How Researchers can Succeed on Agile

Question 1

What is Continuous discovery?

Answer 1

How do we continuously infuse our decisions about what we’re building with customer input?

Continuous discovery means there’s no specific set-aside time for learning from users. We should be constantly engaging with users, clients, stakeholders, and customers to get feedback on everything from the existing product to future ideas.

Question 2

What is an easy way to start the transition from a project-based discovery phase to continuous discovery?

Question 3

Why is it important for everyone on the team to participate in research?

Question 4

What is the difference between Project-Based Discovery and Continuous Discovery?

Question 5

How can teams balance big research with smaller continuous research?

Question 6

With agile teams, we are constantly ________, _________, and _________.

Answer 6

building, shipping and learning

Question 7

Which research method would you typically employ to derive insights for innovation?

a. Contextual Inquiry
b. Usability testing
c. Surveys

Answer 7

a. Contextual Inquiry

Some research methods tend to be better suited for “big” research. Contextual inquiry is more likely to provide insightful, generative feedback from users and potential users, rather than the more closed research insights from usability testing and surveys. Having said that, just because the other methods will likely lead to incremental improvements, doesn’t mean they aren’t important. True agility leads to continuous improvements and refinements that collectively make products and teams better.

Question 8

What approach can researchers take to deliver insights for both innovative and incremental improvement in an agile team?

a. Allow research activities to span multiple sprints and work with developers to prioritize other activities while research is going on.
b. Have separate research teams devoted to different research methods so that faster and time-consuming research can be done in parallel.
c. All of the above.

Answer 8

c. All of the above.

Research methods vary in the time as well as type of insights you can get from them. When working in an agile team, some methods may be easier to fit into two-week sprints. For more time-consuming research, it is worth taking the extra time to be thorough and derive the type of insights you need for bigger impact. In such scenarios, work with developers to prioritize tasks that require low-intensity research, while you conduct the more heavy research on the side. If you have the luxury of a larger team, you can split work so that you can cover all research requirements in parallel.

Question 9

What is a customer advisory board?

Answer 9

A panel of actual customers of your product who are willing to connect with you, and sometimes each other, roughly once a month to discuss your product.

Question 10

What is the common theme in all these methodologies?

Answer 10

They are all designed to help you automate or at least simplify, the collection of feedback from various types of users

Question 11

Which of the following scenarios is best for employing the Customer Advisory Board?

a. When a Voice of Customer (VOC) isn’t a feasible option.
b. Where there are a small number of similar customers.
c. When users are all C-suite executives.

Answer 11

Where there are a small number of similar customers.

Customer advisory boards are best in B2B situations, where there are a smaller number of customers, who share similar requirements. Depending on what you would like to test, or what type of feedback you need, the boards can include different types of people. C-suite executives can potentially be part of these boards. However, they are not the only type of people to include in such boards, and they may not even be users. The advisory boards are not a substitute for, and can be used in addition to other research methods such as VOC.

Question 12

What is the purpose of Beta Testing Groups?

Answer 12

To get timely feedback from users before deploying applications for internal use.

Internal beta testing groups are ideal in the case of products that will be used internally. Since the people in these groups are actual users, you can get good feedback quickly.

If your product is not meant to be used only by internal users (like customer service), then you should make sure the people you recruit for usability testing represent your users. Since internal people may not represent your users (and also likely be familiar with the product), they will not be a good fit in this case.

Question 13

How can you make sure that user feedback reaches the product team in a timely manner?

Answer 13

By providing the product team with direct access to customer feedback.

You can sidestep the task of compiling reports to make sure your product team gets customer feedback on a near real-time basis. You can implement mechanisms in your organization to give the team direct access to customer feedback. For example, you can automatically notify the team every time a customer reports a bug or the customer support team raises a new support ticket.

Question 14

If you were to work on a user story, which required you to conduct extensive research, which of the following would be the most agile approach?

a. Involve other members of the product team in the research efforts.
b. Request early access to the user story so that you have a lead time to work on it before the engineers are assigned the task.
c. Adapt your research methods to fit the sprint’s time constraints.

Answer 14

a. Involve other members of the product team in the research efforts.

Depending on the type of product you are working on, the type of insights you are trying to get, and the constraints that you are working on, sometimes, you may not have any choice but to adapt your research methods. However, it can severely limit the impact of your efforts. A better approach would be to request early access to the user story, so that you can make sure that your team gets the maximum benefit from your research. The most agile approach of all, is to involve the other members in your team. When you involve engineers in research, you will have the added benefit of getting their buy-in and knowing your decisions will be feasible.

Question 15

What does continuous discovery mean?

Answer 15

There’s no specific set-aside time for learning from users. We should be constantly engaging with users, clients, stakeholders, and customers to get feedback on everything from the existing product to future ideas.

Question 16

What is an easy way to start the transition from a project-based discovery phase to continuous discovery?

a. Research the macro decisions on a project.
b. Conduct one customer interview a week.
c. Split research work between team members and share insights monthly.

Answer 16

b. Conduct one customer interview a week.

In a project-based discovery, dedicated researchers tend to focus on the big picture. Continuous discovery encourages teams to participate in research together. One way to start continuous discovery is to conduct customer interviews. Any customer interaction is better than none at all. Teams can start with just one interview a week. The important thing to remember is to make it a habit and keep listening to customers. The more regular the interaction with the customer, the more likely the team will learn how to ask questions and derive key insights.

Question 17

Continuous discovery encourages teams to…

Answer 17

participate in research together

Question 18

Why is it important for everyone on the team to participate in research?

Answer 18

To make sure that everybody on the team understands the needs of the users, and gets buy-in from all team members on needed changes.

When different team members participate in research, they will have a sense of ownership. It will be easier to collaborate when everyone has first-hand information, instead of relying on hearsay. Team members are also likely to trust the research when they are part of the process.

Question 19

Why is collaborating with engineers early on important?

Answer 19

Involving other folks helps to develop a deep customer understanding throughout the team, and it can avoid technical delays by surfacing potential issues early in the design process.

Question 20

What are the advantages of conducting team research?

a. You can get away with not producing any deliverables during the sprint as engineers are aware of the changes needed.
b. You can be sure your designs will be technically feasible because engineers are involved in the decision-making process.
c. Engineers will appreciate the role of research better when they are involved and have much more respect for your work.

Answer 20

b. You can be sure your designs will be technically feasible because engineers are involved in the decision-making process.

One of the upsides of involving engineers in design-related decisions is that you can be sure that the design will be technically feasible. Involving engineers in research activities can possibly reduce the need to produce pixel-perfect mockups, but it is unlikely to completely eliminate the need for deliverables. Unfortunately, on many teams, engineers are penalized for doing activities other than writing code. If that is the case with your team, try to talk to the leadership in your organization and share the benefits of having engineers participate in research activities.

Question 21

If a team wants to do bigger research studies with longer lead times, what are a couple of ways to do it?

Answer 21

Either outside of the sprint framework or run in parallel to development by a different team.

Question 22

What is Sprint Zero?

Answer 22

Sprint Zero is just shorthand for saying that research (and sometimes design) will start on stories one sprint before engineering does.

Since sprints are generally between one and four weeks, with two seeming to be the overwhelmingly popular choice, having a sprint zero means relatively little time for large research projects, especially if Sprint Zero also includes design. It can mean plenty of time for mid-sized features or incremental improvements, though, and if research and design are working collaboratively and quickly, the team can often get through a few iterations of a design direction on smaller changes.

Question 23

What is Dual Track Agile?

Answer 23

Where the delivery track and discovery track would work in parallel, with the discovery track validating new product ideas and then feeding them into delivery.

Question 24

What is the difference between the discovery team and the delivery team?

Answer 24

The difference here is that the discovery team is focused on understanding longer-term customer needs and experimenting with ways of meeting those needs, while the delivery team is focused on shorter-term implementation of less risky features.

Question 25

What are the potential dangers of implementing Sprint Zero?

a. Teams can cease to be cross-functional, with designers, researchers and developers working independently.
b. The quality of research for incremental research suffers, because it is still time-crunched in a sprint.
c. All of the above.

Answer 25

c. All of the above.

The Sprint Zero is a fairly decent work-around to give designers and researchers sufficient time to work on incremental improvements. While it may appear that teams begin resembling the Waterfall model, the Sprint Zero is still more agile, as teams still deliver smaller chunks to users, test and iterate on features. The real danger is that teams can fall into silos, with designers and researchers working ahead of time, without collaborating with engineers. It’s also often difficult for researchers to fit certain types of research into exactly one sprint, which constrains the type of discovery you can do.

Question 26

If you are on a small team and do not have two separate teams for delivery and discovery, how can you ensure researchers do not get burned out?

a. Run a Sprint Zero so that you can minimize the strain on researchers for at least incremental improvements.
b. Balance high-intensity features with low- or no-research activities such as refining code.
c. Fall back to Waterfall methodology.

Answer 26

b. Balance high-intensity features with low- or no-research activities such as refining

In smaller teams that cannot have dedicated discovery and delivery teams, you can prevent researcher burnout, by giving them more time. To ensure that engineers aren’t held back because of these activities, they can work on tasks that do not require as much research. This could include cleaning up the code base, or fixing known bugs from previous feature implementations.

Question 27

What are Information Radiators?

Answer 27

Artifacts that we keep around us that share important information all the time.

Question 28

What is Snackable Content?

Answer 28

Small, bite-sized pieces for quicker, easier consumption. It’s the fun-sized candy bar of research results.

Question 29

As a researcher on an agile team, what might you do differently from regular research teams?

a. Write code to directly implement insights from research.
b. Replace all written reports with videos and storyboards for a more engaging handoff.
c. Condense research ideas into actionable bite-sized chunks.

Answer 29

c. Condense research ideas into actionable bite-sized chunks.

As a researcher on an agile team, an important goal is to make sure that your research gets translated into actionable items, as soon as possible. This may mean delivering shorter bite-sized insights more frequently. While you will not actually write code, you can work with the engineers in your team to make sure that insights—especially critical ones—get implemented fast.

Since agile teams often conduct research as a team, you will not always need to prepare detailed reports. Instead you can focus on high-level overviews that are meant to serve as reminders about what you learned as a team (instead of handing over). You may need to create different types of deliverables that are faster to consume, such as video rolls, storyboards and sketches. However, you will still need to maintain some level of written documentation to ensure people across the organization know the rationale for decisions.

Question 30

When you demo research, what should you keep in mind?

a. Stick to the time limit allotted to you.
b. Prepare detailed decks to make sure you cover all insights.
c. Make sure you demo on a daily basis.

Answer 30

a. Stick to the time limit allotted to you.

Demos are scheduled at the end of sprints so that the team members can share what they have built. Make sure you give others a chance to give their demos and limit your demos to the most important, actionable insights. If your team has set time limits for the demo, or has other guidelines, stick to them.

Question 31

What is the purpose of information radiators?

a. To motivate people by showing work-in-progress.
b. To make the most important information visible to everyone.
c. To communicate research findings with everyone all at once.

Answer 31

b. To make the most important information visible to everyone.

Information radiators are meant to serve as constant reminders about the most important aspects of our work. These could be user personas, customer journeys, insights from qualitative research that everyone in the team should be aware of at all times.

Question 32

What does Generative research often deliver?

Answer 32

It often delivers big insights into the lives and attitudes of potential users.

Question 33

Which one is more time-consuming? Generative research or Evaluative research?

Answer 33

Generative research. It does not typically fit into single sprints.

Question 34

In an agile team, researchers frequently do not have a dedicated “discovery” or “research” phase at the beginning of a project to conduct generative research. Instead, researchers do what?

Answer 34

Researchers continuously discover insights and share them with the team.

Question 35

You can also split the agile team into two separate cross-functional teams, one for discovery, and the other for delivery. This is sometimes known as

Answer 35

Dual Track Agile

Question 36

In larger teams, you can have _____________ devoted to different research methods so that faster and time-consuming research can be done in parallel.

Answer 36

separate research teams

Question 37

Some agile teams have a ___________, in which the researchers work one sprint ahead of the developers. This can potentially lead to siloed working patterns.

Answer 37

Sprint Zero

Question 38

Another variation of Dual Track Agile, which is more suitable for smaller teams, is for research activities to _______________ and work with developers to prioritize other activities while research is going on.

Answer 38

span multiple sprints

Question 39

Research deliverables in agile teams are often________, bite-sized, actionable insights. The key is to make sure that you do not spend too much time creating detailed reports that will likely not be read or used.

Answer 39

shorter

Question 40

Some of the deliverables that you can use to communicate research findings are visual artifacts for example:

Answer 40

(infographics, sketches, storyboards, video rolls) and high-level overviews.

You can present these in the end-of-sprint demos, or work directly with engineers to implement solutions based on the research findings

Question 41

Which of the following approaches can reduce the amount of time you need to spend on creating research deliverables?

a. Involve team members in research activities.
b. Complete all research activities in Sprint Zero.
c. Implement Dual Track Agile in your team.

Answer 41

a. Involve team members in research activities.

When you involve team members in research activities, you can save the time it takes to communicate findings to the team. Since team members participate in the research, you will only need to prepare high-level overviews as reminders about what the team learned collectively.

In Sprint Zero, researchers typically work one sprint ahead of the engineers and cannot take advantage of shared research activities. Dual Track Agile helps give teams more time for generative research, by splitting research activities into two teams, either based on research methods (faster and slower methods), or functions (discovery and delivery).