In lean, agile, or similar working environments, defining a priority order between many project candidates and aligning to your organization following its priorities can take a lot of time and effort.
Finding out what helps
We needed something that could help us reduce guesswork and let us work more efficiently. Fortunately, numerous frameworks exist to solve similar problems.
However, after putting a lot of effort into finding a framework that suits our needs, we felt that none of them would suffice alone because they didn’t entirely fit into our context. Therefore, we decided to develop our own framework to speed up decision-making.
I wasn't prepared for a project this complex
As lead of the project, I have encountered a challenge as difficult to grasp as I have never faced before. I had two important questions to answer:
- How could we create a guide for us in an environment that seemed far too complex to understand by any of us?
- How could we consider all the facets involved in making decisions and designing a solution that would work even if the product strategy changes?
None of us had the answers, so I decided to act as designer, and took a step back.
I did my research
- And interviewed all stakeholders relevant to the project to learn more about their needs and pain points with the current prioritization process to identify gaps to define improvement opportunities.
- I also collected all the best practices I could find to understand how others are solving similar problems.
With the collected information, we sat down, and created the first draft of the framework. To learn as quickly as possible, after establishing the guidelines, we started using it and decided to refine it iteratively.
The framework works!
After three major iterations and countless smaller refinements and fixes, our Ranking Framework works pretty well! It has significantly reduced the time we spend on prioritizing and planning project ideas to only a third of what it used to be.
Even though the framework helps only with prioritization, it ensures that we do not forget about the necessary project details. This allows us to make decisions based on facts, research, and strategy rather than hunches and feelings.
This project had a steep learning curve
It was my second big project in Emarsys that aimed to solve a bigger organizational need, and I enjoyed every bit of it. It was a revelation to me when I figured out that designing internal processes is very similar to what I am used to doing as a UX designer. To do it effectively, I only need to think a bit more abstractly, which is, in my opinion, similar to designing services.
