Designing Quickly
This was originally published internally in October 2015 as a documentation of the work @boldvc did with the @clustoapp team. The work described here was done in the first half of 2015.
The Clus.to team has come a long way since the time we decided to invest in them. For them, the driving factor has always been about creating a better and more robust product in every release. This team is a true believer of learning by doing and it shows in the 3 product iteration/pivots that they have made since their early days. Starting out as ‘Quickly’, all they really wanted to do was to have one space in which all-disparate productivity apps can work together from. This has been the vision from the get go.
While Quickly was a simple Chrome plugin for Gmail, the usage patterns and constant 2 way communication with its top 1% users really showed them the value of creating their own dashboard as a separate app, which is not only focused on email and not limited by the integrations possible on a predefined service. This is roughly about the time we came in. While the Clusto team understood the big move they needed to make, they were quiet unsure about the best method to make it. We decided to start with a 3 day deep dive session which was basically a knowledge transfer mode. We wanted the Clusto team to explain everything about the product in the way they imagined, could articulate and would like to see as an end product. We wanted to come upto the same level as them with the same vision about the end product. This helped us in identifying and determining the best path to take. And oh boy did the Clusto team brief us properly! We practically became family :)
During the 3-day deep dive, we also conducted persona mapping exercises, brainstorming the way forward, product roadmap and design strategy maps. All these sessions transferred our visions and approach towards product design to the Clusto team as well.
Prior to the deep drive session, we had prepared ourselves by conducting a few interviews with existing and prospective users. We believe that the best way to design a new product is to first get a good sense of what people are currently doing in such scenarios. Armed with this primary research data, and the vision for Clusto from the deep dive session, we hopped towards design.
A few quick sketches and some conceptual clarity later, we decided we needed to explore the users’ psyche a little deeper. We teamed up with the guys at Clusto and took our study to the field. Our intention was not only to study the users but also teach the Clusto team how to conduct these in-depth study sessions. We knew from the start that the team was very perceptive about design and was on its way to becoming independent as far as product design was concerned. We needed to help them get there. This testing and research session was so successful that Clusto team themselves created a brilliant insights report where they clearly documented all findings and relevant insights! Mission accomplished!
At around the same time, we were starting out our Craft fellowship and were ready to start with Batch #1. We were fortunate enough to find the perfect candidate for Clusto and with our rigorous orientation program, he was absolutely ready to join their team and help them with the UX UI level challenges that they were now facing.
All these measured steps and serendipities have helped the clusto team evolve from a 200 users chrome plugin to an independent 2000 user mobile app + a web dashboard. One that works and looks kick ass! We can’t wait for it to be released in the public and hear what you think of it!
