exclusively on analytical thinking, which merely refines current knowledge, producing small improvements to the status quo. If you only do one thing, be over-prepared! CareerFoundry is an online school for people looking to switch to a rewarding career in tech. And we came to the following conclusion: Being a good workshop facilitator is like being made out of bamboo. The purpose of a Design Thinking workshop is to get people thinking outside the box, so be sure to set up a space that invites creativity. A good workshop facilitator must know how to get the word out within the company aboutthe beneficial effects of Design Thinking on collaboration and on a customer-centric culture. Its worth suggesting to the team to use one piece of paper to represent each screen so that mistakes can be easily rectified and the journey is easy for everyone to follow.. By leveraging our full spectrum strategy, design, and technology capabilities, we deliver game-changing outcomes for our clients around the world. Most workshops last 1-2 days. By presenting our cake prototypes, our personas can imagine the delicious possibilities of their celebration dessert. This is where your participants will narrow down the broader design challenge (how might we improve the user experience for LoveFoundry customers?) It is important to . However, Design Thinking workshops arent just for designers; they are also increasingly used to teach professionals how to innovate and problem-solve. If your workshop takes place over several days, take the time necessary at the end of each day to write down the big ideas of the day. For this example, well use the worst possible idea technique followed by a simple brainstorm. Go over the benefits, give examples of successful workshops, and leave a few minutes at the end for any questions or clarifications needed from the group about the process.. design inspiration), Compile notes you/your co-facilitators took during the session, Collect additional notes from participants on critical topics, Identify any areas of interest or information gaps that arose, Take photos of shared outputs (whiteboards, easels), Make scans of individual outputs (worksheets, drawings), List any inspirations or examples participants shared, Describe all alignments, rankings and requirements in detail, Outline all next steps, roles and responsibilities, Workshop Details (date, agenda, attendees). Make a note of these answers so that your workshops continue to improve steadily over time., Heres a shortlist of what to keep in mind at all times while running your Design Thinking workshop!. Deliver a world-class experience to your customers through the application of Design Thinking. To build trust, start by creating ground rules for the workshop. Its important to encourage all ideas, no matter how big or small, and we will set an anything is possible mindset. When considering the term Stakeholder this could mean anyone who is involved in the cake-making or consuming process. They will also be your workshop participants. This role can be filled by an in-house facilitator or an external or freelance facilitator who seeks to guide team members towards a common objective via the Design Thinking process., There are pros and cons to both internal and external facilitation., While an internal facilitator benefits from knowledge of the product and company and has established relationships with the team, they might struggle with objectivity, find it hard to build trust with the team, and avoid asking pointed questions., An external facilitator, on the other hand, is likely to remain detached from internal power struggles and find it easier to remain uninfluenced by existing relationships with the team. How to run a UX design workshop by Andreas Johansson; Three Types of narratives to build amazing workshop experiences or really any of Daniel Stillman's writings; Managing Discussions by Matt Leighninger more ground rules, including "Bob's Rules," this is part of a series of 3 blogs entries on facilitation Prompt: Draw as many objects as you can using a sheet of paper with 30 blank circles printed on it. Regardless of the activities chosen, the goal here is to create a prioritized list of stories spanning the entire experience. This will allow them to see the benefits of the approach, and maybe it will open up other opportunities for you to use this methodology within the company. Coffee is always appreciated, and quick icebreakers or intros may be needed if teams seldom meet. To review a set of ground rules and select the most important ones . The great thing about these exercises is that you have the freedom to expand them to work with your audience and how best suits their needs. Keep in mind that the experience your clients will have during your workshops is the way they will remember you. There's often not a whole lot of difference between outrageous and brilliant. 2. If you want easy recruiting from a global pool of skilled candidates, were here to help. Sharing user journey maps, reflection and discussion (10 minutes): At the end of the ideation phase, put ten minutes aside for presenting and reflecting on all the user journey maps created. This is extremely helpful when it comes to reviewing your workshop, and, if youre running your workshop with clients, photos also make for a great souvenir. So what next? In phase one, we went through some general pointers to consider when devising the workshop agenda. Well finish this exercise with a selection of ideas to bring through and prototype. We finish our Define process, by presenting our personas to the group, and together voting on two personas we will choose to design cakes for. What will they take away with them? Its a process that is designed to encourage creative problem solving and innovation from each member of the group in order to address business challenges.. These challenges might be related to product development, team collaboration, recruitment or retention, reaching targets, as well as any number of issues that are preventing a company from reaching its goals. Whatever the context, be clear on what the workshop should achieve. Or align on specific requirements? . Activitycreate mobile screens (15 minutes): For each step in the user journey, participants will sketch out the user interface (i.e. If youre running a workshop for a client, you might print display advertising campaigns from three of their biggest competitors, for example. If our Persona character was a strong supporter of local business, that may play a part in where the cake ingredients were sourced. All these benefits aside, Design Thinking workshops are incredibly fun and engaging. Design thinking workshop step by step guide | by Taras Bakusevych | UX Collective Write Sign up Sign In 500 Apologies, but something went wrong on our end. What did the team learn? You can learn all about, Activitycraft a point of view (10 minutes): Based on their empathy maps from the empathise phase, ask participants to create a point of view statement. 1. the mobile screen) that would be needed for this step. As a designer, you might hold a Design Thinking workshop with your direct team in order to tackle a tough design challenge youve been struggling with. A wedding cake will be seen and eaten by many guests. With your agenda in place, you should now have a good idea of what youll need for the workshop. When design thinking emerged in the '90s and '00s, workplaces were made up of cubicles and closed doors, and the term "user experience" had only just been coined at Apple. Originally from England, Emily moved to Berlin after studying French and German at university. Now were going to consider the agenda in more detail, going through all the elements that make up a successful Design Thinking workshop! On the contrary! Activitycoming up with solutions (10 minutes): Having explored the opposite of what would be helpful to the user, it should now be easier to find potential solutions. These visualizations not only help teams describe ideas, but also interpret data and make informed decisions. (These are in no particular order. Some key points to include in your introduction are: This is also a good time to mention that youd like to document the workshop by taking photos. Your slides should directly reflect your workshop agenda. Your agenda is one thing, but behind the agenda, there is a human beingyouwho must show emotional intelligence to be able, for example, to reorganize teams to better balance the different personality profiles, or even to identify a silenced participant to give them the floor. Activityconduct user research (10 minutes): Normally, the empathise phase consists of conducting research with actual users. In this workshop, well ask the group to approach the problem of baking a cake. By the end, youll be ready to take your colleagues (or clients) through the entire Design Thinking process, equipping them with the tools they need to come up with innovative strategies and ideas. Limit the number of ground rules to 12. . Your email address will not be published. You can even recap these ideas at the start of the next day, so that your participants get started on the right foot. We might also wish to consider if the idea excites us, as innovative ideas should light a spark within us to have the drive and momentum to carry it through to the next stage of the process. Help participants unpack technical problems and appreciate the current user exprience, constraints and supporting systems. Having gone through the users challenges in the previous exercise, the group is in a better position to go into more detail with the issue itself. Take a user-centered approach and ask your participants for feedback. In which case you could finish the lesson here and return back later to process a few days later, giving participants a chance to engage outside of the workshop space. Are we designing how we think?, one person asks. The goal of this time is to generate dozens of relevant user stories for each persona. Build a career you love with 1:1 help from a career specialist who knows the job market in your area! Lets find out. Now that youve got your solution, the team needs to map out each step the user needs to take for it to work., Its time for the team to create low-fidelity prototypes! For example: How might we provide an easy, safe, online dating experience?. Now that the team is warmed up and all on the same page, its time to start thinking about the user. 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