3 Takeaways From Design Sprints
In the month of May, I worked alongside my classmates as we delved into three weeks of one-week long design sprints. Each Monday we were presented with a new client and problem. Deliverables included a full-fledged solution for each of the clients by Friday. It was a tiring and rewarding three weeks. Here’s what I learned.
Assurance Never Happens
Each week we needed to come up with realistic solution that we needed to pitch to the client. We had five days to come up with our design, story, and pitch. It isn’t a lot of time. Design so often gets stuck in rumination. It prompts questions, understanding, a full scope of the problem. Sprints force designers to act. It is not based on assurance, it is based on an insight and a need to deliver something. Time is often the enemy of designers– it stifles our ability to act and inflates our trepid nature. We want perfection and so we hesitate to go forward with anything. A sprint leaves no room for hesitation. Design should be careful, but it also needs rapid iteration, and to do that it needs action.
The Story is your Ship
There is no design without a story. When it comes to delivering your ideas to a client in an understandable way, you need a story. There is an ocean between you and your clients ability to understand what and why your solution works. Your story is the ship that can deliver your ideas to them on the other side. Our last week, it was noticeable that our pitching abilities had developed from the previous couple of weeks. Including the details and examples about how an idea works in context visually, how much it costs, how much they can expect to earn, what technologies are necessary, all of these details solidify the solution and create an excitement because it becomes a feasible option.
Jump In, Even If You Don’t Know
Throughout this year, I have been focusing on visual design and my skills reflect this. These sprints were primarily service design briefs so UX dominated the required deliverables. As a visual designer, I approach problems differently than a strictly UX designer. The thing is, as designers we are each wanting the same thing– a solution. Throughout the sprints, I needed to carry the hat of a UX designer while knowing I had the mind of a visual designer. It was critical that I jumped in even though I didn’t quite understand what I was doing or if my insight had any sort of credibility. If I had sat on the sidelines our solutions wouldn’t have had the necessary diversity of thought that design solutions require. Design is hitting a chord that many instruments can play. Each new instrument you include in your process means a better solution in the end. I was an instrument in this process and as one, I was able to chime in what I knew and how it would sound if I were to play it. This demanded that our solutions were dynamic.
The sprints were an eye opening experience introduction into client facing work. They were challenging, exhausting, and insightful. I recall running track in high school. It was so grueling, but I had never felt so strong after giving it my all in a long, hard sprint.
