Introduction to Design Sprint and Thinking

The sprint is GV’s unique five-day process for answering crucial questions through prototyping and
testing ideas with customers. It’s a “greatest hits” of business strategy, innovation, behavioral science,
design, and more—packaged into a step-by-step process that any team can use.
A brief history of the Design Sprint

Jake Knapp created the Design Sprint process at Google in 2010. He took
inspiration from many places, including Google's product development culture,
IDEO's design thinking workshops, ideas like Basecamp's Getting Real and Atul
Gawande's Checklist Manifesto, and his own experience building products like
Gmail and Hangouts.
From 2010-12 at Google, Jake refined the Design Sprint with teams like
Chrome, Search and Google X. In 2012, he brought Design Sprints to Google
Ventures, where the rest of the team chipped in their expertise to perfect the
process.
Braden Kowitz added a design, an approach that focuses on the user instead of features or
technologies. Michael Margolis took customer research—which can typically take weeks to
plan and often delivers confusing results—and figured out a way to get crystal clear results in
just one day. John Zeratsky brought a focus on measuring results with the key metrics from each
business. And Daniel Burka brought firsthand expertise as an entrepreneur to ensure every step
made sense for startups.

In 2012 and 2013, the Google Ventures team published a how-to series about Design Sprints,
and the process started to spread. The Sprint book came out in 2016, and today, thousands of
teams around the world have run sprints in startups (like Slack and Airbnb), big companies (like
LEGO and Google), agencies (like IDEO and McKinsey), schools (like Stanford and
Columbia), governments (like the UK and the City of Chicago), and even museums (like the
British Museum and the Smithsonian).
 Before the sprint begins, we ’ll need to have the right challenge and the right team, also need
time and space to conduct your sprint.

1. Challenge

The bigger the challenge, the better the sprint If you’re starting a project that will take months or years
sprint makes an excellent. But sprints aren’t only for long-term projects.
Here are three challenging situations where sprints can help:

1. High Stakes
you’re facing a big problem and the solution will require a lot of time and money. A sprint is your
chance to check the navigation charts and steer in the right direction before going full steam ahead.
2. Not Enough Time
You need good solutions, fast. As the name suggests, a sprint is built for speed.
3. Just Plain Stuck
Some important projects are hard to start. Others lose momentum along the way. In these situations,
a sprint can be a booster rocket a fresh approach to problem solving .
Solve the surface first
The surface is important. It’s where your product or service meets customers.
Human beings are complex , so it’s impossible to predict how they’ll react to a brand-new solution. Get that
surface right, and you can work backward to figure out the underlying systems or technology. Focusing on
the surface allows you to move fast and answer big questions before you commit to execution, which is why
any challenge, no matter how large, can benefit from a sprint .
2-Team
According to Google Ventures, the best sprint teams are no larger than seven people. 6 Critical Roles
for any Design Sprint Team

1. Decider / Product Manager

The Decider / Product Manager is the informal leader of the sprint team. It doesn’t matter where this person comes
from so much as it does that they have real-world experience with the problem you’re seeking to resolve.
2. The Facilitator
The design sprint facilitator adopts the most responsibility when it comes to the team dynamic.
This person serves several essential purposes, including but not limited to ensuring that critical pre-sprint
work has been completed and that the team features all the skills and personalities it needs to be successful.
3. The Customer Expert
This person steps in to conduct the face-to-face business with your clients. They’re the ones who simplify sales
language. This person should have past customer service experience and the skills needed to converse easily with
your client base.
4. The Design Expert
Every design sprint team needs a good designer. This person serves several critical roles. In addition
to making things look appealing, they are also handy for helping the team visualize an idea, make
abstract thoughts a reality, and stay grounded regarding what is possible and what’s not.

5. The Engineer / Tech Logistics Expert

While some teams don’t have an engineer among them, there are many good reasons to hire one. To
start, engineers are valuable for testing the prototypes you develop.
They may produce software, hardware, and other real-world product prototypes that can help you
drive your sprint forward in an effective and streamlined way.

6. Marketing Expert
Having a great marketing person on your design sprint team is essential, and it’s easy to see why.
The words used to describe your product are some of the first things customers will come into
contact with.
3-Time and Space

Block five full days on the calendar This step is obvious, but important. The sprint team must be in the
same room Monday through Thursday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday’s test starts a little earlier, at 9 a.m.

Why five days?

Five days provide enough urgency to sharpen focus and cut out useless debate, but enough breathing
room to build and test a prototype without working to exhaustion. And because most companies use a
five-day workweek, it’s feasible to slot a five-day sprint into existing schedules.
no-device rule In a sprint, time is precious, and we can’t afford distractions in the room. So we have a
simple rule: No laptops, phones, or iPads allowed. No virtual-reality headsets.
Whiteboards make you smarter

Paper If you can’t get hold of whiteboards, paper is better than nothing. Those poster-size Post-it notes are
pricey but easy to arrange and swap when you make mistakes

Basic office supplies

Before starting your sprint, you’ll need a bunch of basic office supplies, including sticky notes, markers,
pens, Time Timer
Design Sprint Methodology

The Design Sprint follows five phases: Understand, Define, Sketch, Prototype, and test.

Design thinking is a non-linear, iterative process

The five phases of design thinking are:

1. Empathize(Understand): research your users' needs.

2. Define: state your users' needs and problems.
3. Ideate(Sketch): challenge assumptions and create ideas.
4. Prototype: start to create solutions.
5. Test: try your solutions out.
It is important to note the five stages of design thinking are not always sequential. They do not have to
follow a specific order, and they can often occur in parallel or be repeated iteratively. The stages
should be understood as different modes which contribute to the entire design project, rather than
sequential steps.
The design thinking process should not be seen as a concrete and inflexible approach to design; the
component stages identified should serve as a guide to the activities you carry out. The stages might be
switched, conducted concurrently or repeated several times to gain the most informative insights about
your users, expand the solution space and hone in on innovative solutions.
The main benefit of the five-stage model is Knowledge acquired in the latter stages of the process
can inform repeats of earlier stages. Information is continually used to inform the understanding of
the problem and solution spaces, and to redefine the problem itself. This creates a perpetual loop, in
which the designers continue to gain new insights, develop new ways to view the product (or service)
and its possible uses and develop a far more profound understanding of their real users and the
problems they face.