Design. Handover. Document. Launch.

The goal at this stage is to research to understand the problem from all the perspectives.

Small interviews or surveys with the stakeholders, end-users and subject matter experts (SME), are the core of the investigation. However, external research (competitor analyses...) is also fundamental to get the bigger picture.

Data must be structured and synthesized before it can become useful. I find this stage the most tedious and rewarding of all, since it requires plenty of analytical thoughts but it establishes the requirements of the solution.

I like to summarize all the findings into a problem statement, because this is the ultimate goal of the whole project. I use other definition techniques for the design work too: empathy map, affinity diagrams, MOSCOW, user flows...

This step is where creativity, powered by the findings from the previous stage, takes over. Although am generally the only designer in the project, I enjoy analysing how to optimize the product in every dimension: changing the workflow, rearranging parts of the UI...

Once I am satisfied with one or two solutions, I conduct an initial validation with subject matter experts (SMEs). After refining the design further, I present the enhanced version to project managers and other stakeholders for official internal approval. I highly advise validating the most critical features with end-users before proceeding to the development phase.

Finally the development team is introduced to the design solution and start building the product. In this phase, I stay in the backstage simply supporting the team by answering any questions and providing all the specifications needed.

The quality of the design is ensured througout the development by adding me as a reviewer in their front-end pull requests, and/or conducting design audits.