Ledwell 2014-uxpa-customer-demos

© 2014 Autodesk
Collaborative Product Owning:
Inviting Users into the Agile
ProcessJoshua Ledwell
@jledwell

© 2014 Autodesk @jledwell #UXPABOS14
 Background
 Why customers in sprint demos?
 Others ways to get user feedback
 Preparing customer participants
 How to moderate
 Achieving internal buy-in
 Enhancing customer participation
 General questions and answers
Outline
2

Background
New feature set
New market
New user type
3

http://www.agileforall.com/intro-to-agile/
4

 A natural progression of Agile
 My domain knowledge was limited
 Satisfy a few “lighthouse customers”
 Customers and users were invested
Why invite customers?
5

If you are practicing Agile UX:
How do you get user feedback
working within an Agile framework?
6

Jennifer (Jen) McGinn and Ana Ramírez Chang. RITE+Krug:
A Combination of Usability Test Methods for Agile
Design. Journal of Usability Studies, Vol. 8, Issue 3, May
2013, pp. 61-68.
Desirée Sy. Adapting Usability Investigations for Agile
User-centered Design. Journal of Usability Studies, Vol. 2,
Issue 3, May 2007, pp. 112-132.
UX research, Agile style
7

 Work with sales and product management to
identify target customers.
 Email to briefly explain the concept and gauge
interest.
 Sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs).
 Give a kickoff presentation to show them where
we’ve been and where we think we’re going. 1-3
times per year.
 Optional: Visit the customer site so they’re not just a
voice on the phone.
 Goal: Recruit 3 customer firms and 2 – 3 individuals
apiece.
Recruiting customers
8

How does this work?
 Phone and online screen sharing meetings, every two weeks.
Currently alternate Wednesdays at 9am Eastern. Quick
meetings, ½ an hour or less.
 Live demo! We show you what we did. You tell us what you
think.
 Internal stakeholders and other customers also attend.
Preparing customers
9

Keep in mind …
 Progress may seem slow.
 We aim for consistent participation or else you might lose
context.
If this is not going to work for you …
 Sprint demos are not the only way to participate!
 We’re also planning interviews, usability tests, and more
Preparing customers
10

Subject: Comments from Sprint Demo
Hello, I have watched the video, I have the
following comments:
Electrical Panel 7763:
Good solution, no comments
IDs 7590:
Good fix, what happens to the element ID when
swapped over? This is a loaded question. We use
element ids to export models to navisworks and
use the ID as an analogue for time to show how
the model has put together from designers.
Sample feedback
!!
!
11

Reveal and redirect
12
“So how will that work when I
[real world scenario]?”
“How would you want it to work?”
“I like that.” “Tell me more about that. What
part do you like? Why?”
“That reminds me I need
something else changed, let
me tell you about that.”
“Thank you for that. Let’s set up
a separate meeting to discuss it.
Do you have any thoughts about
the demo?”
“Are you going to ship it like
that?”
“What would happen if we did
ship like this?”

 When customers argue with each other
 When customers argue among themselves
 Also, train your team
Moderating excited participants
13

Before
 Developers talk about code throughout the demo.
After
 Focus on eliciting stakeholder responses.
 After the demo is over, the team stays in the room and
discusses what they heard.
 During the sprint we say, “Let’s see what the customers
think.”
Changing the conversation
14

“I was skeptical two years ago – I thought it would be a
distraction – but I’ve changed my mind.”
“We get valid, real world use cases instead of theoretical.”
“You can learn a lot just listening to customers talk.”
“We often get feedback that we probably should be working
on something else.”
Team members in their own words
15

 Find The Bright Spots: We’re
already meeting with key customers
under NDA.
 Script the Critical Moves and Build
Habits: We already meet regularly
and demonstrate to internal
stakeholders.
 Shrink the Change: Let’s start with
just a couple of customers.
Achieving internal buy-in
16

Achieving buy-in
From: Development Manager
PM/PO/UX’s –
Josh and I had a discussion yesterday about
including customers in our team demo
meetings. This is a topic that has come up a
number of times in the past. As we’re making
an organizational change in this direction,
this seems like the right time to pick this
up and make it happen. We need someone to
drive this effort, so I’m looking to this
group for options for this role.
17

 Demos are too superficial to get definitive feedback
 Managers won’t let users participate
 Risky to let customers see our slow real-world progress
 Sales will object
We decided to test the waters at customer visits …
Concerns from stakeholders
18

Responding to stakeholder concerns
From: Me and my UX colleagues
Our contacts at (Customer A) and (Customer B) are
ready to participate in our sprint demos. During our
visits, we explained what we are asking for:
• that they would be short meetings at the same time
every two weeks
• very small incremental views of progress
• we’d want to ask them questions
and we didn’t hear any problems or doubts. Our
(Customer B) guy in particular pressed us on when we
could start and why we hadn’t started already.
--Josh
19

If you were to adopt this method:
What objections or barriers might you
need to overcome in your organization?
20

 Kickoff meetings to give context
 Send user stories 1 day ahead
 Prompt for feedback
 Note all responses, but focus on the demo
 If a customer can’t attend, send the recording
Lessons learned
21

 Listen and pivot
 Implement delighters
 Spread the practice to more internal teams
 Don’t try to scale, use different methods
Improving the method
22

Questions and comments?
Thanks to my colleagues who helped with this presentation!
Joshua Ledwell, Principal UX Designer, Autodesk
@jledwell #UXPABOS14
23

Ledwell 2014-uxpa-customer-demos

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