7-step design process to help you daily

Robson Neves
UX Collective
Published in
5 min readNov 4, 2019

When working in an international company it is natural to find people with culture, languages, and behaviors completely different from yours. Each one has its own methods when it comes to work, especially in a design team where the final results and processes are not exact sciences.

In one of the companies I used to work, it wasn’t different. Each one used to work in their own way: some designers spending time deep-diving into the problems understanding the “whys,” while others quickly coming up with hypotheses and testing them as fast as possible. Even though all the design tasks were achieved in time, misunderstandings between the design team, developers, and stakeholders used to happen from time to time. It was compromising our results and we needed to solve this issue as fast as possible.

Conveniently, during some research, I found a promising article talking about a “design checklist”. Reading the article, I realized that it could be a tool to help us solve our problems, or at least, it could be a guide for creating our own checklist.

While discussing the idea with the design team, we noticed that many items from the “design checklist” weren’t in our routines, and many others that we were doing weren’t on the checklist neither. As a result, we realized that our process was inadequate and had a few gaps. That checklist was the sparkle to understand that it was time for reviewing and aligning our design process.

A week later, we organized a workshop to review the common processes within the team. On a white wall, we mapped out each one’s routines. First, UX Researchers started explaining their methodologies and deliverables, then the designers explained their methodologies and responsibilities about exploration, prototyping, and testing steps.

During the conversation, naturally, the 5 items of Design Thinking (Emphasize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test) started to stand out on the wall, and curiously apart from them, a few other important steps started to come up as well, they were Hand-off, Supporting & Review, and Tracking.

These 3 extra topics had extreme importance to our process and the team’s way of working. We had to take them into consideration to ensure we ship consistent and meaningful solutions as well as making sure they would be properly implemented by the developers. As a result of this workshop, we ended up with a realistic design process.

The process looked something like this:

1 — Research

Mixing a bit of the “Emphasize” and the “Define” phases of the Design Thinking methodology, the Research step consists of gaining an empathic understanding of the problem, as well as the user pains and needs. Of course, always making sure the goal is aligned with the business strategy.

The main outcomes here, are insights, and data that provide clarity for our future hypotheses and decisions.

2 — Exploration

Here we formulate the hypothetical solutions based on the requirements, and data provided by UX researchers. Through user journeys, flows, wireframes, etc. we validate the propositions with the Product Owner, developers, and stakeholders. If possible, Concept Testing with users is recommended.

3 — Prototyping

As the name says, it is time to open your favorite software and play.

High fidelity prototypes allow turning the hypotheses into “tangible” solutions, and it ensures that everyone has the same interpretation of what is being discussed.

This is a long phase, sometimes with lots of back and forth, so it is highly recommended to use a design system to help you keep the high quality without losing speed. After rounds of improvements, the prototype will be validated on usability testings and development planning.

4 — Validation

Let’s finally check if our hypotheses are true. By doing qualitative tests, you can certify that the usability is great, and detect flaws in the user journey. With quantitative methods, it’s possible to check how the KPIs are doing and also some behavioral metrics.

5 — Hand-off

With the solutions properly validated on hands, it’s time for documenting the learnings from the tests and hand off the solution. In a kick-off meeting, the results can be presented to PMs, and later the final designs delivered to developers, who will be starting planning the development.

6 — Supporting And Review

Sometimes things don’t go as expected, and we need to change a few points. For that, developers need the designer’s support to make the best decisions. Sometimes, they just need a small asset or align some expectations.

One thing to highlight is that before they close a design task, a quality assurance review will ensure that everything is following the design proposal, I even use to have this in the DOD (Definition of done). It’s the designers’ responsibility to make sure the quality of the final deliverables, interactions, and behaviors are following the product standards.

7 — Tracking

It’s highly recommended to watch the solution for a couple of weeks to see if everything goes as planned. So, set the metrics in your favorite analytical tool, I like to use Google Analytics. Hotjar is another powerful tool that allows me to watch some real sections.

Applied to a Kanban board, these 7 steps are being used continuously by the design team. We now have a clear view of all tasks. It’s much easier to manage time and catch-up on the projects. The kanban is reviewed weekly by the Head of Design and team members to unlock blocked tasks and update everyone. I also created a check-list file as a “take away” from this whole process.

Download it here.

This check-list is not a magical solution because as we know, every company has its processes, and every design team works on its way. However, it can be a guide if you are lost or maybe an inspiration for your own checklist. Feel free to share and adapt it according to your needs, and if you have any questions or suggestions, leave a comment below. I hope that it helps you as much as it has been helping me.

Sign up to discover human stories that deepen your understanding of the world.

Free

Distraction-free reading. No ads.

Organize your knowledge with lists and highlights.

Tell your story. Find your audience.

Membership

Read member-only stories

Support writers you read most

Earn money for your writing

Listen to audio narrations

Read offline with the Medium app

Published in UX Collective

We believe designers are thinkers as much as they are makers. Curated stories on UX, Visual & Product Design. https://linktr.ee/uxc

No responses yet

What are your thoughts?