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Framing
The Framing Process
Determine what piece of value will be most valued by your users.
Length
2 Weeks
Participants
Key decision maker, relevant subject matter experts, core team, neutral facilitator
Why Do It
- You don’t want to boil the ocean
- You are building something your users will value
- You will avoid the sunken-cost fallacy
- You will surface risks up front and better prepare for them
- You will have external team buy-in to help deliver your solutions if they are needed
When To Do It
- Once you’ve aligned on the top problem to solve
- Before you’ve begun development
How To Do It
- Journey Map
- Design Studio
- Design Critique
- Lean Experiments
- Sailboard Futurespective
- Outcome-Oriented Roadmap
- Event Storming
- Value Stream Mapping
- Service Blueprint
- Risks and Mitigations
- Team Working Agreements
Introduction
Framing is a critical stage of your solution strategy, where many possible solutions to your main problem statement are brainstormed, critiqued, and tested with your users. It utilizes divergence and convergence product philosophies to isolate a singular “golden nugget” of work that is of high value to your users.
It involves:
- Generating and vetting ideas
- Envisioning what success feels like and working backwards to arrive there
- Learning what internal obstacles are in the way of being successful
- Building alignment and buy-in from external teams to help you reach your goals.
It is the intermediate step between your Discovery and Build phases.
Journey Map
- Document user steps from their point of view
- Record emotions at each step with reasonings behind each
- Record opportunities to solve each
Design Studio
- Research: look at solutions in other industries to see how they handle your general issues
- Notes: document your favourite research items
- Ideas: record your first solution ideas
- Crazy 8’s: generate multiple solutions in a timed exercise
- Solution Sketch: refine the best ideas into a more detailed solution
Design Critique
- Specific and Kind feedback on solutions being generated from the Design Studio exercise
- Build team alignment around solutions that work best
Lean Experiments
- Validate the best ideas after your Design Critique with real people
- Measure reactions, not feedback
“Sailboat” Futurespective
- A looking forward exercise: Imagine the goal and how you’ve arrived there
- Note what events would have to have happened to achieve these results
Outcome-Oriented Roadmap
- Align on fence posts based on desired outcomes from the futurespective
- Align on milestones for the solution being implemented
Event Storming (may require multiple sessions)
- Learn about the architecture
- Learn what obstacles may be in the way as the solution becomes a reality
Value Stream Mapping
- Map the stages of delivering customer value from the POV of your internal activities.
- Document information relating to how work arrives at each checkpoint, as well as cycle and lead times
Service Blueprint
- Document everything that goes into the full user experience in real-time
- Separate activities by swim lanes so see handoffs between user, business, and IT activities.
Risks and Mitigations
- Determine likely obstacles in the way of success and how to avoid them
Team Working Agreements
- Stakeholder map
- Agree on how the work will be delivered and by whom