Stop guessing! ??Use this easy tool to find out what folks really need today, tomorrow, remote or not??

Work efficiently with a persona in the discovery phase and use the feedback to stay on ??target - in a world of remote working this is more important than ever

In our New Normal remote working, some things are still valid. Like the need to satisfy clients and customers. Design Thinking uses many different levers to understand both the critical problem as well as the client. We use a human-centered innovation ? framework. In it, the phases, principles and experimental approach are well defined, but not the actual tools that can be used within each phase.

It is up to the skillful ?? Design Thinking facilitator to choose the right tool or method. The choice totally determines the impact. ??Good to know there are many possibilities depending on the context and challenge.

Here is one of the best. The persona tool is so robust and can be used in different contexts. Like in marketing or agile product development. And especially in the discovery phase. Personas can be seen as inspirational sounding boards that guide your entire development process from start to finish.

?What is a persona and why is it used?

Personas are in essence invented people ???????????that represent your different audiences and their different:

• interests
• goals
• motivations
• behavior patterns
• Pains and Gains

There are many kinds of personas (ex. Buyer, Customer, Role, Proto, etc) that are based on various sources of information, like biographical, professional and geographical. What information is gathered depends on what is useful for that particular business sector.

When we use a persona in Design Thinking, it is less about demographics and more about emotive characteristics. We try to understand our clients through emotionally intelligent glasses. Personas are created in the first or second phase of the Design Thinking framework. Often right from the start in the Empathy, Understand, or Define phase.

?How to create a persona

We first ask and answer questions based on our own views, experiences,with reference to our proposed challenge. We brainstorm lots of possible answers and ideas about the persona’s life, interests, possible critical issues, and add this data to a persona canvas or template.

And of course, the persona is baptized with a name! This brings your persona to life ????

You and your team use this team persona as a focal point or point of reference. It is helpful to ask, what would, for example, our persona, named “Veronika” think of this? Or how would she react to a particular feature or change? Does this help her solve her problem? Why or why not?

Veronika by the way, is the name of a famous persona that guided the makers of Ferrero products like Nutella ??for many years.

Personas help you understand the types of people and their motivation so you can position your particular service or product better and more effectively.

In Design Thinking, our first personas capture the teams’ assumptions and previous experiences. But then the pivot! These assumptions are later validated through qualitative user-research and continual adaption. We don't stop with guessing!We validate our hypotheses.

?What is qualitative research?

We hit the streets, observe, interview. We seek out and talk with those folks we are designing for and if this isn’t possible, we do video interviews using, for example, open questioning technics. The team discovers and checks if what was assumed or guessed ie. what “Veronika” needs, actually syncs with what real target users reveal to us. Not what they say they want but what we discover through a systematic evaluation of the user research results.

There are usually lots of surprises and much adjustment of the original team hypotheses. This is to be expected and is all part of the Design Thinking iterative, open-ended agile process. It is adaptive and flexible. We learn as we go along.

?Quick and Dirty ??

This is not to say that there are not good reasons to use “quick and dirty” personas! These are based on brainstorming assessments of what you and your team know or think you know about the client or potential client. These personas can help get a first direction started, whether the personas are validated or not. 

?Design Sprints

Design Sprints, for example, take yet another route. On the first day, after the long-term goals are defined, interviews are carried out with SMEs (subject matter experts). The team captures the expert knowledge notes. The persona is created indirectly by interaction and interviews with this customer expert (SME). This means, there is not a direct exchange with targeted customers but with someone, an “expert”, who knows the customer well.

Creating personas helps you take a step out of yourself

This statement seems like such a no-brainer. But actually, it is not.?? When problem-solving or looking for answers, we humans naturally apply our own thinking models and experience. Why do we often assume that what we think is good, others will like as well?

?In effect, we’re solving the problem for ourselves, not for our potential client!?

Personas remind us to recognize that different people have different pains, needs and expectations, and it is those requirements, often emotive requirements, we have to focus on if we want to trigger innovation, keep customers loyal and maybe even develop a new product or service for tomorrow's client.   

?Perspective Shift ?

The Design Thinking process leverages this clear perspective shift. Actually, we use this continually when using our personas on the journey towards uncovering critical points, helping clients solve porblems and ultimately discovering values of our future customers. Constructing personas will help you ask the right questions, gather meaningful feedback and answer those questions further down the line with prototypes for the users you are designing for.

At the end of the day, we design for these underlying needs.

?Use Empathy

So, here’s the key ? and how I’ve had the best results. Remember personas are not real. They do not describe real people. But when you and your team systematize your interview findings and apply an ??empathetic stance, you’ll determine solid hypothesizes to work with. Not guesswork. You’ll find trends and patterns in the data that has been collected and be able to move forward with confidence. Here we come solution space!

?Tool ?? for Product Owners

But wait - there's more. There is a clear application for the persona tool in agile development, like in scrum. At the beginning of a scrum sprint cycle. Personas are so easy to use and are such a beneficial tool. They can help product owners add the human touch and emotive perspective (qualitative) to what might otherwise remain cold (quantitative) facts in their research. Isn't it worth a try?

?Tool ?? for the Legal Profession

The same applies for Design Thinking for lawyers and the legal profession. As law firms struggle to keep up with client demands, they too are beginning to embrace a more holistic ??approach like Design Thinking. After all, design thinking is all about asking the right questions and thinking about the problem from the user’s perspective! For law firms, using a tool like a persona will help uncover what their clients’ needs and problems really are and drive fresh solutions for addressing them.

??To sum up: Stop guessing! It’s easy to find out more meaningful information about your stakeholder, clients, and users! And remember, there is no one way to use this tool. Use it in the way it makes sense for your scope and time budget. Personas are a great, inexpensive way to test out ideas and validate hypotheses before much time or money has been spent! ??

Read more about personas in my book, “Design Thinking? Ask me anything!”. The e-book is in German and provides a comprehensive overview of Design Thinking, with case studies and hands-on tools.

Give me a shout out if you have feedback or questions!

For more information on personas here is another helpful source: https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/personas-why-and-how-you-should-use-them

Thanks for reading and have a wonderful ?? day!

Karla Schlaepfer

www.designchange.de

www.legaldesignchange.de