Lean UX, 3rd Edition

Chapter 2. Principles

Go that way. Really fast. If something gets in your way, turn!

Better Off Dead (1985)

At the heart of Lean UX, you’ll find a core set of principles that govern the design process, team culture, and team organization. Treat these principles as a framework. Start with them to get your teams pointed in the right direction, and keep them in mind as you begin to implement the Lean UX processes we describe later in this book. It’s really important to understand that Lean UX is not a set of rules. Instead, it’s an approach that you adopt. Given the infinite variety of contexts that product teams work within and the different industries, companies, cultures, regulations, customers, and missions that designers serve, it’s inevitable that you will need to adjust the processes we describe to make them work in your organization. The principles in this chapter will provide guidance to help you make those adjustments.

Ultimately, if you’re able to apply principles, you’ll find that you will change your team’s culture. Some principles will have more impact than others, and some will be more difficult to act on. Regardless, each principle described here will help you to build a product design organization that is more collaborative, more cross-functional, and a better fit for today’s agile reality.

The Foundations of Lean UX

Lean UX stands on a number of important foundations: it’s a combination of a few different schools of thought. Understanding where it comes from ...