This presentation, given at Refresh Boston, provides a short introduction to the Agile development process and reviews current design and UX practices. It examines whether Agile can work without hindering the creative process, highlighting the reasons why developers like Agile, the problems Agile poses for designers, and the ways teams can mitigate some of these issues. Lastly, the presentation reviews techniques integrated Agile development and design teams use, and evaluates which methods have worked and where they can be refined.

1. Making
Agile Work JONATHAN FOLLETT
DAN PICKETT
for Design REFRESH BOSTON
APRIL 29, 2009

2. OVERVIEW
• The Design and Development Process Survey
• A Quick Introduction to Agile Development
• The User Experience Design Perspective
• Problems in Design with Agile Development
• Mitigation Strategies
• What Agile Development Techniques Can Design
Incorporate?
• Can It Work?
• A Proposed Process
• Q&A

3. ABOUT YOU
• How many people here are developers?
• How many are designers?
• How many are managers/executives/other?

4. WHY ARE WE
OBSESSED WITH
PROCESS?

5. 43% OF OUR SURVEY
RESPONDENTS FELT THERE
WERE INEFFICIENCIES IN
THEIR PROCESS

6. 65% OF OUR SURVEY
RESPONDENTS FELT THEY
DID THEIR BEST WORK
AS A RESULT OF THEIR
CURRENT PROCESS

7. THE SURVEY
• Who did we survey?
93 designers and developers (and counting)
• Professional Groups
Refresh Boston, NEWDA, CHIFOO,
UX Professionals Group
• Participate
survey.enlightsolutions.com

8. SURVEY AUDIENCE BREAKDOWN
BOTH
DESIGNERS
DEVELOPERS

9. AGILE IN PRACTICE
HAVE NEVER
HEARD OF AGILE
NOT USING USING AGILE
AGILE

10. A QUICK
INTRODUCTION
TO AGILE
DEVELOPMENT

11. THE STATE OF SOFTWARE PRE-AGILE
• The Waterfall Method
- Drawn out product lifecycle
- Product failures without realizing any value
- Lack of stakeholder feedback and involvement

12. HISTORY OF AGILE
• Snowbird, Utah in 2001
• Notable names like Kent Beck, Dave Thomas, Andy
Hunt, Martin Fowler
• Led to popular frameworks like XP, SCRUM

13. THE AGILE MANIFESTO
We are uncovering better ways of developing
software by doing it and helping others do it.

14. THE AGILE MANIFESTO
Through this work we have come to value:
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan
That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value
the items on the left more.

15. “Clients, users,
developers, designers,
etc. ... taking little steps
together towards a
larger goal, providing
feedback, analyzing and
making sure goals are
being met at each step. ”
- RACHEL DONOVAN

16. THE AGILE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS
Iterative - Release Early, Release Often

17. THE AGILE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS
Iterative - Release Early, Release Often
Intense Stakeholder Involvement

18. THE AGILE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS
Iterative - Release Early, Release Often
Intense Stakeholder Involvement
Daily Standups

19. THE AGILE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS
Iterative - Release Early, Release Often
Intense Stakeholder Involvement
Daily Standups
User Stories

20. Mike
Cohn
User Stories
Applied

21. “It is not the strongest
of the species that
survives, nor the most
intelligent, but the one
most responsive to
change.”
- CHARLES DARWIN

22. USER EXPERIENCE
DESIGN

23. USER EXPERIENCE
Spiral-like process of:
Research
Understanding Users and Their Goals
Information Architecture
Interaction Design
Visual Design
Usability

24. PROBLEMS IN
DESIGN WITH AGILE
DEVELOPMENT

25. UNCERTAINTY

26. Timeboxing
Creativity

27. “The creative is the place
where no one else has
ever been. You have to
leave the city of your
comfort and go into
the wilderness of
your intuition.”
- ALAN ALDA

28. Ben
Franklin’s
Schedule

29. Depth of Customer Involvement

30. Predictability of Work Volume

31. Volatile
or Vague
Requirements

32. Maximized Performance with
Senior Talent

33. “If you don’t like
change, you’re going
to like irrelevance
even less.”
- GENERAL ERIC SHINSEKI

34. MITIGATION
STRATEGIES

35. Frameworks, Technologies
& Constraints

36. Develop an
Established,
Shared Vision
of the Users &
the Product

37. Rough Sketches
& Concepts

38. Bill
Buxton
Sketching User
Experiences

39. Have a Roadmap

40. Design Ahead

41. Flexible Layouts

42. WHAT AGILE
DEVELOPMENT
TECHNIQUES CAN
DESIGN INCORPORATE?

43. AGILE DEVELOPMENT TECHNIQUES
• Refactoring: How malleable is a design? Can it be altered
again and again?

44. AGILE DEVELOPMENT TECHNIQUES
• Incremental Construction: Can a design build on itself?

45. AGILE DEVELOPMENT TECHNIQUES
• Acceptance Testing: Can you get upfront criteria from
stakeholders to evaluate the success of implementation?

46. AGILE DEVELOPMENT TECHNIQUES
• Pair Design: This might mitigate the need for exclusively
Senior designers.

47. PROJECTS WELL SUITED FOR AGILE
• Primarily senior, adaptable developers and designers
• Loose upfront requirements
• Committed and available stakeholders

48. PROJECTS NOT WELL SUITED FOR AGILE
• High concentrations of junior resources: Senior resources
must identify batch work for the juniors to perform.
• Offshore arrangements
• Extremely strict requirements and quality standards
• Split focus teams

49. CAN IT WORK?

50. Understand what the
“Other Side” is doing.

51. Familiarity vs. Specialization

52. Mutual
Respect
for Each
Others’ Craft

53. HOW DO YOU
DEVELOP A
COHESIVE VISION?

54. Johanna
Rothman
Manage It!

55. A PROPOSED PROCESS

56. GETTING REQUIREMENTS
• Talented Creative and Engineering Resources: In the room
with the stakeholder
• Follow Brainstorming Basics
• Reflect Shared Goals Through Deliverables
- Rough Screen Sketches
- Rough User Stories tied to screens

57. SYNCHING UP THE DESIGN & DEV TEAMS
• Cohesive Vision
• Offset Design

58. Q&A

59. THANK YOU.

60. GET IN TOUCH
JON FOLLETT
jonfollett@hotknifedesign.com
twitter.com/jonfollett
DAN PICKETT
dpickett@enlightsolutions.com
twitter.com/dpickett