Are You Running A Remote Design Sprint? 12 questions you might have.
Two years ago, my Upper Funnel Design team introduced our own version of the Remote Design Sprint. We presented it to UXPA-Boston under the title Our Remote Design Sprint, A toolkit.
Since then, we ran 10+ remote designs sprints and learned a lot in the process. Here are 12 questions you might have.
Suggested pre-read: Our Remote Design Sprint: A Step-by-Step Toolkit.
1. How many people are needed to run a Remote Design Sprint?
You want 2 designers to run the Design Sprint. It helps when running workshops: one is facilitating, the other is managing time, participants’ questions, and taking notes.
2. How do design sprints compare to design thinking?
Design thinking is a global process (Discover, Define, Ideate, Test, Refine) that can leverage relevant methodologies over time. In contrast, Remote Design Sprints offer specific constraints. It defines all the steps and tasks with dedicated timings and expected outputs.
In each step of the remote design sprint, rules of time and tasks keep the team focused on a concrete material that the team will use in the next step. It also allows all participants to contribute simultaneously, regardless of their levels.
3. How do you deal with the bias that emerges from internal people inputting and prioritizing things?
Invite different functions and team representatives that have a say in the final product. When asking other teams isn’t possible, the process captures all information gathered transparently.
Later on, other stakeholders will have the opportunity to see or read what was expressed by the Remote design sprints participants, leveling the field.
4. How many members are there for the design studio activity?
We recommend keeping the group to 10–15 participants max. Using an online board like Miro and the precise process for the Design Studio, it is possible to accommodate up to ~20 people.
5. How do you have team meetings that can last only 30 mins?
We leverage the “alone together” philosophy.
- Gather participants’ opinions and expertise before the meeting by sending a survey.
- Analyze and group answers before the meeting.
- Read the analysis during the meeting and have team members vote on the most important or impactful items. Doing so exposes all participants to each other’s opinions or expertise.
- Ask the team members to add sticky notes for any questions or follow-ups.
6. What are some pitfalls you’ve experienced when making remote design sprints? When does it not work out as planned?
Here are some of them:
Not preparing enough in advance:
- Make a copy of all the templates: project checklist in a spreadsheet, miro board with all activities, slide deck of each step, surveys, etc. This gives a clear idea of all the steps and how to prepare for them.
- Project owners need to be onboarded early enough. Set a specific time with your Product Manager to align on who will own what during the design sprint. They need to feel good about the entire process.
- Book time on people’s calendars two weeks in advance.
Not setting expectations enough:
- Make sure people understand the output: user tested mocks with a list of specific refinements, and the outcome: an idea has been validated or needs iteration.
- Commitment is necessary from the remote design sprint participants. About 4 or 5 hours total.
- Share a clear view of the schedule of all the steps when kicking off the process. Include pictures of the outcome of each step.
- Communicate that a design sprint is the beginning of the process. The design team will be involved and work with engineers and product managers after.
- Make your schedule visible on your calendar, block the entire week(s), email auto-responses, and Slack status. On all these, write, “In a Design Sprint from DD/MM to DD/MM, expect delayed answers.”
7. How do you facilitate concept sketching in an entirely remote setting?
The most crucial aspect is designing fast and freely with a high volume of ideas. So we ask participants to sketch on paper and take a picture of their sketch. Participants write details on digital sticky notes in Miro to ensure the concepts are self-explanatory.
8. Do you do any initial research before the Vision phase? If so, do you bring any research insight artifacts into that meeting for reference?
The team can start the vision phase with or without prior research (quantitative and qualitative). If there is no research available, we recommend adding some time between the Vision and Creation phase to do some light Adhoc research talking to internal experts, creating proto journey maps, etc.
When knowledge is available, it is shared with the vision survey (remote sailboat workshop) asynchronously with a slide deck. Reading the documentation is required before answering the survey to ensure shared context. We include:
- A link with the necessary documentation to read as a first section of the survey with a required question stating, “I have read the documentation”.
- A Q&A session during kickoff, the vision workshop, or expert talks, so participants can openly ask questions.
9. Do you include a summary after each day and a morning recap?
Transparency and constant communication are necessary for a Design Sprint. We always have a dedicated slack channel for all project members with a simple daily recap of what has happened each day. It usually comprises a quick paragraph of text with a link to the dedicated frame in Miro.
10. How do you get stakeholders to participate in these and stay available and engaged as needed throughout the remote design sprint?
We never had issues bringing or engaging stakeholders in a design sprint because it is a rare time of intense collaboration between different stakeholders and functions.
If stakeholders are challenging you, communicate that the process allows to create and validate an idea with actual customers within a few weeks. This is often appealing. The straightforward steps and clear outputs will build momentum throughout the process.
11. How deep do you prototype? Do you design and prototype all the interactions? How do you define them?
For a completely new idea, aim for low-fidelity mocks. If you have a robust design system and readily available banks of realistic content (imagery, copy, products, etc.), aim for higher fidelity prototypes.
We prototype critical interactions and the experience flow, including the screen before, during, and after.
- We use “fake doors” to let participants interact with any elements they want. We make a simple unbranded screen that says “end of prototype, return to the previous page” with a back button. This allows users to click or tap on anything more naturally.
Definitions of these steps are based on the flow defined by the team in the vision phase.
12. How many remote sprints did it take for you to feel the process was well-tuned? How do you measure success?
Every team, project, organization, and function has its own set of constraints. For a given context, three design sprints should feel enough to be comfortable running it and onboarding a new designer/facilitator.
We measure success by seeing the ideas generated from the sprint successfully translated to real-world products. Many of the live Wayfair experiences came from Remote design sprints! We also run a retrospective at the end of the process.
If the remote design sprint envisioned a north star experience with cross-functional leads across the company, or if there was something notable that was unlocked, at Wayfair we encourage a Case Study readout to share wins, learnings and optimization opportunities. These types of programs allow for shared knowledge across teams!
Thank you for reading.
Norman Wozniak is currently the Associate Director of Product Design for Marketing Landing and Promotions Experiences at Wayfair.
About Wayfair’s Global Experience Design Community
Global Experience Design at Wayfair is a cross-disciplinary function including product design, user research, and content strategy. We create experiences for all of our end-users, including suppliers, customers, agents, field champions, and internal employees. The Wayfair experience supports our mission to be the destination for all things home, helping everyone, anywhere create their feeling of home. Join the team reinventing how we shop for it. 🎉
Resources:
Our Remote Design Sprint: A Step-by-Step Toolkit
Big kuddos to my current and past team members in running and improving our Remote Design Sprint process, in particular: Emily Thompson, Lauren Lamperski, Sam Morrison, Weinan Li
