Undoubtedly, the world of consumer behavior and user experience keeps evolving. Companies try to adjust to changes and follow a more user-centric approach. As a result, they enforce tactics in such a way that delivers the most enjoyable user experience.
Nowadays, businesses don’t believe the process stops after deploying the product. Instead, they believe in a more agile and iterative approach to constantly improve quality assurance for users. Something that many UX design teams practice is Lean UX. And it spurs design teams to work in an agile manner.
In this blog, we will understand what Lean UX is and the importance of adopting this ideology in your design projects.
What is Lean UX?
Lean UX is a strategy and a process where Agile combines with UX design. It encourages teams to work in an agile manner and increment minor improvements to the user experience.
It is mainly essential for companies having limited budgets and resources. Moreover, they want to provide maximum value to their customers despite these constraints. Hence, Lean UX has sparked interest among businesses to incorporate it in their design processes.
It derived from Toyota’s lean manufacturing process where they attempted to decrease the time for each task using small incremental changes. Ultimately, this approach transformed Toyota into a high-performing unit, and it became one of the largest automotive manufacturers in the world.
Features of Lean UX
- It is iterative in nature
In this approach, teams continue to provide a better user experience for customers. It’s a continuous process where designers look to implement each design step-by-step to improve the user interface. In addition, the flexible nature allows designers to spot flaws in a particular stage in the project and take a step back to rectify them.
- It is based on assumptions rather than requirements
In Lean UX, there is less emphasis on detailed requirements or deliverables. You are identifying the problem based on assumptions and looking to advocate numerous benefits for the user. As a team, we think of the problem and focus on delivering the design to solve that issue. As a result, it is a transformational way of thinking that is more customer-driven and looks to produce that all-in-one package for the user.
- It requires collaborative design
This approach does not encourage going solo. It is a team-based approach requiring good collaboration, ensuring each individual is on the same page. It brings together designers, developers, engineers, customers, business owners, and other stakeholders to combine their efforts in delivering an ideal business solution. In addition, it encourages brainstorming and exchanging opinions at a higher level on improving each segment of the user experience.
- It minimizes waste and maximizes value
Just like how we burn fat to get ourselves lean, this approach eliminates waste in each system to make it a well-oiled machine. Since it is an iterative process, stakeholders will continually take a step back at each stage and analyze how to improve them. Implementing minor incremental tweaks to each design system removes redundant tasks and manages resources well. As a result, it provides value for the customer in the long term.
Phases of Lean UX
You can simplify the Lean UX cycle into 3 phases:
- Think
We start the process by making a lot of assumptions about the problem. Next, we define a hypothesis based on these assumptions to test and receive feedback. Therefore, it is essential to collaborate as teams to brainstorm ideas as much as possible to provide adequate solutions for improving the user experience.
- Make
Next up, we start production. We incorporate a collaborative design approach in our process and produce a minimum viable product (MVP). We use our defined hypothesis to speed up the process and evaluate if the idea bodes well with our expectations. Therefore, the purpose is to stick with the idea if it works well with our goals or abandon it immediately if it indicates flaws.
- Check
Lastly, we seek validation from our users. We test the design to check our hypothesis to get various feedback. Utilize consumer observation studies, surveys, interviews, and adequate A/B testing to finalize results. If there is positive feedback – the design was successful, and negative feedback – the hypothesis was a failure, and we go back to the Think phase.
…. and repeat
However, the beauty of this cycle is its iterative nature. After testing, teams can move on to the thinking phase again to start a new production. Therefore, it assists design teams to work in cycles and implement incremental changes to their design process.
Shred the fat and make your design process leaner….
As mentioned earlier, Lean UX is a smart way for budget-strapped companies to test prototypes and designs effectively without compromising quality.
Lean management practices are best explained in Eric Ries’s book called, The Lean Startup. It motivates start-ups and smaller teams to manage their resources efficiently using these principles.
It is time for design teams to think differently and not have a fixed mindset focusing only on deliverables as we see in traditional UX. Use the power of Lean UX design to minimize redundancy and deliver maximum value for users.