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As product designers, one of the challenges we often face is to come up with new products or features in a short time frame, whether that’s at work or during a job hunt. More often than not, the prompts of these assignments tend to be brief and the problems are likely open-ended. Without a lot of specifics, how can we create something meaningful without designing haphazardly and feeling overwhelmed? Having gone through multiple projects like this, I’ve learned to stick to the 3 principles below so I can navigate these situations more easily. I’m sharing them here and hope that you’ll find them helpful.
Do Just Enough Research
Sidenote: there’s a book written by Erica Hall named Just Enough Research. I haven’t read the book yet so I’m not sure if this section contains anything in common with it.
Research is the backbone of user-centered design. It informs or validates our value proposition so we don’t pluck product features out of thin air. However, doing research takes time. Real-world projects can either be so messy or move so fast that we don’t have the luxury to conduct any primary research. I remember in grad school, our team was given three months for the research part for our capstone project. At work, I’m given only less than 4 to 6 weeks for the entire project. In a job interview, candidates typically only have less than 15 hours to complete the entire design exercise. Under such circumstances, we can only afford to spend limited time on research, doing just enough so we can get everything done(including mockups/prototypes) on time.
This is where observations, assumptions, common sense, and secondary research should step in. These can all be inspirations, so jot them down when they pop into our head or when we notice them. Observation of a phenomenon, a user pain point or a user behavior can give us ideas on what problem to solve and what to design. Assumptions can make the user problem complete and help us move forward. Whenever possible, use secondary research and common sense to validate assumptions, because by definition, they are subjective and not always correct.
Another tool I like to use during the research/planning stage is scenarios. It goes hand-in-hand with the 5W1H framework. Scenarios can help us think about the user problem in rich details: Who’s in this scenario? When and where is he? What problem is he facing that needs to be solved? What are his needs and goals in this context…
