1. Product design at Wiredcraft
How we design stuff that doesn’t suck

2. Who the f**k is that guy? Ronan Berder CEO (aka Chief Janitor Officer)
WeChat: hunvreus
I know a thing or two about design
I’m French and will swear like a pirate

3. Big WeChat thingy (the marketing team made me)

4. What is this all about? Submit you to some shameless plug
Understand what’s hard about designing products
Show you how we solve it & hopefully that is useful for your team too

5. About us Shameless plug I warned you about...

6. In a nutshell...
We help Fortune 500, non-profits and startups build digital products
30+ engineers , designers & strategists
3 countries with offices in NYC, DC, Berlin & Shanghai
100+ clients including CNN, the World Bank, Apple, the United Nations, Starbucks...

7. Wait… what? We think, design and build Web & mobile apps
This means we work on many related things Data science, DevOps, Strategy & stuff…
We work on sh*t that matters:
Things at scale Building mobile apps for millions of users
Things with an impact Building software to run the elections of Myanmar

8. Look at ‘em clients!

9. The problem There has to be one, otherwise why would I be here?

10. How to f*ck things up Let’s get started asap
Let’s obsess about the details that includes technology & graphic design
Let’s design by committee (yuck!) or in a silo (double yuck!)

11. Really..? Why? Yep! Even “pros” fall for it.
Failure doesn’t care about your likes on Dribbble
That’s why we have a process

12. Our process I know you guys love a good process

13. Is that even working?
It’s not perfect, but it weeds out the obvious fuckups
It adds constraints, and constraints are good for creativity
It defines what success looks like and that’s probably the most important thing

14. Ok, what does it look like?
Understand: set up the context and outline the problems and goals you're designing for.
Diverge: generate as many solutions as possible.
Converge: align the team around one idea.
Prototype: quickly build a prototype you can test.
Validate: test the prototype with users.

15. We totally ripped it off
“Inspired” from Google Ventures
Moar on our website (shameless plug again): How we design products

16. Understand Goal: Frame the discussion & list goals
Tools: interviews (see our Google Forms), data, moodboards…
Deliverables:
Pitch
Critical user story
Definition of success (seriously)

17. Diverge Goal: Generate ideas to solve the identified problem.
Tools: wireframes & userflows (doodles!!!)
Deliverables:
Wireframes & userflows for the critical user story
Notes about each other's solutions

18. How we run it...
Each individual/team sketches at least 3 versions of the user flow and UI.
Teams/individuals then go around and silently evaluate others work.
You can then open the discussion to the whole group to explain and debate the solutions generated.

19. Wireframes & Mockups

20. Userflows

21. Converge Goal: Pick a variation you will prototype.
Tools: wireframes & userflows (doodles again!!!)
Deliverables:
A single userflow
A list of assumptions and how to test them

22. Prototype Goal: Build a prototype to test.
Tools: Keynote, Powerpoint, Google Docs, Marvel, Invision, Dreamweaver (just kidding)...
Deliverables:
A simple prototype that can be tested
A scenario to test the prototype

23. Validate Goal: Test the prototype and validate our assumptions
Tools: Skype, Google Talk, ...
Deliverables:
Notes about what works and what doesn’t
Validation/invalidation of assumptions

24. Keep these in mind... Move as fast as possible and iterate.
Sketching is always the first step.
Content and function drive the design discussion, not the other way around.
Work on as few elements as possible.
Steal ideas from others.
Be transparent; update others of your progress.

25. Are you not entertained? Also: questions?

26. The WeChat thingy, again (I still blame the marketing team)