Diamond Valuations
Using the Double Diamond to map and focus your team’s and your own design value
How to do it
- Take a Double Diamond framework like the one above
- Mark a point in the bottom half to indicate where in the framework you feel you currently offer the most value
- Mark a second point indicating where you would like to shift that value
- Do the same on the top half for your business
- Get the whole team to add stickers or make a mark on a big shared sheet, or in a digital survey tool like Mentimeter.com
- Do it with your team and discuss why that might be
Background
I’m not the biggest fan of the infamous Double Diamond. I love the messages of divergence and convergence. I love the notion of focusing on what the right things is, and then delivering the best version of it. I just don’t appreciate its overuse and reductionist attitude to the design process. We all know it’s a bit messier than all that.
That said, when dealing with the perception of design value in your organisation I have found that it acts as a good framework to understand where designers see their own value and the value of the wider team and organisation.
In some of the Shaping workshops I run, I get people to map their current perception of where they think they offer the most value. And where they believe they should shift.
I then ask them to do the same for their organisation.
People can then map different coloured dots (current and desired) on a bigger shared sheet and the team can discuss.
There is no right or wrong answer, and obviously a great design team would have strengths in each stage.
That aside, discussing where the team feels they offer the most value now and where they ideally should can expose some interesting perspectives, for example:
- Discover — are they spending a lot of energy exploring the problem space but never defining a clear way forwards?
- Define — are they spending too much time on defining the damn thing and strategising rather than finding the right problem or delivering against the strategic direction?
- Develop — are they spending too much time exploring lots of ideas rather than delivering any of them, or defining the right challenge?
- Deliver— are they spending lots of time delivering and not really deciding what is the right thing to deliver?
Want to find out more, follow the series
If you want to learn more about the Shaping Workshops I run, and what I have learned over the years, follow me, or read some other articles in the Medium Publication.
Keep your eyes peeled for another post tomorrow.
