Discovery phase: UX activities & research methods to consider

Including a curated list of resources for students, and young professionals.

Illustration by Freepik Stories: Most of the time, the design of a new project, service, product, or feature starts with a discovery phase.

Almost any design cycle for a new project, service, product, or feature starts with a discovery phase. During this phase, we usually collaborate with business and other stakeholders to:

• research the landscape and gain insights about the current situation
• define our challenge and frame the right problem to solve
• collect insights and align on our first steps for the next phase

There are many standard UX Methods and Activities, and I know from the experience I have with my students that it’s quite tricky for young designers to decide which would be the most appropriate to combine for each Design Phase.

This article will concentrate my efforts on the first phase of the design cycle and try to walk you through the UX Workshops and User Research Methods that we may combine and use in our project’s Discovery Phase.

Illustration by Freepik Stories: We facilitate a shared vision amongst stakeholders, and gain alignment on the next steps

As UXers, our primary goals during this phase are

• to familiarize ourselves with the current situation and the problem at hand
• to understand our users and their needs and investigate opportunities
• to build bridges with internal and external stakeholders across departments, and find allies to support our work within the organization
• to facilitate a shared vision amongst stakeholders, and gain alignment on the next steps

Based on our project objectives, our process and performed activities should and will vary. We may choose to use only a few of the activities below or consider and apply more if our project requires it.

During the Discovery Phase, we facilitate several workshops and user research sessions. For example, it’s pretty common to conduct one or more of the following: