$30 off During Our Annual Pro Sale. View Details »

Forging rock solid design disciplines

Forging rock solid design disciplines

Embedding designers within multidisciplinary delivery teams is all the rage. But as a leader, with your design team scattered throughout many teams, how can you cultivate an environment where your designers can grow their skills, benefit from each others unique specialisations, and develop their confidence to stand up as a user advocate within their product team? Let’s explore how establishing a design guild can help bridge these gaps & build an even stronger team.

Laura Van Doore

May 11, 2018
Tweet

More Decks by Laura Van Doore

Other Decks in Design

Transcript

  1. FORGING ROCK SOLID
    Design Disciplines
    Laura Van Doore

    @lauravandoore


    View Slide

  2. Looking at design cultures through the lens of:
    SaaS & Startups Large Enterprise Agency
    Government
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  3. Managing Designers is hard.
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  4. A quick look at design team models
    DESIGN HISTORY LESSON
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  5. Centralised Teams
    • The ‘Agency’ model
    • Designers work in one team in shared space.
    • Other teams approach the central design team
    with projects
    • Great for creating a strong design disciplines, but
    other parts of the product delivery cycle can suffer.
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  6. Decentralised Teams
    • The ‘Agile’ approach
    • Each designer is assigned to a cross-functional team
    • Designers have great autonomy, but it can be
    challenging to develop their skills further
    • Designers can feel isolated and disconnected from
    their peers
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  7. Hybrid Teams
    • The ‘Blended’ model
    • Designers are embedded in agile teams, but
    regularly return to a central ‘design guild’
    • Benefits from cross-functional collaboration, but
    retains a strong sense of design culture
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  8. 3 Models for Design teams
    CROSS-FUNCTIONAL MODELS
    TRADITIONAL MODEL
    CENTRALISED DECENTRALISED HYBRID
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  9. • Aligned with agile delivery methods

    Designers working within delivery teams to shape outcomes
    • Better communication, faster product development

    Less chance of communication breakdowns, and bottlenecking
    • No ‘us vs them’

    Fosters a collaborative culture across disciplines to build great products
    The Benefits of cross-functional teams
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  10. Cross-functional teams
    EXPECTATIONS REALITY
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  11. Challenges of managing designers
    in cross-functional teams
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  12. Isolating Designers
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  13. Isolating designers

    Designers have more autonomy, but less support &
    guidance to turn to when they need it, and less
    development/progression opportunities.

    The Challenges
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  14. Generalist Fever
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  15. Generalist Fever

    In cross-functional teams, all designers tend to be
    treated as if they have perfectly matching skill sets

    • How can we utilise design specialisations?

    Designers will have different strengths & weaknesses, but
    how can you benefit from these if no one works together?

    The Challenges
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  16. Inconsistent Outputs
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  17. Inconsistent Deliverables

    Since output from designers can vary radically from
    one designer to the next, no one really knows what to
    expect from a designer in their cross-functional team.

    The Challenges
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  18. Designers feel outnumbered
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  19. Designers feel outnumbered

    It can be exhausting for designers to be the solo
    design & user advocate in their delivery team.
    Engineering priorities can easily overtake UX priorities

    The Challenges
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  20. Drawing inspiration from Ancient Greek Military strategy
    ACTUAL HISTORY LESSON
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  21. The Spartan Phalanx
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  22. The Spartan Phalanx
    • Forms a ‘wall of shields’
    • Fought in formation in a highly organised
    and disciplined manner
    • Each Spartan uses his shield to protect
    the man to his left
    • Codified, streamlined battle training
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  23. GETTING STARTED WITH A
    Design Guild
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  24. The things you’ll need
    • Your design team
    • A dedicated time slot each week to meet together

    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  25. Codify Together
    #1
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  26. The Idea:
    Set aside one day every 6 months for designing
    the way you work together.
    Codify Together
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  27. Codify Together
    • Uniformity vs fluidity

    Decide as a team what should be locked in & where there’s some flexibility. 


    E.g. At Fathom, we require Sketch for high fidelity UI, but wireframes &
    prototypes can be designed in your tool of choice.
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  28. Codify Together
    • Templates and guides for common UX deliverables

    As a team, design the best possible templates for Personas, Empathy Maps,
    Journey Maps, and other common design deliverables your team produces.
    This saves time from everyone creating their own versions, standardises the
    outputs, and helps newly onboard designers get productive as fast as possible.
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  29. Design Pairing
    #2
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  30. The Idea:
    Instead of having one designer on
    100% of one project, split two
    designers 50% across two projects.
    Design Pairing
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  31. Design Pairing
    The Reality:
    • More design iteration, happening at a faster cadence
    • Two designers will continually challenge each others
    concepts until they are solid
    • Work doesn’t grind to a halt if someone gets ill
    • Benefits from cross-pollination
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  32. A Book Apart
    club
    #3
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  33. The Idea:
    Reading the same short book,
    and discussing it as a group a
    month later.
    A Book Apart
    club
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  34. The Reality:
    Realising way too late that
    everyone in our team had
    different tolerances for
    reading.
    A Book Apart
    club
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  35. A Book Apart
    club
    Failure
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  36. Pitch & Enrich
    #4
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  37. The Idea:
    Each member pitches their latest
    design concepts to the group. 


    The group offers constructive
    criticism & tries to ‘enrich’ the
    design further.
    Pitch & Enrich
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  38. The Reality:
    • More robust design choices
    • Better presentation skills
    • Support, guidance and validation for designers throughout
    their design process
    • Identify early when experiences are feeling inconsistent
    Pitch & Enrich
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  39. Universal Design

    Presentations
    #5
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  40. The Idea:
    Read & research a principle
    outlined in the book 

    ‘Universal Principles of Design’
    1 week later, give a 10 minute
    interactive presentation to the
    rest of the design guild.
    Universal Design Presentations
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  41. Universal Design Presentations
    The Reality:
    A complete success.
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  42. BENEFITS:
    • Improved team presentation and public speaking skills.
    • Challenged designers to present concepts creatively &
    persuasively.
    • All designers became fluent across a standard set of
    principles and terminology.
    Universal Design Presentations
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  43. Codify Together
    1
    Design Pairing
    A Book(club) Apart
    Pitch & Enrich
    Universal Design Presentations
    2
    3
    4
    5
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  44. Don’t forget to take stock
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  45. Don’t forget to take stock
    Regularly ask your designers what they need
    out of their guild time.
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  46. Crafting a ‘Design Phalanx’
    ? ? ? ?
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  47. Crafting a ‘Design Phalanx’
    Core Design
    Principles
    Codified
    Deliverables
    Discipline
    Strengthening
    Design Pairing
    (No lone wolves)
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide

  48. Thanks
    Laura Van Doore
    @lauravandoore

    View Slide