Lighthouse Projects to Promote UX

A lighthouse project is a small-scale but big-picture project. It is supposed to have a signal effect into an organisation to demonstrate how an innovation can create a positive impact on the activities of the organisation if other projects adopt the approach of the project. For that it uses the show-don’t-tell principle. In other words: “A lighthouse project is a short-term, well defined, measurable project that serves as a model — or a “lighthouse” — for other similar projects […].” (Dan Williams, 2017). Well said, Dan.

Lighthouse projects can be an experiment to test and demonstrate the value of a new technology, of new methodologies, or new development practices like human-centred design. They can drive change when concatenated. Microsoft did a study with 30 interviewees holding leadership positions in Australian organisations and found several common factors. Especially interesting here is that “by and large, these organisations viewed digital transformation as a journey that started with isolated digital experiments and built up progressively over time.” (Microsoft Australia, 2016, p. 6). This demonstrates that organisations can successfully drive large-scale change by splitting it into a series of small-scale lighthouse projects.

Two Poles

From my point of view there are two kinds of lighthouse projects:

1. North Pole Projects: The simpler case are those projects the company starts with large-scale optimism and clear metrics to demonstrate some anticipated gain. Such projects are characterised by early stakeholder involvement and an early agreement on the desired benefits. In other words: a top-down approach. The top management supports the project and it is clear from the beginning that the company shall adopt the results of the lighthouse experiment if the metrics show a success.
2. South Pole Projects: That is usually not the case for projects that demonstrate new development practices. The value of these is usually harder to prove. In human-centred design we failed to demonstrate the return-on-invest (ROI) for decades (at least, when we look at the ROI for individual companies or even projects). That makes it difficult to bring stakeholders on board. It changes the nature of lighthouse projects. Their purpose is to bring stakeholders on board, advertise the idea, and win sponsorship.

These two different types are two poles of a continuum rather than distinct categories. All lighthouse projects have some of both. This article is about projects closer to the South Pole. These are the projects with a much higher uncertainty and complexity. They are the tricky ones and I want to share my insight about those.

When we want to promote human-centred practices in our organisation, we travel the hemisphere closer to the South Pole. One might say that lighthouse projects near the South Pole are a big marketing campaign supported by observations and learnings made during the project. Such lighthouse projects imply an additional goal and it is a marketing goal. All other goals become secondary. Not unimportant, but secondary, unless they have a negative impact on the main goal. The lighthouse is mainly about trust, not a successful project itself (Smit, 2019). It is not the goal to create the best UX for the product. The quality of the UX is only important as long as it pays into the main goal: and that is to tell a convincing story how UX can make your organisation more successful. The project needs a shared understanding among it’s decision makers how that can work.

The Right Direction

There are a number of questions that you need to answer first.

The main goal of a lighthouse project is to influence the organisation. You need a clear idea what that is that you want to change. Proving that human-centred design can create a great UX and desirable products may be such a goal. Though I would say in most cases we come up short. Because there are many opportunities and challenges along the way. Being valuable is not enough. Your cause must be more valuable and more urgent than everything else. Only then it will get the priority it needs.

To avoid coming up short, ask yourself this: imagine you have reached your lighthouse goal. Now, firstly, does your organisation have the means to take the necessary next steps to change it’s ways? Secondly, did you reach the right people who could access those means and enable the organisation to take that next step?

Each lighthouse project should have a specific problem to address. User Experience, in general, may still be a rather large issue in your situation. It often is. It can make sense to split it up and focus — for example — on a specific type of customer challenge, on the value of user research, or on a seamless integration of design and development. Splitting the problem gives your organisation the chance to keep up and make the necessary adjustments to support UX work in the long run.

Talk to the stakeholders before you pick your lighthouse project. Find out where they see future challenges and how they are trying to address them. If you can piggyback on one of these challenges, do it! Build your case and your lighthouse project around it. In any way you need to find aspects of UX that these people find not only relatable but also urgent.

Communications

Accompany the project through communication about it. You need to know about the most relevant stakeholders with whom you have to communicate throughout the project. Most of all, we communicate benefits:

1. Benefits for the organisation,
2. Benefits that individual stakeholder may draw from the endeavour personally (i.e. in their role for the company).

Identify key stakeholders, determine who these people are, and what drives them. A stakeholder analysis helps you decide how to interact with them. Determine if they are in favour of your cause, neutral or rather sceptical? And, finally, how much influence do they have in the organisation? Decide your means of communication and which stakeholder you can reach over which channel. Find ways to get feedback about how your stakeholder perceived your messages. The stakeholders must be brought in from the very beginning, and you need to initiate a dialogue.

It is also of great benefit to have a “lighthouse keeper” with a good reputation and influence. Somebody who acts as face of the project and delivers it’s messages. Even if the idea isn’t his or hers, the person helps build trust in the organization.

Since we are involved in a marketing campaign some typical marketing tools may also help to create lasting memory engrams. The size of the project and the size of the organisation should reflect the effort you invest in communication tools like logos and slogans (so avoid overdoing it). What you can always invest in without a guilty conscience is consistent and responsive communication. Reflect with the team how the people in the organisation perceive the project and how you can respond in a consistent way.

Metrics

Once you have all the above: a clear focus, a primary goal, and your target group, you can move on to metrics. Clear metrics can support your messages. When it comes to human-centred practices metrics will never be enough. For almost twenty years I’ve been following the subject. Proving the value of UX is really hard. Not impossible, but usually very hard. The best evidence is usually created with a before/after study but they can be difficult to implement. In my experience, even companies which successfully implemented human-centred practices, did avoid the cost of such a study. Still, metrics, help in the communication because they help to formulate precise messages.

Project Setup

To accompany the project with communication you can use a “double pipeline setup”. In the bottom pipeline you organise the actual work. At the top you run a communication work alongside. Here is a proposal how that may look like.

You need to communicate regularly. The regularity is provided by the sprint structure. Another reason to communicate are milestones in the project. And — of course — we should always respond to questions and contribute to discussions in the company.

Lighting the Way

Lighthouse projects are smaller-scaled initiatives to gain instil change into an organisation. It demonstrates how the organisation can benefit from new ideas, technologies, or practices. Most lighthouse projects cannot provide hard evidence. Their main purpose is rather to build trust. That is especially important when the purpose is to demonstrate the value of human-centred practices. For a lighthouse project to have a lasting effect you need to keep several quality criteria in mind:

• Repeatability. Human-centred practices are — more or less — supposed to be an integral part of every product development activity. Therefore, every colleague responsible for such activities must have the support to replicate the approach of the lighthouse project.
• Goal Congruence. The lighthouse project has a much larger chance to make an impact if the pursued objective behind it does not conflict with other objectives of the organisation.
• Small. Given the purpose of a lighthouse project it shall not become too ambitious. If it was, not only could that have a negative impact on repeatability, it would also take a long time to complete. The later the project finishes the longer it will take until you can tell the whole story and get the last stakeholders on board.
• scalable. Because a certain scalability will improve repeatability.

A lighthouse project itself can only make an impact if the next project can simply adopt what the lighthouse project demonstrated. However, if projects face circumstances beyond their control the effort is lost. Please note, that you should check that first. In many situations the lighthouse project can only be a brick in a larger undertaking.

References

Williams, Dan (2017). Why Lighthouse Projects, Not PowerPoints, Will Unlock Your Transformation Value. Blog. Accessed 2022–12–17.

Microsoft Australia (2016). Embracing digital transformation. Accessed 2022–12–17.

Szmit, Radosław (2019). A Lighthouse Project For Digital Transformation. Blog. Accessed 2023–02–20.