As with any other area related to Product Development, Product Design involves major challenges. Understanding users and building a solution that solves a problem for them can feel like finding a needle in a haystack, and bridging the gap between business ideas and users' needs and expectations can be very difficult.
As it happens, around 90% of startups in the USA fail. How businesses approach Product Design can help them overcome the main challenges involved and increase their odds of success. That said, Design Sprints have proven to be one of the most efficient and effective ways to solve the main design challenges. Let's explore that further.
Why Should Companies Implement Design Sprints?
Following the essence of Design Thinking, Design Sprints have a strong focus on putting real users as the heart and soul of the Product Design process.
Sprints are a fast-paced method that blends users' needs and business requirements. Ever since Google Ventures developed this methodology, countless businesses have used it to drive massive growth, including Adidas, Lego, and Slack. Yet, note that the benefits of Sprints also apply to businesses that start from nearly nothing.
The process engages multiple teams, helping bring as many ideas to the table as possible. It forces teams to work under extremely tight time constraints. In fact, the goal is to validate a business idea with a usable prototype in a single week.
At the same time, Product Designers collaborate closely with stakeholders to make sure products align with business goals. As a result, it optimizes the use of business resources, including time, money, and human talent, to get the best results.
Note that Design Sprints are normally used to help validate business ideas with a prototype that will then become a Minimum Viable Product (MVP), yet they can also be used to refine existing products or develop new features.
For example, with Design Sprints, Anthropic drafted the prototype for its AI assistant, Claude, in only five days. Contrariwise, Netflix also used a Sprint to build its top ten rows showing relevant and personalized content.
7 Design Challenges Design Sprints Can Solve
1. Audiences
No business can build user-centric products if they don't deeply understand their target audiences. Design Sprints dedicate an entire phase that involves the entire team to understanding and empathizing with real users.
The goal is to gain meaningful insights about the experience users have when facing a specific problem.
Product Designers can conduct direct interviews, thorough research, and use techniques like experience mapping to understand users' problems better.
They get feedback very early on that they can later use to define a solution that addresses their real problems. Then, they share the knowledge with everyone on the team to ensure everyone is on the same page.
2. Validation
Validating a business idea can be one of the most challenging aspects of Product Design. What’s more, idea Validation has a major impact on how well products do when they reach their intended audience.
Here, Design Sprints helps teams validate ideas as quickly as possible, separating assumptions from users' real problems early on in the design process.
In this manner, businesses can figure out if they're going in the wrong direction fast and implement the necessary adjustments.
Note that Design Sprints can also help future-proof business ideas, making sure they are sustainable and adaptable in the long run.
3. Innovation
Even if you understand users' needs very well, it can be hard to come up with potential solutions to their problems. That can be even harder if you want to build a unique product that stands out from the competition.
Designs Sprints foster creative and collaborative environments by getting ideas from multiple teams. During the second phase of a Design Sprint, which is called "Sketch," teams bring as many potential ideas to the table as possible.
By putting users at the center of the design process, getting their feedback early on, and empathizing with them, it's much easier for teams to innovate and create products that resonate with users.
Considering a wide range of ideas from different people helps discover unique ways to provide value. Studies show that around 83% of companies rank innovation in their top three priorities, yet only 3% qualify as innovative. Design Sprints can be an excellent tool to cope with that persistent problem!
4. Communication
Product Designers are in constant and close communication with their whole team, developers, and sometimes people from marketing and sales.
They need to make sure everyone is on the same page and understands product requirements to make designs consistent, and they must ensure developers align with the design vision and users' needs as they build the final product.
Communication errors can lead to long delays and duplicate efforts, yet Design Sprints work this out by engaging with developers from the very beginning of the design process. As a result, developers get a much better understanding of the product they will be working on even before the prototype is ready.
5. Expectations
By involving partners in the Design Sprint, designers can help ensure the product aligns with long-term goals.
Since partners can see the work from its earliest stages, it's much easier to make sure they are on the same page with designers, which gives them clearer and more realistic expectations about deliverables.
Better alignment between the Design team and partners can help reduce the number of iterations and speed up time to market.
6. Resources
Whether they want to launch an MVP or develop a new feature, projects can involve a large amount of business resources.
Just to give you a rough idea, the average cost of developing an app in the US ranges from around 80,000 USD.
Consider that these costs can escalate to much higher numbers if the project involves Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, or the Internet of Things.
With Design Sprints, businesses can future-proof their idea on a budget, helping ensure the product will drive growth and revenue.
Plus, they encourage teams to work under very strict time constraints, helping businesses save both money and time. Research and ideation in traditional approaches to Product Design can take months, yet in a Sprint, these phases last a single day each.
Here, Sprints represent low risk and costs, which can help businesses save money and work with limited resources.
7. Decision-Making
The fast-paced nature of Design Sprints encourages teams to make informed decisions quickly based on feedback from real users. With Design Sprints, teams focus on getting valid results and tangible outcomes fast instead of wasting precious time in endless discussions.
By the end of the third day or stage (Decide) in a Design Sprint, teams will have defined the solution they will use to build a prototype the following day. Since there's only a single day for each phase in the Design Sprint process, teams are forced to prioritize tasks. That can help make quicker and more effective solutions.
Conclusion
The implementation of Design Sprints can help solve some of the most significant challenges of the Product Design process.
By building a realistic prototype in one week, businesses can gain valuable insights and answer critical business questions to create innovative solutions. Keep in mind the team or agency you work with plays a major role in the efficacy of Design Sprints.
With over 14 years of experience in Product Design, we'll be pleased to tell you more about our unique approach to bringing business ideas to life. Feel free to reach out if you have any questions.
