The document outlines crucial truths for creating great product experiences, emphasizing the importance of user-centered design and incorporating user feedback into the development process. It discusses various elements of user experience, including visual design, interaction design, and the importance of research to inform product decisions. Additionally, it advocates for agile methodologies and fast iterations to refine products based on real user interactions and preferences.

1. 10 truths to great
Product Experiences
agile / user experience /
research / methods /
business value / product fit

2. @jeremyjohnson

3. WORKED FOR

4. WORKED WITH

6. “Uncover user needs,
Design great solutions,
and build out solutions to launch.”

7. 10 truths to great
Product Experiences

8. Quick note
around User Experience

9. The Elements of User Experience
A basic duality: The Web was originally conceived as a hypertextual information space;
but the development of increasingly sophisticated front- and back-end technologies has
fostered its use as a remote software interface. This dual nature has led to much confusion,
as user experience practitioners have attempted to adapt their terminology to cases beyond
the scope of its original application. The goal of this document is to define some of these
terms within their appropriate contexts, and to clarify the underlying relationships among
these various elements.
Jesse James Garrett
jjg@jjg.net
Visual Design: graphic treatment of interface
elements (the "look" in "look-and-feel")
Information Architecture: structural design
of the information space to facilitate
intuitive access to content
Interaction Design: development of
application flows to facilitate user tasks,
defining how the user interacts with
site functionality
Navigation Design: design of interface
elements to facilitate the user's movement
through the information architecture
Information Design: in the Tuftean sense:
designing the presentation of information
to facilitate understanding
Functional Specifications: "feature set":
detailed descriptions of functionality the site
must include in order to meet user needs
User Needs: externally derived goals
for the site; identified through user research,
ethno/techno/psychographics, etc.
Site Objectives: business, creative, or other
internally derived goals for the site
Content Requirements: definition of
content elements required in the site
in order to meet user needs
Interface Design: as in traditional HCI:
design of interface elements to facilitate
user interaction with functionality
Information Design: in the Tuftean sense:
designing the presentation of information
to facilitate understanding
Web as software interface Web as hypertext system
Visual Design: visual treatment of text,
graphic page elements and navigational
components
Concrete
Abstract
time
Conception
Completion
Functional
Specifications
Content
Requirements
Interaction
Design
Information
Architecture
Visual Design
Information Design
Interface Design Navigation Design
Site Objectives
User Needs
User Needs: externally derived goals
for the site; identified through user research,
ethno/techno/psychographics, etc.
Site Objectives: business, creative, or other
internally derived goals for the site
This picture is incomplete: The model outlined here does not account for secondary considerations (such as those arising during technical or content development)
that may influence decisions during user experience development. Also, this model does not describe a development process, nor does it define roles within a
user experience development team. Rather, it seeks to define the key considerations that go into the development of user experience on the Web today.
task-oriented information-oriented
30 March 2000
© 2000 Jesse James Garrett http://www.jjg.net/ia/
UserExperience101

10. User-centered design can be characterized as a
multi-stage problem solving process that not only
requires designers to analyze and foresee how
users are likely to use a product, but also to test
the validity of their assumptions with regard to
user behavior in real world tests with actual
users. Such testing is necessary as it is often very
difficult for the designers of a product to
understand intuitively what a first-time user of
their design experiences, and what each user's
learning curve may look like.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User-centered_design
UserExperience101
User-Centered Design

11. UserExperience101
http://atiqurrehman.com/understanding-user-expectations/

12. UserExperience101

13. UserExperience101

14. 10 questions to great
Product Experiences

15. Companies that invest in Design perform better than
those that don’t.
True / False
#1

16. http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/04/design-can-drive-exceptional-returns-for-shareholders/

17. https://twitter.com/DesignUXUI/statuses/563738777596608513

18. “At Nike, a large and well-resourced design function
reports directly to CEO, Mark Parker, who early in his
tenure was a designer himself.”
“Using human-centered design methods,
inspiration for the company’s signature products is
drawn directly from its cadre of famous and not-so-
famous practicing athletes, with whom the
designers directly interact to devise authentic
performance innovations and style updates.”
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/04/design-can-drive-exceptional-returns-for-shareholders/

19. •Increase Sales
•Reduce Support
Calls
•Increase Customer
Adoption
•Increase Customer
Satisfaction

20. http://www.humanfactors.com/coolstuff/roi.asp

21. 145k views
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O94kYyzqvTc

22. "The datacenter has not yet had it’s ‘iPhone moment’, but it will
soon. The user interface on the iPhone transformed how we
interact with mobile devices. As a company, we’re going to
make that happen in the datacenter."
https://mesosphere.com/2014/12/03/mesosphere-acquires-h1-studios/

23. http://techcrunch.com/2014/10/02/adaptive-path-acquired-by-capital-one/

24. https://www.capitalonelabs.com/#/news

25. http://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/blog/morning_call/2014/11/apple-cofounder-applauds-capital-ones-new.html

26. http://www.ibm.com/design/?lnk=msdDS-daib-usen

27. http://www.ibm.com/design/?lnk=msdDS-daib-usen

28. “IBM Design emerges as the new standard-setter for
user experience. Hundreds of designers and interface
developers start to transform the development process
through deeper understanding of the people who use
IBM products and how they use them.”
http://www.ibm.com/smarterplanet/us/en/innovation_explanations/article/phil_gilbert.html

29. IBM Design Thinking

30. Companies that invest in Design perform better than
those that don’t.
True / False
#1

31. Product decisions should be based on evidence.
True / False
#2

32. http://www.mindtheproduct.com/2014/11/leisa-reichelt-changing-organisations-to-improve-products/
“…highlights the
importance of
reducing the
distance between
the people
designing the
product and making
decisions about
them and the
people who use
them, through
increased research
and team
participation in that
research.”

34. DATA

35. https://strategyzer.com/value-proposition-design

39. - How do you decide which product opportunities to pursue?
- How do you get evidence that the product you are going to ask your
engineering team to build will be successful?
- How do you identify the minimal possible product that will be successful
http://www.amazon.com/Inspired-Create-Products-Customers-Love/dp/0981690408/

40. “Rather than focus on
artifacts, we focus on
prototypes and validating
those prototypes in Discovery,
with the added benefit that the
prototype serves as the spec
for Delivery.”
http://www.svproduct.com/dual-track-scrum/

43. Qualitative & Quantitative
Evidence?
Institutional Knowledge and gut

44. http://www.nngroup.com/articles/ux-without-user-research/

45. User experience cannot exist without users. Creating user interfaces
involves intricate and complex decisions. User research is a tool that can
help you achieve your goals.
Even the most well thought out designs are assumptions until they are
tested by real users. Different types of research can answer different types
of questions. Know the tools and apply them accordingly. Leaving the user
out is not an option.
UX - U = X

46. http://blogs.wsj.com/accelerators/2014/02/19/braden-kowitz-why-you-should-listen-to-the-customer/

47. “Investing in user research is just about the only way to consistently
generate a rich stream of data about customer needs and behaviors. As
a designer, I can’t live without it. And as data about customers flows
through your team, it informs product managers, engineers, and just
about everyone else. It forms the foundation of intuitive designs,
indispensable products, and successful companies. So what are you
waiting for? Go listen to your customers!”

48. http://www.gv.com/sprint/

49. Why 4-5 Participants?
Number of Test Users
UsabilityProblemsFound
0 3 6 9 12 15
0%
25%
50%
75%
100%
“Elaborate usability tests are a
waste of resources. The best
results come from testing no
more than 5 users and running as
many small tests as you can
afford.” - JAKOB NIELSEN
N (1-(1- L ) n )
Where N is the total number of usability problems in the design and L is the proportion of usability problems discovered while testing a single user. The typical
value of L is 31%, averaged across a large number of projects we studied. Plotting the curve for L = 31% gives the result above.
Even with Qualitative…

50. The Wizard Of Oz Techniques For
Social Prototyping – You don’t need to
build everything at first. You can be the
man behind the curtain. Krieger says him
and Systrom tested an early version of a
feature which would notify you when
friends joined the service. Instead of
building it out, they manually sent
people notifications “like a human bot”
saying ‘your friend has joined.’ It turned
out not to be useful. “We wrote zero
lines of Python, so we had zero lines to
throw away.”
http://techcrunch.com/2012/11/30/instagram-co-founder-mike-kriegers-8-principles-for-building-products-people-want/
- Mike Krieger, Instagram’s founder

52. http://www.wired.com/2015/01/airbnbs-new-head-design-believes-design-led-companies-dont-work
“Thus, every project team at Airbnb
now has a project manager whose
explicit role is to represent the user, not
a particular functional group like
engineering or design. “Conflict is a
huge and important part of innovation,”
says Schleifer. “This structure creates
points where different points of view
meet, and are either aligned or not.”

53. Product decisions should be based on evidence.
True / False
#2

54. Software never ends. And once launched should be
analyzed, and driven by metrics.
True / False
#3

56. http://designmind.frogdesign.com/blog/sxsw-lean-startup-for-big-brands.html

57. SXSW: Lean Startup for Big Brands
“…In actuality, there is never a guarantee that customers are
going to get excited when a new product is brought to market.
In our work, we employ a number of tools to eliminate that
uncertainty as much as possible, often through consumer
research or validation testing…”
“…while a startup has nowhere to go but up, known companies
risk brand erosion with the release of a substandard product to
the market. We encourage clients to distill innovations to the
most valuable, tangible, and deliverable attributes for initial
launch but not to compromise on the intended experience…
…Overtime, the company can add features and
functionality, but the overall experience begins and
remains excellent.”
http://designmind.frogdesign.com/blog/sxsw-lean-startup-for-big-brands.html

58. “I can launch this
app in three
months”
“This solution will
launch in 12 months”

59. http://www.slideshare.net/jysimon/product-tankparis-jysimon16may2013

60. Sign-up Abandonment
Getting First Task
Repeat Usage
Duration in App
Conversion
Traffic

61. http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-01-10/how-ihops-new-menu-design-gets-customers-to-spend-more

62. Pivot?

63. Systrom, Intuit founder Scott Cook, and Lean
Startup author Eric Ries talked about the
changes that have swept through product
development in both big and small
organizations. Many companies have moved
from what's called "waterfall development" -- a
method that relies on large engineering
executing a carefully mapped-out plan -- to
"lean" development, where creators move
quickly to push out products and revise them
on the fly.
"We thought about what we could do to
iterate more quickly," Systrom said of
Burbn's pivot. "People loved posting
pictures on Burbn" -- so that's where they
took the venture, jettisoning other planned
features. Burbn now lives on only as an
abandoned Twitter feed.
http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/13/technology/startups/instagram_burbn/

64. http://pando.com/2014/04/05/third-life-flickr-co-founder-pulls-unlikely-success-out-of-gaming-failure-again/

65. Software never ends. And once launched should be
analyzed, and driven by metrics.
True / False
#3

66. Agile is the preferred development methodology.
True / False
#4

67. http://www.meta5.us/2014/07/10/677/

68. “…methodologies like Scrum — have no mechanism
for determining if they’re building the right feature and
whether that implementation is designed well and/or
worth improving.”
http://www.jeffgothelf.com/blog/agile-doesnt-have-a-brain/

69. http://www.jeffgothelf.com/blog/agile-doesnt-have-a-brain/

70. “Agile methods like Scrum and XP
both rely on a close and collaborative
relationship and continual
interaction with the customer – the
people who are paying for the
software and who are going to use
the system.”
http://swreflections.blogspot.com/2012/02/agiles-customer-problem.html

71. http://scaledagileframework.com/ux

72. http://scaledagileframework.com/ux

73. http://scaledagileframework.com/ux
“…a small, centralized UX design team who
provides the basic design standards and
preliminary mock-ups for each UI, but the teams
have team-based UX implementation experts for
the implementation.”

75. Agile is the preferred development methodology.
True / False
#4

76. Small, multidisciplinary teams are better.
True / False
#5

77. http://techcrunch.com/2012/11/17/heres-how-spotify-scales-up-and-stays-agile-it-runs-squads-like-lean-startups/

78. A throwback to their days with Jeff Bezos
at Amazon, projects are assigned to "two
pizza teams," groups of engineers small
enough for them to be fed on two large
pies. "We want the team to be flat and
allow everyone to communicate with
each other," Rajaraman says.
http://www.fastcompany.com/1811934/walmartlabs-brings-two-pizza-team-startup-culture-walmart-empire

79. Designers
Developers
Product Owner
Project Manager
Co-Located, autonomous, metrics driven

80. Shipping Software Based on Priority
To the Right
Customers
To Meet their Goals.

81. Shipping Software Based on Priority
To the Right
Customers
To Meet their Goals.
Research what to
build…
Learn from
Shipping…

82. Designers
Developers
Product Owner
Project Manager
Co-Located, autonomous, metrics driven

83. Small, multidisciplinary teams are better.
True / False
#5

84. You should launch with only the features that matter.
(MVP)
True / False
#6

88. What tools do you use to determine “this”?

90. “MVP should be a polished slice of
your experience, that meets the basic
needs of your customers.
By launching you’ll learn what they do
with your product - and use that
learning to prioritize enhancements
going forward”

91. You should launch with only the features that matter.
(MVP)
True / False
#6

92. Launching and learning should be fast and frequent.
True / False
#7

93. http://www.fastcodesign.com/1663968/wanna-create-a-great-product-fail-early-fail-fast-fail-often

94. “fail fast” is actually better
framed as “experiment fast.”
The most effective innovators
succeed through
experimentation.
http://www.uxbooth.com/articles/fail-fast-fail-often-an-interview-with-victor-lombardi/
- Victor Lombardi

95. “Moving fast enables us to build more things and
learn faster. However, as most companies grow, they
slow down too much because they’re more afraid of
making mistakes than they are of losing
opportunities by moving too slowly. We have a saying:
“Move fast and break things.” The idea is that if you
never break anything, you’re probably not moving
fast enough.”
http://blogs.ft.com/businessblog/2012/09/zuckerberg-if-youre-going-to-fail-fail-fast/

96. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeman_Dyson
Freeman Dyson

97. Freeman John Dyson FRS is
an English American
theoretical physicist and
mathematician, famous for
his work in quantum
electrodynamics, solid-
state physics, astronomy
and nuclear engineering.

98. “Say something about failure in experiments or businesses
or anything else. What's the value of failure?”
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/6.02/dyson.html?pg=7&topic=
1998

99. “You can't possibly get a good
technology going without an
enormous number of failures. It's a
universal rule. If you look at
bicycles, there were thousands of
weird models built and tried before
they found the one that really
worked. You could never design a
bicycle theoretically. Even now,
after we've been building them for
100 years, it's very difficult to
understand just why a bicycle
works - it's even difficult to
formulate it as a mathematical
problem. But just by trial and error,
we found out how to do it, and the
error was essential. The same is
true of airplanes.”

100. “So you're saying just go ahead and try stuff and you'll sort out the
right way.”
“That's what nature did. And it's almost always true in
technology. That's why computers never really took off
until they built them small.”

101. “Why is small good?”
“Because it's cheaper and faster, and you can make
many more. Speed is the most important thing - to be
able to try something out on a small scale quickly.”

102. “Fail fast.”
“Yes. These big projects are guaranteed to fail because
you never have time to fix everything.”
1998

104. “The Adobe KickStart program empowers
employees to create an idea and take it straight to
the consumer for testing. “We say, ‘Don’t tell us the
idea — just go do it.’”
http://blogs.adobe.com/adobelife/adobe-life-magazine/v1/innovation-revolution/

105. “The timing of long-
range plans is screwed
up too.
You have the most
information when you’re
doing something, not
before you’ve done it.
Yet when do you
write a plan? Usually it’s
before you’ve even
begun.
That’s the worst time to
make a big decision.”
http://37signals.com/rework

109. http://paulstamatiou.com/twitter-video/

111. Launching and learning should be fast and frequent.
True / False
#7

112. Having a dedicated designer on a development team
is important.
True / False
#8

113. # of developers
# of UX designers

114. # of developers
# of UX designers

115. # of developers
# of UX designers

116. https://twitter.com/jjg/status/565613568314572801

117. Devs rather write good code.

118. Devs like Designers after they get their first taste.

119. http://www.brownwebdesign.com/blog/dont-be-in-a-rush-to-be-a-specialist

120. Designers
Developers
Product Owner
Project Manager
Co-Located, autonomous, metrics driven

121. Developers
Product Owner
Project Manager
Developer Lead Design

122. Developers
Product Owner
Project Manager
Agency Design Lead
“Uh, I got 2 hours today, can I
help with something?”

123. Having a dedicated designer on a development team
is important.
True / False
#8

124. Having a deep understanding and empathy for your
end users is key for user experience.
True / False
#9

125. https://www.google.com/search?q=the+homer+car&aq=f&oq=the+homer+car&aqs=chrome.0.57j0l3j62j64.3274j0&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

126. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpPuYGPcvD4

127. https://twitter.com/MarkusWeber/statuses/540880480569413633

128. “Beauty is wasted when our
products don’t address real user
needs in a usable manner”
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2014/09/01/think-your-app-is-beautiful-not-without-user-experience-design/

129. ““Before we deal with world domination, let’s back up.” I
help people walk back up the ladder to get to: Who’s the
user? What problem are you solving for the user? Does
your proposed solution actually solve that problem—
and how can you answer that? Then, how can you
answer that faster?”
http://how.co/the-right-questions-to-ask-before-you-build-software/

130. 1. Determine a product-market fit by seeking signals from
communities of users.
2. Identify behavioral insights by conducting ethnographic
research.
3. Sketch a product strategy by synthesizing complex
research data into simple insights.
4. Polish the product details using visual representations to
simplify complex ideas.

131. http://www.ac4d.com/

132. “User Experience Design is not data-driven,
it’s insight-driven.
Data is just raw material for insight.”
http://www.inkblurt.com/2009/07/06/data-insight-ux/

133. https://twitter.com/userfocus/status/519437111540584449

134. http://michaelvhurley.com/2013/01/04/my-worthless-degree/

135. http://www.slideshare.net/jeremy/putting-the-user-back-in-user-experience-dallas-techfest-edition

136. http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/marketing_sales/what_every_executive_needs_to_know_about_design

138. http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/marketing_sales/what_every_executive_needs_to_know_about_design

139. “Meeting ever-increasing consumer expectations requires
senior executives to place design at the center of business
strategy.”
“What a user-centered approach enables companies to do
is to take insights into the consumer decision journey and
the marketplace and convert them into products and
services customers actually want…
In the new competitive marketplace, designing “usable” is
just table stakes. Customers now expect products and
services to be not only usable but also useful and
desirable.”
http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/marketing_sales/what_every_executive_needs_to_know_about_design

140. “Users should be a part of the design
process from the very beginning to help
validate concepts and refine final direction.
Your team needs to be open to
experimenting and taking risks and then
quickly learning and iterating…”
http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/marketing_sales/what_every_executive_needs_to_know_about_design

141. Having a deep understanding and empathy for your
end users is key for user experience.
True / False
#9

142. User Experience is a profession that has a
robust methodology.
True / False
#10

144. robust!

145. 1. Drive: UX practitioners are part of the customer or product owner team
2.Research, model, and design up front - but only just enough
3. Chunk your design work
4. Use parallel track development to work ahead, and follow behind
5. Buy design time with complex engineering stories
6.Cultivate a user validation group for use for continuous user validation
7. Schedule continuous user research in a separate track from development
8. Leverage user time for multiple activities
9. Use RITE to iterate UI before development
10.Prototype in low fidelity
11.Treat prototype as specification
12.Become a design facilitator
http://agileproductdesign.com/blog/emerging_best_agile_ux_practice.html
- 2008
(not new)

147. Where does your
organization stand?

148. • the pattern name
• the user need
• when to use the pattern
• when not to use the pattern
• how to use the pattern
• guidelines and constraints
• example screenshots
• related patterns
• a link to the code.
http://experoinc.com/business-benefits-of-ui-design-patterns/

150. http://www.inuse.se/blogg/ux-mognaden-i-sverige-2014-och-hur-du-tar-dig-till-nasta-niva-inuseful/

152. http://poetpainter.com/

153. http://poetpainter.com/
“EASY”
HARD

154. http://poetpainter.com/

155. “personal significance”
“works like I think”

156. “Hey, I want you to go
and understand our
user’s needs, wants,
and desires.”

157. You get there by
understanding
your users.

158. http://www.centercentre.com/

159. http://www.hcde.washington.edu/

160. http://designresearchcenter.unt.edu/

161. http://www.uxutd.com/

162. http://www.nngroup.com/ux-certification

163. User Experience is a profession that has a
robust methodology.
True / False
#10

164. KEY TAKEAWAYS

165. 1. Companies that invest in Design perform better than those that don’t.
2. Product decisions should be based on evidence.
3. Software never ends. And once launched should be analyzed, and driven by metrics.
4. Agile is the preferred development methodology.
5. Small, multidisciplinary teams are better.
6. You should launch with only the features that matter. (MVP)
7. Launching and learning should be fast and frequent.
8. Having a dedicated designer on a development team is important.
9. Having a deep understanding and empathy for your end users is key for user experience.
10. User Experience is a profession that has a robust methodology.
10 truths to great
Product Experiences

166. “The software design
and development
process has changed
for the better”

167. “Getting everything right
the first time, is hard.”

168. “Talking with one user is
better than talking with
no users.”*

169. “UX is a robust
methodology, while
relatively new, is tested
with success”

170. “You don’t really
know your
customers as well as
you think you do…”

171. “User Experience has a
large number of
methods to help create
empty and data for
products teams”

172. “Empathy and
understanding of users
is key in product
success”

173. “If you’re launching
twelve months from now,
and are not involving your
customer, that’s a big
gamble…”

174. “Software is always
evolving, and a mix of
qualitative research,
market research, and
analytics are needed to
improve and prioritize.”

175. “User Experience
methods provide data to
business teams to make
smart decisions”

176. Thanks!
@jeremyjohnson
www.jeremyjohnsononline.com