What makes UX Researchers exceptional design sprint facilitators?

Full transcript

Intro

Mina: My research team, speaking from experience, have been trained as design sprint and workshop facilitators. And so far it's been going really great.

Jay: Mina Johnson is the Head of Research at Next Gen inside of ADP. Mina and her team of researchers are building on their existing research skills to build the company's design sprint practice. So Mina joins me today, to talk about all of the skills that researchers already have to become exceptional sprint facilitators. And she's also gonna cover the questions and the challenges that some researchers face in stepping into facilitation. So if you're on the fence or you're thinking about becoming a facilitator, that's good news. And you're gonna want to watch today's episode of Facilitator's Q&A.

Today’s question

Jay: I get hired a lot of time to facilitate design sprint, or design thinking workshop. And more often than not, I'm connected with the researcher on the team. I'll notice that they have all of these facilitation skills. And I'll say, "You would make a great facilitator." And they're like, "No, it's not really what I do. I've never been invited to do it." It seems like they're not connecting the dots or their bosses and managers aren't realizing the power that researchers have to be great facilitators.

So you're the Head of Research for Next Gen at ADP. So knowing what you know about building research teams, I'm curious what we can talk about today to help researchers realize how they can become great facilitators.

Mina: Sure, that's a great hypothesis first of all, and I share it with you. My research teams speaking from experience have been trained as design sprint and workshop facilitators. And so far it's been going really great. And I think the reason why in terms of the skillset of a researcher, having a large overlap with the skillset needed for a good facilitator. So I guess what we could talk about today, we could break down what some of those skills are.

So the first skill that definitely plays in is empathy. Empathy comes in handy when a researcher becomes a facilitator for design sprint and has to connect with a new team of people that they're trying to serve. So folks from product, from sales, from client services, from all reaches of the organization sometimes come together in one group to work together. So for the central point, the facilitator to then connect with each of those people during pre-meetings and then bring them all together for a shared activity I think is really powerful.

Jay: I hear phrases like let the process take care of itself. What you're suggesting is if you don't spend time building that sort of rapport and trust and empathy amongst the group, then your sprint is probably not gonna go as you hoped it would. So empathy is a big one. What else do researchers bring to the table?

Mina: In general, researchers are less biased towards particular designs or solutions, not really leaning in one direction or another coming into a problem. They just really wanna explore the problem itself.

Jay: So what do you think about, then, facilitators being part of the conversation and lending their ideas and perspectives?

Mina: I think that can come into play at select moments. And this ties into another researcher skill which is giving feedback and maybe rephrasing or paraphrasing what was just discussed. "What I've been hearing is this, but what I heard earlier was this other idea, you know, how should we tie these two together? Or should we lean one way or another?" And just kind of guide them that way.

So another strength or set of skills that some researchers bring to the table as facilitators is that they are already familiar with the activities. Whether they know it or not, they may be already familiar with what it's like to run a collaborative journey mapping exercise, something that frames the problem. So if there are a number of activities throughout the course of your three to five-day design sprint it's helpful to feel confident that you've already got a couple of them under your belt as a researcher. And also prior experience with any common challenges that might arise during that kind of exercise.

You know, kind of related to another soft skill is being able to elicit participation from users that are quieter during a research session. That can translate over as well. And so if you're running journey mapping, co-creating a map with a team and you're already comfortable with the framework from your research work, and you're already skilled at eliciting feedback from folks who are quieter, you can run that, sorry, you can run that journey mapping exercise and if your decider or your product folks are very vocal during that exercise, you can then turn the conversation over to the developer in the corner of the room and ask them to contribute and enlist their thoughts into that.

Jay: Where are you seeing researchers get stuck or have challenges in becoming, and leaning into that facilitation role?

Mina: I've noticed so far patterns emerging around not knowing who to pull into a design sprint in the planning phases. I've also noticed that sometimes researchers don't feel as empowered to take charge. But I have also found that if the researchers lean on the right leader to make those connections for them, then they find success in pulling the right group together.

Jay: Crap... (fumbles with phone)

So I'm like forming this vision of a researcher that's quiet and pays attention to the information before speaking up. So how does that, how do they balance that because a lot of the time the facilitator needs to interrupt or get the conversation. Is that something that you're seeing them struggle with?

Mina: That's something that happens depending on the personality of the researcher. So if you do have a quieter style person, they might feel like they need to let the conversation play out till its natural end.

Jay: Cool. These are good ones. What other challenges do researchers face?

Mina: In a design sprint, a lot of times due to the number of people and the liberties that they're given, the empowerment that they have to speak up and take the floor, researchers need to be able to think on their feet and adjust the agenda, adjust the plan, right on the fly. And that can make some types of folks more uncomfortable than others.

In a design sprint I try to make it clear that it's okay if things are a little bumpy. It's okay to fail. If you really mess up the agenda, it's okay. Let's just look at our constraints and see what we can do with it.

Jay: So then the challenges that we covered are not feeling empowered to get the right people or certain people in the room interrupting, which is just a challenge that everyone seems to have as human beings. Being flexible, thinking on their feet versus having their more designed, structured way of conducting research.

Well, so if those are all the challenges, but we wanna inspire researchers to raise their hand and step forward and lead sprints. Do you have like one, like your go-to one tip that would inspire the researchers to lead that first sprint?

Mina: Design sprints can be really daunting to think about facilitating end-to-end as a new facilitator. So my advice is to start small. Always define a really small, actionable, manageable first step. Maybe set up a how might we workshop. You know, go out there and talk to your product leaders or to your managers about buy-in to give you an opportunity to facilitate your first small workshop. And then go from there.

Jay: That seems a lot less-daunting than like, "I've got to get the whole sprint down." Which is like multiple days and multiple activities.

Mina: That's the key, is just feeling good about it. And at the end of the day, asking yourself, "Is this something that I enjoy? Does it bring me joy and how did it go? And do I feel like this is an area that I want to learn more about?" And then go online and check out all your online resources including some of Jay's videos and learn more about some of the watch-outs and tips and tricks facilitating design sprints. And then try another workshop, a different kind. Eventually have those building blocks ready so that when you go into a full design sprint you feel competent with each one.

Jay: Thank you, Mina. I hope that researchers out there watching this are inspired to step forward and lead a sprint. They are really challenging, but like Mina said, you already have a lot of the skills. Thanks so much Mina, appreciate it.

Mina: Thank you so much Jay.

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