Virtual Sprint Week Diary, Day 8
Monday, November 12
I’m testing the limits of sleep deprivation like Salvador Dali… well, not really.
That guy was nuts with testing limits. While I hang out with design sprint teams based out of Taiwan, Australia and New Zealand, here’s what Mr. Dali did for fun:
He would sit with a key in one hand, poised above a metal plate placed on the floor, and let sleep take him. As soon as he began to slumber in earnest, the key would slip from his fingers and clang against the plate — waking him immediately.
The modern version of that scenario would be holding my tea cup and having it slip from my fingers, hitting me square in the crotch. Bonus points if the tea was still hot. Either way, I’m not signing up for that stuff.
The Hustle
Instead, I’m putting a lot of time into welcoming new facilitators and newcomers to the design sprint process. Monday is a critical impression day. Those that are choosing to attend Day 1 of a design sprint and foregoing a trip to H&M for a high end shoe sale have their reasons. It’s up to me and the rest of the group to make the case.
Sometimes that isn’t enough. We had five folks drop out this morning before even getting started, due to immediate client work and obligations that overpowered even the most flexible of schedules.
All you can do is meet those incidents with understanding and empathy. What I’m doing with this event is a million times better than being locked in meeting rooms all week, trying to deliver against an aggressive deadline. It’s even worse if they *really* wanted to attend the virtual design sprint, but reality smacked dashed their hopes to the rubbish bin. Not fun.
The good news is that I’m going to continue this into next year. I’ll be looking to try again in either March or April, taking the learnings from this pilot and building it into something more substantial.
An interesting play on this would be to arrange paid projects for virtual design sprints. The event would look to hire and contract designers, researchers and developers from all over the world to take part. Pro-bono would be the default, but the paid variation would be a greater conversation to have with others about where it could go.
Day 1 Results
After taking a quick scan of the Murals and what I’ve been able to glean from facilitators and others taking part, Day 1 went pretty well. There are two teams I need to keep an eye on, and two teams I’m raising eyebrows with (meaning, they are kicking some major ass early). I won’t tip my hand in one direction or another, but some teams are doing some serious business.
Day 2 with Team F (as of this writing) is going really well. Dan Levy made an appearance about the same time I did (at 1:00 AM). People think I’m a machine… Dan’s a damn Terminator when it comes to staying busy and making things happen. I was just glad I caught him on a drive-by right before helping out with a Storyboard session.
Thinking ahead, both prototyping and user testing will be taking on a life of their own soon. There’s a very lightweight, structured process for getting prototypes ready, but it’s really up to the teams to arrange for user testing.
I suspect I’m going to have to put in some additional work on the recruitment side to make sure facilitators don’t feel lost. They’ll likely have to tap their professional networks for help, but it still needs a proper process to make it happen. That’s next up!
Okay, enough from me. I really will turn into Dali if I started pressing things beyond 2:00 AM. :) . See you tomorrow!
