Even when we’re miles apart…
or kilometers. My experience during the first Global Virtual Design Sprint.
Being relatively new into Design Sprints, I’ve always been looking for opportunities to learn. It started with the videos from AJ&Smart (Gateway drug), then I bought the book (Buy sprint!), and then AJ&Smart’s masterclass. I was in, I felt like I could run a Design Sprint and I did, but this week I was able to co-facilitate a virtual sprint for the first time, a Global one at that.
A Curious Case
Back in October, while lurking in the AJ&Smart Masterclass Facebook Group, I saw a post from Robert Skrobe, I expressed my interest and asked more about it.
That post would then turn into the Pilot of the Global Virtual Sprint with 30 participants coming from different countries across different timezones. Robert Skrobe arranged this whole shebang and I would definitely recommended following him if you want to find out how he did all of this.
The Set-up
The team, the challenge, and the tools
Sprint Team F
Falcon, Fun, Fantastic, Fierce? We were asked to think of a team name but we totally forgot about that, sorry, but Forward we went.
The 30 participants were divided into 6 teams according based on our timezones to make scheduling easier; we were the team from Asia and Oceania.
Phil and I volunteered for the facilitator roles while Brian was the lead designer of the team and I acted as his back-up; Sandra and Juggernaut(Awesome name, right?) were the experts; and finally Dan was our advisor together with Robert, who felt like a Deus ex machina for our problems.
Design Sprint Referral Network
Our team was assigned to take on the Design Sprint Referral Network topic, authored by Robert Skrobe himself.
His vision was to create an ecosystem where Design Sprint Facilitators would be able to connect with professionals who are familiar with the Sprint process. The members of this ecosystem would be referred and vouched for by existing members and the goal was to come-up with a demo of this ecosystem that has a near-frictionless signup process which encourages members to engage in referrals. This was inspired by his experience with a Design Sprint where the people called upon to do the sprint were through referrals.
The target audience for this network are Design Sprint Facilitators, Designers, Developers, Architects, and Researchers who are familiar with the process.
Virtual Boards and all
To make this whole thing possible, we turned to Mural, Zoom and of course, Slack; not to say these three were the only things we used, but they were the key drivers for the virtual sprint’s success. In the slack workspace we shared files, zoom links, and schedules. We also used Google drive for text documents, decks, and sheets.
Into the fray
The Pre-sprint
The week before the sprint, Robert Skrobe sent out doodle links to coordinate the members’ schedules; he also set up our communication channels and gave us the assigned topic brief.
I was able to keep track of what was happening through of the facebook group, the emails, and the slack workspace but due to timezone differences and schedules, coordination was a bit of a challenge; late responses to the doodle links and confirmations of schedule made it feel like the whole thing may fall off, but we were set. Robert did most of the preparations, with this being a pro-bono pilot, he took on most of the responsibilities since most of us were busy with our own lives.
We then had a quick kick-off zoom meet-up on Nov. 9 to get the team acquainted. Robert then gave us a schedule to follow during the sprint week, we had a mix of online and offline sprint exercises scheduled to account for the different availabilities of the team members.
Sprint week
We started the Sprint Week on November 12 and ended on the 16th. Each day posed the a different challenge for us and I’ll be sharing my side of the story as a co-facilitator and designer.
Coming into the sprint week, I had a video call scheduled with a client and other things for work but I made sure to plan ahead and blocked off most of my week for the sprint.
On Sunday, Sandra and Phil recorded some Expert Interviews to set us up for the expert interview session on Monday.
Monday
On the Morning of Monday, we kicked the sprint off with the Deck prepared by Robert; we started with the first exercise which was the Long Term Goal and the Sprint Questions with me acting as the team’s facilitator.
In the Design Sprint 2.0, the sprint week’s first exercise is the Expert Interviews, but we decided to follow the deck from Robert. It shouldn’t be a problem since the original sprint follows the same sequence but this change dictated where we would take the challenge and result in a different approach from the other sprint teams working on the same challenge for the Referral Network.
We did the note-and-vote for the Long Term Goal and the Sprint Questions and came up with these:
After setting the Long Term Goal and the Sprint Questions, we all went offline to do the Expert Interviews; we used the pre-recorded interviews and wrote down the How Might We’s in the Mural Board for Voting in the afternoon.
At this point I had to get out of the Sprint to take a client call; Phil was great to take things from there and he facilitated the HMW Voting and the Map.
With Phil’s facilitation, the team selected the target area for the Sprint using the Note-and-Map method.
The team focused on new sprint practitioners by creating a solution that would help them upgrade their skills and find “Buddies” who acted as mentors that could also potentially work with them.
After the target area was selected, the online activities for the day were done. The team was dismissed with just the offline Lightning Demos left to do and the team posted their Demos into the Mural Board for reviewing on the morning of Tuesday.
Tuesday
The team reconvened at 9:00am Tuesday to do the reviews of the Lightning Demos using the Six Thinking Hats approach. Phil facilitated this exercise because I wasn’t familiar with the Six Thinking Hats; I joined the activity as a team member and participated in the reviews. We took note of the things that were mentioned for each thinking hat to create a “communal brain” and posted them all on the Mural Board.
After doing the reviews of the Lightning Demos, Phil had to leave for other commitments and I took over the facilitation of the 4-part sketching.
We did the 4-part sketching both offline and online; the first 3 exercises done online since this needed more facilitation and time-boxing. When we got into the Solution Sketching, I gave the members freedom by letting them work on their sketches offline, however, I made sure to stay online just incase anybody needed some help. I set a time when they had to post their solution sketches, around an hour before we did the Sticky Decisions Voting to make sure that the sketches were easy to understand and legible before we went on with the Art Museum.
At 2pm, after we reviewed their sketches and posted them, we went on with the votings with Sandra as our decider.
After Sandra made her Decider Votes, we took a short break, but other members had prior commitments which meant that Brian and I were the only ones left to do the storyboarding session.
We did the user test flow exercise but since it was just the two of us, we just had a discussion for the 8 steps of the storyboard and agreed on how it would go.
Based on the schedule, we were done for the day, we didn’t have the drawing of the storyboard session. It was an experiment since it would be very challenging to do given the member’s availability and the storyboard usually turns into a “Rabbit Hole” of endless discussions. It was interesting approach and we went with it, there was more to learn.
Since Brian and I were the Designers for Prototyping day, we made sure to add some details into the 8 step flow, putting in the things that we thought would be needed for the prototype. We would’ve added more but we honestly didn’t have enough bandwidth for it and called it a day.
Wednesday
Prototyping day. Being a designer, it always feels a bit nerve-wracking for me. We had the job of giving our solution life and we had to finish it in 6 hours.
For the tool, Brian and I decided to use Figma for it’s collaboration capabilities.
Before starting, we had some members check the flow for any last minute changes and then we discussed which were the most important screens to prototype.
To start things off, Brian created our palette and chose the typeface to use. While creating the prototype, Brian and I had a lot to think of since there was no detailed storyboard, so we basically had to sort of wireframe as we were designing high-fidelity screens, creating copy, and finding assets, but we pressed on, we didn’t worry, we trusted the process.
At 4:00 pm, we were able to breathe a sigh of relief, we finished the prototype. We felt happy about the screens and the flow.
While we were prototyping I, being the facilitator, had to stay on top of the user testing and here we had a hiccup. With my attention divided, I wasn’t able to align the team and the schedules weren’t coordinated. We still haven’t prepared our approach for the testing or decided on our schedule.
Before signing out for the day, with what’s left of my willpower, I created the user testing board in Mural and added the talking points following the Design Sprint 2.0 approach; I notified the other members in Slack and they refined the board.
Thursday
Thursday morning, nobody was available to facilitate the testing until 9:30 AM, but some of the testers we recruited were only available at 8:30 AM to 10:30 AM, so we missed 2 of them. Woops!
There were no incentives for our user tests so nothing was wasted, but it meant that we had to find volunteers again. Robert swooped in to lend some help by suggesting a different approach, it was discussed that we could come up with a user discussion guide that testers could use and follow by themselves, but while waiting for the document, we all decided to push through with the other scheduled tests.
During the first interview, we interviewed Phil, with me acting as the lead interviewer and Brian as the notetaker, later on we switched roles. Phil was part of the team but since he was a facilitator and wasn’t involved with making the prototype, he was a qualified tester.
For our second interview, we got Robert Skrobe to test our prototype and our approach to his idea of the referral network. Brian started the interview but we later split up to cover more ground since another tester was available.
Brian was joined by Juggernaut for the 3rd interview and then we got 2 more testers who I interviewed simultaneously. It was my first time to do simultaneous interviews and I liked how the testers played off each other; I interviewed Ryan from AJ&Smart and Sandra from our team, who both came in late in the day to save the team.
All the user tests I conducted felt like a storyboarding session, the testers focused on the design and the details of the solution, covering our mistakes in the prototype, but I made sure that our talking points were addressed.
But we made it, Testing day was done. We made it to the Sprint’s finish line.
Friday
On 1pm on the Friday, we had our retrospective. Everyone made it to the zoom meeting all at the same time, it was a beautiful moment.
During the retrospective, we used the Mural Board again and framed what went well, what went wrong, and how we could improve; focusing mostly on the Virtual Design Sprint as a whole, but also giving some comments on the challenge and our team.
What went well
Mural-The team pointed out how the Mural was able to recreate the magic of in-person design sprints in a virtual setting. As the co-facilitator, I would attest to that, this whole thing wouldn’t even be close to possible without Mural.
Team chemistry and engagement- Although schedules were a pain, each time that we had a meeting, everyone was focused and engaged. We didn’t have any problems there. Awesome people!
Robert Skrobe- Through Robert’s hard work, guidance, sleepless nights, and patience, we were able to get to the finish line. He saw us through and made sure that everything was set-up well for us, from schedules down to the drawings in the Mural board. Amazing!
Online and Offline Activities- Due to the team’s different schedules and availabilities, we had to do some exercises offline, but it turned out to be a happy accident. Since most of us were familiar with the Sprint process, the members could do some of the exercises by themselves offline. This lead us into some talks of a possible Design Sprint 3.0, exciting stuff.
What didn’t go so well
Schedules- We weren’t able to stick with the set schedule, being the facilitator, I was responsible for that. Also due to schedule conflicts, not everyone could join all the exercises, so some exercises we had to do with just a few members present; we also missed some of the interviews. It was recommended that invites and schedules should be set about a month in advance so everyone could accommodate the sprint.
Zoom meeting sessions- We didn’t have a proper zoom account, so we basically leached off Robert’s and Phil’s, and whoever was available between them would have to set up. This created a lot of zoom meetings, so some members joining in had to scour the Slack channel to find the proper meeting link.
Alignment on the topic- Since we switched the order of the exercises during the first day, specifically the Expert Interviews and the Long Term Goal/Sprint Questions, we felt quite lost with the challenge. Also, just having a document for the topic brief wasn’t enough to get everyone oriented and aligned. It was recommended that in the kick-off meeting, the week before the sprint, that we have an interview with the topic author.
No storyboarding session- We didn’t have a storyboarding session which resulted in a few mistakes in the design of the prototype due to the workload on the designers. Since it would be very hard to do a storyboarding session remotely, it was suggested that an exercise could be added on Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday morning that would set up the designers for success, something like kanban board for the details of the prototype. Other exercises could also be created for remote storyboarding sessions.
Other Recommendations
Guide- The team discussed that a guide could be created for virtual sprints. It would contain how to set everything up, the tools
New frameworks- New approaches for the exercises could be developed based on the aptitude of the members on the design sprint process. Offline activities could be done if the members know the process but using the board as the team brain, and having online activities for voting and for members who need more facilitation.
2-day sprint- Based on how the whole virtual sprint went and using a mix of online and offline activities, the idea of compressing the whole virtual sprint into 2 days could be explored.
Having a key person- Since the members had other commitments, it was a challenge to schedule the exercises and the meetings, so having one person who would be present for the whole week would help everyone stay aligned and keep the process in check. This person could also work closely with Robert Skrobe a week in advance to prepare everything for the week, potentially taking some of the load off of him.
My takeaways
Coming out of the Global Virtual Design Sprint, I am very happy that I chose to invest a lot of time on it during the week. I wanted to be involved and take on a lot of the responsibilities for facilitation and designing; this was a very good opportunity for me to sharpen my skills, experiment with new approaches in the sprint, and work with amazing people who are more skilled than me.
I learned a lot of things about remote work, facilitation, and design. I would always cherish the user test with Robert during which he went on about a lot of things, and as he spoke, I thought to myself how he was really amazing at what he does; his level of expertise on design, strategy, and business is something that I want to reach someday.
My challenges
As a facilitator…
My challenge as the facilitator was making sure that everyone was aligned on what was happening and juggling the members availabilities. I had to make sure to keep the conversation going during the exercises and even after since not all members were present for all the exercises, I wanted the whole team to stay updated so that coming into an exercise wouldn’t be hard for them.I also had to work with each members schedule, coordinating with them when they would be available so I could plan things ahead, or ask Robert how to approach the different situations.
I had to play 2 roles during prototyping day which has caused a problem for user testing day, maybe by being more organized and planning ahead, I would be able to take the same challenge with more grace.
This was my first virtual sprint and I was worried if I could facilitate it at first, but getting started is more important than being right and I was pretty happy with what we achieved.
As a designer…
Creating the prototype without a storyboard drawing was a big challenge for me and Brian. We didn’t have the chance to ideate and create wireframes for the screens, but we dove into prototyping anyway. This solidified the importance of storyboarding for me and I would make sure to implement that in my future sprints.
What set me up for success
The Team
The team really allowed me to show what I can do in the short amount of time that we worked together. I remember being shy at first, I was a bit nervous, but everyone had great energies that created an environment that was conducive to sharing of ideas, discussions, and learning. I would usually get lost in thought when I process things and it was good that the other members could pick up the ball from there, so the energy doesn’t drop.
Going into the user testing day, being the designer, I felt a bit bad due to some mistakes that Brian and I should’ve seen; but I distinctly remember Sandra congratulating us for what we’ve done in one day, and that got my spirits up. It’s always great to work with people who are positive and supportive.
Robert who did most of the leg work for the preparations made our job us facilitators a hell of a lot easier.
Having a co-designer in Brian during prototyping day helped us get to the finish line easier. We were able to exchange ideas about the design and I don’t always get that luxury of having a co-worker, so it made the day a lot easier and successful. Co-facilitating with Phil helped me learn a few facilitation tricks that I could use myself, especially the Six Thinking Hats.
My job as facilitator was exponentially easier thanks to the engagement and responsibility of the whole team, I couldn’t have done it without that.
Tools
Mural was the key tool behind this virtual sprint, I was able to create frames and drawings for the team to use during the exercises. But I hope we could get some templates for Design Sprints in the future :)
Figma also helped prototyping day become a success; I mainly use Sketch and have only used Figma once before, but this was my first time co-designing with someone with an ocean between us, but it was seamless all thanks to the combination of Figma and Zoom.
AJ&Smart
Though there was little involvement from AJ&Smart in this Virtual Sprint, I was still able to get some help from them by referring to the documents and videos in the masterclass. I finished the class a couple of months ago and ran a few sprints since, but time and time again, I still refer to their material.
My key takeaways
Kanban for prototyping day
Prototyping day became a challenge for us due to the lack of the storyboard. This made me think of other ways to approach prototyping and it was suggested that we could use a kanban board for the things that were needed for the design. I am planning to use that not only for Design Sprints but also for other design production projects that I would do, that on top of the wireframes should improve my workflow.
Six Thinking Hats & note-and-map
It was my first experience with the six thinking hats approach and I found it to be very valuable for framing; I’m planning to use that in my sprints in the future. As with the note-and-map, I’ve heard of it before but it was my first time seeing its results, I’m planning to use it for teams who are more familiar with the process since they would need less hand holding to give them more control over the results of the map.
High Fives
Sandra was full of positive energy and was upbeat for the whole week. I will always make sure to have the same kind of energy moving forward and give lots of high fives to keep the team’s spirits high throughout the week. Great facilitation takeaway!
Let them finish
During user testing day, the testers got into the details and asked questions right away before finishing the flow because I asked questions too early, some of their questions would be answered later in the flow so it messed up the rhythm of the interview. I usually have a questionnaire that I use for user interviews but tried not using one this time, I like the spontaneity but I would have to improve my interviewing skills. Time to brush up on the 5-act interview.
“Matching mentors-mentees as the central focus of the product and designing intuitive and seamless experiences around that”
This came from my user testing with Robert and it was my top takeaway from the whole sprint. As a designer, it’s easy to get caught up in designing different experiences for the user, but to create a great product, it should have one focus and then design experiences around that theme. Thanks Robert for that bit of product strategy knowledge.
See you again
This was an awesome experience for me, I met new people, practiced my skills, and learned a ton of things.
There are plans of a March 2019 run and I would definitely sign-up for it!
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I’m a Product Designer and Design Sprint Facilitator from Ten&Eleven Product Design and Innovation. We bring value to people through Design of Products and Services.
Follow me on Instagram: @abelmaningas
Send me an email: abel@teneleven.design
Find me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/abelmaningas/
