Experimenting Our Way Through Crisis
We read about organizations and industries experiencing disruption all the time. Airbnb disrupted the hospitality industry, Uber disrupted transportation, and Netflix disrupted entertainment. Typically these disruptions in the market are a result of an innovation or a young startup questioning old norms and reframing them for a current generation. But Covid19 is a different type of disruption. And as disrupting as it feels to our work at Stoked, and the lives of millions of humans all over the world, I have a strong sense positive outcomes will emerge.
At Stoked, we have been utilizing remote collaboration tools for years as we’re a distributed team. And frankly, they all kind of suck. I can’t think of any tool we’ve used that felt as good or effective as in-person collaboration. We take a human-centered approach in our work, so you can imagine that virtual connection leaves us all feeling a little underwhelmed.
But for the past three weeks, as clients adhered to travel bans, our in-person work has become virtual. And let me be the first to admit that I was scared it wouldn’t work as well. That we couldn’t transfer our same sense of positive energy and caring that we deliver in-person to our clients as they sit in their home office on a laptop. We’ve been designing and leading innovation work and sprints for a decade…in-person. The force to move to virtual in a short amount of time was scary, but as it turns out, oddly fortunate.
For years, we’ve prided ourselves on a high-touch, personalized experience designed for precisely the people walking in our doors. Since the pandemic has put a stop on travel, we’ve had to move ahead with work that felt rough, raw. It felt unfinished and scary to show others. Ironically, these are the same fears our clients have when we first teach them our approach to problem-solving. How could they possibly show unfinished work to a user? It feels so counter-intuitive, but it saves so much time and energy and creates a bond between designer and user that’s hard to come by any other way.
Last week, we delivered our first virtual session with clients. From a design perspective, we had to take most of what we know about delivering content and leading teams and throw it out the window. Stoked was forced to get back to our roots of low-resolution prototyping and testing to see what we could learn. Everything we did was manual and janky at best. Sure, we utilized tools that are already out there like WebEx, Mural, Vimeo, and even Instagram, but the connection between all of these things was human-powered. There were hiccups, of course, but since we did our best to frame this session with our clients as an experiment, they were gracious and provided excellent feedback about what worked well and what felt like it was lacking.
We were practicing what we teach, we learned a TON, and the clients have been more than willing to play along. To collaborate and all learn something new about the way work will likely transform in the coming weeks, months, and years.
Lately, I feel like every time I hop into LinkedIn, I see twenty posts from consultancies who claim to have figured out the answer to virtual collaboration and communication. Good for them. Stoked is still busy experimenting, learning, and trying to stay curious. We’ll do our best to share what we’re learning and learn from what you’re sharing.
I’ll end with this, there seem to be two competing notions right now. 1) Necessity is the mother of invention. These constraints we’re all in will undoubtedly lead to innovations and new ways of working. Contrast that with 2) the very real fact that it’s often hard to think big when we have a mindset of fear and scarcity. Survival mode isn’t usually the most generative mindset. So be aware of that. If you’re struggling just to keep your head above water, know that coming up with big new ideas may not be available to you. However, if you’re the kind of person that tends to go big when times are hard, this is your chance to contribute to the universe!
