Published on <a href="http://ift.tt/2p441nq">| Prototyping: From UX to Front End &mdash; Medium</a> Skjoldbroder <img alt="" src="http://ift.tt/2pGxHuO">
The British Design Council developed the Double Diamond model in 2005. It is still a good conceptual tool for understanding and talking about creative processes, user-centered design, and wicked problems. But the world has changed since 2005. The design field has accomplished a lot of things since then, not least of which is the Google Ventures Design Sprint. I was curious how design sprints would complement and alter the Double Diamond model. This brief article is an exploration and clarification of that idea.
<img alt="" src="http://ift.tt/2p45Z7j">Above: The British Design Council’s “Double Diamond” process model.
Pictured above is the BDC’s DD model (incidentally, do also check out <a href="http://ift.tt/1TPfpMg">Dan Nessler’s article on his revised DD model</a>). The model basically conceptualises a creative process as problem discovery, problem definition, concept development and delivering a tested solution.
Enter Google Ventures design sprints, which has at its core a very simple idea: “what if we took a shortcut and went straight to learning if our idea is desirable? What if we could learn about this without actually building or delivering anything?
<img alt="" src="http://ift.tt/2p4aEGm">Design Sprints take a shortcut directly to learning about an idea
In a design sprint you run a short, 1-week learning loop where you build <a href="http://ift.tt/2pGff5G">pretotypes</a> and test them with users. There is only one goal: to learn about your ideas, design concept, assumptions, questions…
Now obviously the process you follow in the Double Diamond way of thinking is also about learning — but on a larger time scale! The short turnaround time of design sprints is one of the reasons it is such a potent tool: you rapidly gain feedback and learn, which lets you make decisions and stay agile! The Double Diamond approach, however, has other merits, such as the user centered research phases – which is why a combination of the two could be beneficial. Here is how this might look:
<img alt="" src="http://ift.tt/2p47Pp3">The insights that come out of the “Define” phase can be tested by running one or more sprints
As the model above hopefully shows, the initial discover + define stages in the DD model result in a number of insights / decisions regarding areas to focus on. These are based on user research, which is good! But we still need to learn whether we have made good decisions — design sprints allow us to do this.
At this point you might ask “why should we need to complicate a perfectly good and simple model?”. Such a question would lead me to two shortcomings of the Double Diamond model: 1) it doesn’t account for time spent (i.e. cost), 2) it doesn’t show how or when risk is reduced. Both are pretty obvious parameters in a development process. You might even say risk and cost reduction is the entire point of following a structured design process. You do it, because you want to avoid screwing up and building something nobody wants, right?. Below is an augmented visualisation including time and risk:
<img alt="" src="http://ift.tt/2pGsof7">Adding risk and time spent to the visualisation highlights WHY design sprints are good idea. In essence, they are risk reduction.
The final point I want to make, then, is this: fusing the DD model with Design Sprints makes it possible to reach a greater risk reduction earlier in the process, with less time spent. It also combines a user-centric research phase with quick validation og insights and decisions. Combining the two approaches could be a highly rational move in a fast-paced world.
Thanks for reading! I hope you got something out of this, and I would love to discuss it further if you have anything to add or criticise.
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<a href="http://ift.tt/2pGkZfI">Reduce risk/cost by fusing Design Sprints and the Double Diamond process</a> was originally published in <a href="http://ift.tt/2cAqCpx">Prototyping: From UX to Front End</a> on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Reduce risk/cost by fusing Design Sprints and the Double Diamond process

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