Planning and facilitating a Design Sprint
Goal
How Might We design an efficient scheduling system for a moving company?
Role
Design sprint facilitator
Problem Statement
Hada Trans was experiencing challenges with scheduling efficiency. Manual processes, overlapping bookings and communication breakdowns were leading to delays, dissatisfied customers and lost revenue.
The design sprint aimed to develop a streamlined scheduling system that would optimize the allocation of resources, reduce errors and improve overall efficiency in managing the company's moving itinerary.
The Design Sprint Process
Day 1: Understand
Kick off meeting: I opened the day with an ice-breaker exercise, and then introduced the sprint process and set expectations. The goal of the sprint is to learn, not necessarily to have a full fledged product by the end of the sprint.
Defining the users: We identified 3 user groups involved in the moving process: (1) The end customers, who send the request for the move, (2) the movers, who drive the moving trucks and perform the move and (3) the dispatchers, who receive the customer request and organize the route for the movers.
Expert interviews: Prior to the sprint, I had conducted interviews with movers, dispatchers and past customers to gain understanding of their pain points and presented findings during the sprint.
User journey mapping: I led the team in creating a detailed map of the user journey of the dispatchers and created the final version:
During the first day, I also coordinated a How Might We activity where the team mapped challenges and opportunities:
Changing the sprint goal
During the first day, we faced a tough choice: should we prioritize dispatchers, movers or customers? Each was crucial to the moving experience. Dispatchers orchestrated, movers executed and customers were the end goal. After careful consideration, we chose dispatchers. As the central hub coordinating everything, improving their efficiency with a new scheduling dashboard promised a ripple effect, positively impacting everyone else. This choice, while difficult, was strategic. Optimizing dispatchers' workflow could streamline operations, ultimately leading to a smoother, more satisfying experience for all.
Initially, the design sprint aimed to broadly "Enhance the overall moving experience for customers." However, this goal was too vast and lacked specificity. On Day 1, discussions and research revealed that scheduling inefficiencies were a major pain point affecting everyone involved. Recognizing the ripple effect of optimized scheduling, the team refined the sprint goal to "Develop an efficient scheduling system." This new goal was more focused, measurable, and directly addressed the core issue, promising a smoother experience for dispatchers, movers and customers alike.
Day 2: Sketch
I started the day by emphasizing how important it is to diverge before converging to a solution. Divergent thinking emphasizes the generation of many solutions, while convergent thinking narrows down to the best option.
I facilitated the "Crazy 8s" exercise that encouraged rapid iteration.
We then voted for the concepts we’d like to explore further and prioritized ideas.
After discussing and voting ideas, everyone individually sketched their proposed solutions. We then voted the best solutions and discussed the top-voted solutions, highlighting strengths and weaknesses.
Day 3: Decide and test
We started the day by choose the most popular solutions and create a detailed storyboard. This outlines the user flow through our efficient scheduling system step-by-step.
After that, we planed how to test this storyboard with real users, the dispatchers, and created a paper prototype.
By the end of Day 3, we tested the following scenario with 2 dispatchers:
It's 8:00 AM, a busy Monday morning. You have multiple crews already on the road. These are your scheduled moves for the day.
Suddenly, you receive three new moving requests at the same time. Here are the details.
Using the system, schedule these moves as efficiently as possible, taking into account any special requirements and prioritizing urgent requests.
User feedback
User quotes:
“This is actually way easier than how we do it now!”
“Seeing all the trucks and their locations on the map is super helpful.”
“When I had those three requests come in at once, it was a bit overwhelming. Maybe there could be a way to sort them or flag the urgent ones so I don't miss anything?"
Key takeaways
Positive: The user appreciates the interface and the visual representation of truck locations, indicating that these features are intuitive and helpful.
Needs improvement: The user struggled with prioritizing urgent requests when multiple requests arrived simultaneously, suggesting a need for improved visual cues or sorting functionality.
Suggestion: Implement a system for flagging urgent requests, perhaps with color-coding or a dedicated notification area.
Lessons learnt
Adapting sprint goals for better outcomes: The initial request from Hada Transfers was to focus on the end customers and have a sprint to “Enhance the overall moving experience for customers”. Day 1 revealed that optimizing the dispatcher's workflow would yield the greatest customer benefits. We adapted our sprint goal to “design an efficient scheduling system”, acknowledging that a smoother, more effective backend process directly translates to a better customer experience.
Having a 3-day design sprint was still very valuable: Due to limited availability of the team, we couldn’t spend 5 days on the design sprint. Instead, I focused on leading activities that can bring insights and provide inspiration for the team’s next steps. This worked really well, because in a short time, we designed a paper prototype and was able to test with users gathering valuable feedback. Limited time didn't limit our impact.
Activities
Design Sprint
How Might We’s
User Journey mapping
Crazy 8’s
User testing
Tools
Paper prototypes
Team
Hada Tranfers
