Speakers

Andrew Crow

: In-house Design Teams: The Sole of Your Organization, a Zappos Case Study

In-house design teams are our heroes. They design, build and refine the web sites and applications we use on a daily basis. They see projects through to completion and deal with tough decisions along the way.

From time to time, consultants are brought in to augment an in-house team. As someone who has spent years on the inside, Andrew has identified key areas where in-house teams can make changes to bolster their team’s abilities and value within an organization.

Using real examples from his time with Zappos.com, Andrew explores these issues from both the in- and outside perspective. Through this practical point of view, Andrew will offer tactical ideas to address these issues, enabling in-house teams to focus on what they do best: design.

Workshops: Good Design Faster, Day Two (a two-day workshop)

Good Design Faster is a two-day workshop that helps you understand how to get ideas out of your head, onto paper, and into a prototype format with remarkable quickness. Because you’ll be working in groups, it’s best for everyone if you take the full two-day workshop.

We are working in a world of rich, dynamic interfaces, both on the web and on our devices. The experiences we design are interactive, responsive, and have emotion. Prototypes allow us to articulate the feeling and function of a design in a way that a wireframe does not.

Building on the design learnings from Day One of Good Design Faster, you’ll learn techniques to develop tangible versions of your ideas. You’ll see how your sketchboard materials can serve as a basis for your prototype and how to scope for the right fidelity.

On Day Two, we’ll start by introducing the importance of prototyping to a design process. Through a short presentation we’ll discuss how the use of many small prototypes can better inform the design of a system than one large prototype. Specifically, we will show that:

- Effective prototypes are fast. We want to use techniques that allow for rapid iteration. A prototype should not just be bolted onto the end of a design process. Incorporating the creation of a prototype into your daily design work allows new ideas to emerge and validates concepts quickly.

- Effective prototypes are disposable. Just like with any design deliverable, we are creating an artifact intended to express an idea to someone else (stakeholder, developer, user, etc). Once that design idea has been communicated, the prototype deliverable can be discarded. We don’t have to feel the burden of creating a masterpiece that will live on, and we don’t need to build the final product just for testing.

- Effective prototypes are focused. We want to select the interactions of our design that really need to be prototyped. Look for the parts of your design that have of complexity. Look for interaction patterns repeated throughout the user’s experience. Look for the interactions that bring revenue to your product. A prototype that demonstrates these interactions will be the best use of your time and energy.

There are many, many, many tools for prototyping. We’ll demonstrate a few methods and discuss the pros and the cons. You will learn how to select the right tools and techniques for your specific team, organization, process and problem.

After the morning’s overview, participants will break into their teams and begin to build paper prototypes. A mid-day pause will demonstrate the need to test a prototype with sample “users”. Following the test, iteration on the prototype will incorporate feedback and ultimately result in something that can be presented. Everyone will leave with a working prototype that they can show to others and the skills to incorporate this into their daily work.

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Andrew Crow is a senior experience designer, trainer, and speaker at Adaptive Path. He has a passion for developing innovative design solutions for customers' needs.

Initially a print and web designer, Andrew moved into information architecture and interaction design to promote holistic user experiences to corporate clients. Andrew has over 12 years of design, technical, and strategic experience in the technology industry.

Before joining Adaptive Path, Andrew managed the web and user experience team at Princess Cruises where he led the development of an entirely new online booking system, e-ticket solution, and online branding and marketing initiatives. Prior to that, he worked with element18 and Interfocus Advertising in Los Angeles.

Continually obsessed with the latest technologies in the mobile and gaming space, Andrew advises on the design of Palm, Windows Mobile and iPhone applications, social networking, and collaboration software. He is an advocate of ubiquitous computing, and approaches projects with a desire to ensure that the experience of the device fits into the overall product strategy.

Andrew is a member of American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA), Interaction Design Association (IxDA), the Information Architecture Institute (IAI) and the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA).