CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 8. Alignment Workshops: Find the Right Problem to Solve
“Visualizations act as a campfire around which we gather to tell stories.”
IN THIS CHAPTER
- Using diagrams to gain empathy
- Envisioning possible solutions
- Evaluating concepts and Presumptive Design
- Case study: Presumptive Design aligns teams on the problem to be solved
- Running an alignment workshop
- Case study: Customer journey mapping game
I’m lucky: throughout the majority of my career I’ve had the fortune to come into direct contact with the customers of the companies I worked for. I’ve observed hundreds of people at their workplaces or in retail stores or in their homes, across many industries. I’ve observed what they experience in context.
A diagram is a means to engage others in a conversation.
Ideally, everyone in an organization would get firsthand contact with customers. But for many this type of exposure is limited. Even frontline personnel, such as customer support center agents, may see only a few of the experiences customers have. Anecdotes come in without context.
A broader picture is needed in order to connect the dots, or varying perspectives about the customer experience across the organization. Diagrams provide such a view. But creating a diagram is not the ultimate goal. Rather, it is a means to engage others in your organization in a conversation. It’s your job to make that happen.
You have to take the story of what customers actually experience back to the organization. ...
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