Rapid Prototyping of Informative and Explainer Videos with Design Sprints
The Problem
The Process Management Lab (PML) helps small to mid-sized nonprofit organizations build internal capacity to achieve their missions and serve their communities by providing university expertise and services. Through this work, they provide an authentic, low-risk learning environment for students and graduates to work alongside experts to gain real-world experience. The PML wanted to reach more clients to grow their organization and provide learning opportunities for associates working in the lab.
While the PML had job aids and website copy that explained its offerings, they’d encountered prospective clients who would fill out the contact form on the PML website, only for the lab to later discover during follow-up that its services did not align with the client’s needs.
Additionally, the PML wanted to:
1) Improve lab associate recruitment by more effectively conveying the skills and experiences students could gain from working there.
2) Educate new lab members and associates aspiring to the technographer role.
As a result, the PML engaged my services to help communicate the lab’s purpose, vision, and offerings more clearly to potential clients and lab associates through explainer videos. The goal was to create a video that describes how the PML helps improve processes in order to attract potential clients and educate lab members.
The Rationale
To address the challenge, I leveraged Google’s Design Sprint methodology, which consists of the following phases: Understand, Define, Sketch, Decide, Prototype, and Validate. Design sprints are an accelerated adaptation of the traditional design thinking framework, compressing the phases from problem to tested prototype within days rather than months.
I chose design thinking based on the following operating assumptions:
- Access to the project sponsors throughout the project.
- Access to the end-user(s) to assess their wants and needs.
- Gathering the perspective of project sponsors and stakeholders would help us effectively and efficiently identify the right problem and surface the business needs.
- The project didn’t require extensive research but the deep institutional knowledge of the project sponsors.
- Stakeholders, project sponsors, and project developers had other time commitments, so the faster we could arrive at a minimum viable product, the better.
The Approach
Due to the tight project timeline, I adapted Google’s Design Sprint methodology to carry out two 2-hour virtual sessions. Additional design tasks were completed asynchronously between the synchronous sessions. This aligned with Google’s guidance for running an abridged design sprint customized to the situation.
Design Sprint One
Understand, Define, Sketch, Decide
Before the first session, I conducted a desk review of the documents the PML provided and created a one-pager to improve my understanding of how the organization operates. After developing this understanding of PML’s operations and objectives, I facilitated the first virtual design sprint session.
I asked questions to gain insight into the PML’s audience and the business outcomes they hoped to achieve with the video. Based on the answers to the questions, we defined the problem and expected strategic business outcomes.
In the sketch phase, I mapped out the client’s journey and the behaviors the PML wanted them to exhibit from the moment they encountered the video.
Prototype and Validate
Before the second virtual session, I developed an initial script draft using the client’s journey map and one-pager documents to guide the content. Then, during the prototype phase in the second session, PML members vetted the script and generated ideas for supporting visuals. We also had a previous PML client review the prototype as part of the iterative design process.
Click to view the prototype
Click the three dots to open up a menu then click Enter full screen for a larger view.
We used two key questions to validate the video prototype with the client:
- Does this prototype accurately represent your experience with the PML’s process?
- Would viewing this video have led you to contact the PML earlier in your journey?
Design Sprint Two
Understand, Define, Sketch, Decide
The second design sprint provided an even more collaborative experience. We invited the Interactive Design Lab (IDL) to work with us to create the video. In addition to the PML’s project sponsors, we had current lab associates and a graduate student member join in the sprint. We also switched our collaboration tool from Google Slides and Docs to Canva whiteboards.
For this video, the goal was for the PML to inform their target audience about their mission, expertise areas, and approach to capacity building for nonprofits.
To represent the PML’s target audiences, we first created three personas:
- Kymberly – a 35-year-old who works at a mid-sized nonprofit.
- Rob – a 28-year-old in the OPWL program seeking workplace experience.
- Pat – a 38-year-old OPWL graduate needing a community of practice.
With these user archetypes in mind, I facilitated interactive questions to elicit stakeholders’ and end users’ perspectives about the video’s messaging and content. Participants contributed responses verbally or by adding sticky notes on the virtual whiteboards. A timer helped keep everyone on task.
After discussing all prepared questions, we refined responses by walking through each board to streamline and capture the right viewpoints. I marked completed boards with yellow stars to engender a sense of design sprint gamification.
We concluded the session by mapping the aggregated perspective insights to the client video journey.
Prototype and Validate
Before the next design sprint, we created an initial script draft based on the user journey. During the second session, we refined the script. Once the script was finalized, I conducted an internal sign-off with the PML team members to “freeze” the content, meaning no additional changes at this phase.
I then provided the frozen script and assets to the Interactive Design Lab.
Design Sprint Three
Understand, Define, Sketch Decide
For the third video in the series, the PML aimed to demonstrate how clients can pick a process improvement area to focus on. With our client persona (Kymberly) already defined, we were able to move rapidly through the initial sprint phases.
In contrast to the first two informational videos about the lab, this explainer video was intended to enable end-users to accomplish a specific task. I facilitated the ideation process by focusing our sketching around two simple yet strategic prompts – “For Who?” and “So What?”. The simplicity of these questions helped us brainstorm efficiently with an emphasis on the audience and their key takeaways.
To avoid cognitive overload, we then prioritized the top 3 most vital key takeaways we wanted the target audience to grasp.
Building on the ideation outputs, we mapped the essential content components to the client’s journey. We concluded the session by discussing design constraints, engagement tactics, and ways to incorporate interactive elements to optimize client conversions.
Prototype and Validate
Before the final sprint, I introduced the PML to another tool – ChatGPT.
This change to our workflow significantly reduced the time we previously spent drafting scripts outside of our collaborative working sessions.
We entered the journey map into ChatGPT and prompted it with the following prompt:
You are an expert promotional and instructional video script writer. I want you to review this content and rewrite it as a 3-minute video script. Ensure it has an engaging introduction and call to action. We would like it to be jargon-free.
Our Prompt
The Results
Over the course of collaboratively producing three videos, we cultivated highly engaged, cross-functional working sessions that facilitated creative thinking, upskilling, and traditional and reverse mentoring.
Balancing guidance with a participatory style that embraced group autonomy further accelerated the development of competence.
The opportunities for reciprocal learning and purposeful innovation proved widely motivating and produced both gains in productivity and helped form trust and lasting connections.
I’m proud of all we achieved creating videos that capture the essence of the impactful work the PML does.
References
Ideo. (2019, February 21). History. IDEO | Design Thinking. https://designthinking.ideo.com/history
Interactive Learning Design. (2023, April 10). Interactive Learning Design (ILD) Lab – Interactive Learning Design. https://www.boisestate.edu/opwl-ild/
Jordan, J. (2021, September 17). Why junior employees should mentor Senior employees. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2019/10/why-reverse-mentoring-works-and-how-to-do-it-right
Process Management Lab. (2023, August 16). Process Management Lab – Process Management Lab. https://www.boisestate.edu/opwl-process-management-lab/
Share and engage with the Design Sprint Community. (n.d.). https://designsprintkit.withgoogle.com/methodology/overview