Design operations guide on Digital.gov

Analyzing designs

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Use the frameworks in this section to analyze the design(s) that the team has decided to forward, and to test different expressions of their parts. Through the earlier processes of divergent/convergent thinking, the shape of your design creation has emerged. Break that shape down into its component parts to determine how to start the making process. To break down your design, examine it analytically to understand if it is simple, complicated or complex.

Building out ideas

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The first steps towards expressing your design concepts

Communicate to stakeholders

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0500

At this point, you’ve analyzed your project through convergent and divergent thinking, generated multiple design ideas, built those out with references, and discussed them and figured out what to forward. Now take a moment to reach out to your stakeholders to communicate all this progress. Use this critical moment to bring stakeholders up to speed on what you’ve done. This will help you avoid missing key points of view, give you an opportunity to start socializing your design, and clear the way for a rational, evidence-based assessment approach whose results will be accepted across the organization.

Divergent and convergent thinking

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How different ways of thinking apply at different stages of the design phase

Generating design expressions

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Design expressions are tangible artifacts that illustrate your design ideas.

Making

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0500

Learn to incorporate “serious play” in your designs

Methods

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0500

The methods you should use to express your design concept depends on the type of concept you choose. Look back at your references: what is the nature of the expression you’re creating, based on that collection of references? Is it a product? A service? A system? Or is it more complex than that, like a large service that needs multiple products to support it? If you’re unsure, review the designed things section of the Design Concepts Guide, where you’ll find explanations of the nature of products, services, and systems.

Principles

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0500

To set expectations on what they’ll accomplish together, design teams must create project-level principles at the outset of the design phase. These principles act as the team’s compass throughout a project’s development. They are tactical, immediate, and reflect an organization’s strategy and mission, perhaps articulated through a set of global design principles, but in a focused and outcome-oriented way. Design principles help set project intentions, aligning everyone to a shared project direction.

Propose a model for implementation

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0500

Through design and testing rounds, you’ve developed a strong prototype on an individual participant level; participants understand the concept, and the concept’s design solves their problem. But, as we launch our designs into a complex world, they not only have to work for the individuals who need them, but they also have to work with the products, services, and systems that will host, lead into, lead out of, support, and wrap around your product, service or system.

Testing evaluation

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0500

The number of testing and iteration rounds are highly specific to the nature of your project. An easy way to think about this is to compare the test results to your principles and use cases. At the end of each round of making and testing, reflect back on this combination of goals and use cases to evaluate what to do next. For example, maybe you think you’ve accomplished your principle with the prototype form, but participants stumbled over the order in which they should fill in the information fields.

Testing your designs

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0500

How to test and evaluate the designs you have prototyped

Up next

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:00:00 -0500

Where to go after creating a functional prototype