How to Run a Design Sprint: Purpose of a Design Sprint

A design sprint is a five-day intensive in which a team collaborates to solve a particular challenge in their organization, compressing the business strategy process into a single week. Companies break the design sprint process into five increments in which the team analyzes a problem (day one), brainstorms solutions (day two), chooses and focuses on a solution (day three), creates a prototype (day four), and gets user feedback (day five).

The purpose of a design sprint is to:

• Jumpstart the decision process. The product design process can be incredibly slow, especially when teams are waiting for others to make decisions. Design sprints try to jumpstart decision-making and design thinking by putting members of every team in the same room and designating one person to be the official “decider.” This process encourages communication and collaboration.
• Prioritize user feedback. In the product design process, companies may take months or even years to develop a product before testing it with users and figuring out if it’s what their customers want. With a design sprint, the goal is to create a working prototype and test it with users within the week—incorporating user feedback into the very beginning of the design process.
• Increase team cohesion. Design sprints fundamentally change how teams work together, prioritizing rapid ideation, iteration, and decision-making to keep the design process moving forward. Teams can apply the collaboration techniques they learn during design sprints to help team members work together more cohesively.

If you want to run your first design sprint, check out this step-by-step guide:

1. 1. Choose a problem. Design sprints are meant to help a team solve a big problem in their organization or answer a critical business question—for instance, “What should our new product be?” or “How can we customize our users’ experience?” While you can nail down a lot of the specifics once the design sprint is underway, you and your team should go into the sprint with an understanding of the basic problem.
2. 2. Assemble the team. Before the sprint, assemble a team of up to seven stakeholders, each with a diverse role (from CEO to a sales rep). Designate particular roles, including the leader (or “decider”), who is responsible for making final decisions throughout the week, and the facilitator, who helps keep the sprint team on schedule. Set expectations with each team member before the sprint so that everyone feels ready for an intense setting of collaboration and creative problem-solving—which usually means, for on-site sprints, being fully present without immediate access to their laptops or computers.
3. 3. Secure and prepare the space. Find a five-day window during which your team will be available for intensive, all-day strategizing. Then, secure a private room and stock it with the right supplies—whiteboards, markers, paper, pens, sticky notes, dot stickers in various colors, and snacks. Ensure the space is available for the whole five-day process; you won’t want to relocate partway through the week.
4. 4. Day one: Establish the goal. Once your sprint finally begins, your team will spend the first day laying the groundwork for the rest of the week. First, establish your long-term goal—what overarching design problem are you trying to solve, or what deliverables do you hope to create? Then, gather as much information as possible about the problem by making a map of the various aspects. (You can also invite experts to talk to your team about the problem.) By the end of day one, choose one aspect of the problem (called the target) that your team feels they can resolve by the end of the week.
5. 5. Day two: Gather solutions. On the second day, your team will begin by reviewing all of the existing solutions, case studies, and testing ideas that address your problem from a range of other organizations (often using a process called “lightning demos”). Then, team members will spend the afternoon creating their own solution sketches. One or two people should also start looking for potential customers that fit your target demographic who can serve as testers on day five. They may opt to create an ad or look through relevant online forums to reach potential customers.
6. 6. Day three: Evaluate solutions. On the third day, the team will spend the morning looking at each person’s solution and voting on which one is the best (using colored sticky dots). Take the afternoon to create a storyboard that details the customer journey, simulating how a potential customer would find and engage with your solution. By the end of the day, you’ll have an adequate game plan for tackling the solution.
7. 7. Day four: Create a prototype. On the fourth day, your team will create a realistic rapid prototype of your solution—whether it’s a physical product or piece of software. Focus on the customer-facing aspects of the prototype rather than prototyping a perfectly functioning product to allow potential customers to evaluate the user experience adequately.
8. 8. Day five: User testing. On the fifth day, set up a small room and invite five real users in (one at a time) for an interview and a prototype demo. The team will observe the feedback sessions through a video system and note how the users respond. After all five user tests, you’ll discuss patterns in the responses, wrap up the sprint, and decide how you’ll follow up your work for the week.

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