Slides Nis Frome recently used in his discussion w/ mentees of The Product Mentor. Synopsis: The design sprint is a concrete vehicle for deploying necessary user research techniques to go from problem to solution. You can use it to prioritize opportunities, clarify a roadmap, or iterate on the nitty gritty of a user experience. The Product Mentor is a program designed to pair Product Mentors and Mentees from around the World, across all industries, from start-up to enterprise, guided by the fundamental goals…Better Decisions. Better Products. Better Product People. Throughout the program, each mentor leads a conversation in an area of their expertise that is live streamed and available to both mentee and the broader product community. http://TheProductMentor.com

1. Use design sprints to make
smarter
product
decisions.
by nis frome

2. Nis Frome
Enable Fortune 500 product teams
to test and learn what users want.
Product & Content at Alpha
http://nisfro.me // @nisfrome
product content
2
This Is Product Management
AlphaHQ.com/Resources
about me

3. The goal is to learn.
objective
3

4. challenge
Psychological distance
is the phenomenon that makes
the abstract overly desirable.
4

5. solution
We use designs
to run experiments
to get reliable feedback.

6. assessment
When it comes to user-centricity,
where does your organization stand?
No user
insights
Rarely ever use
data or user
feedback to
make decisions.
Ad hoc user
research
At some point in
the dev
lifecycle, user
research is
conducted.
Continuous
feedback
User research is
seamlessly
baked into the
product team’s
workflow.

7. design sprint
Most product teams are here, which is
why design sprints are all the rage.
Ad hoc user
research
At some point in
the dev
lifecycle, user
research is
conducted.

8. gv’s approach
Get to 90% real and get feedback.

9. gv’s approach
Monday: start with major goal and work
backwards to identify the user journey
and assumptions.

10. gv’s approach
Tuesday: research parallel solutions,
sketch high level ideas, begin
recruiting customers.

11. gv’s approach
Wednesday: decide without
succumbing to camaraderie, and
storyboard the winning ideas.

12. gv’s approach
Thursday: have a prototype mindset to
create something that’s just enough to
learn.

13. gv’s approach
Friday: interview five customers, get at
the why, and have the decider
determine next steps from the data.

14. critiques
Taking five days off is too unrealistic,
and is a barrier to doing more sprints.

15. critiques
Too much armchair quarterbacking
and not enough data-driven decisions.

16. critiques
Get feedback from more than five users
before making key decisions.

17. improvements
Don’t be too prescriptive, because if you
want to get more data, your process must fit
within organizational workflow.
Plan to iterate, because test results are
never that cut and dry, and you want to
make sure that your data is replicable.
Qualitative data is typically underrated, but
that doesn’t mean quantitative datais
overrated (so don’t forget about it).

18. your turn
Identify necessary resources and a key
decision that needs to be made, and
start coordinating a design sprint with
coworkers tomorrow.