Design Sprints are a great way to test ideas before you invest a ton of time and money in building them out. You could certainly make something up without understanding your customer but you’ll get more out of your Sprint if you know a little something about the people you aim to help before you start.

The Job Story method takes the team deeper into the needs of the people we are solving a problem for. This means they are more likely to create a solution that meets those needs and as a result, make something people value.

When Justin Kaster and I first started talking, he was in the midst of working on the next iteration of his business ideas and wanted help defining what his team could do next. I ran a 3-day Design Sprint with Justin’s team to design, test, and get feedback on new concepts that could help him evaluate the best next direction for his business.

The magic of the Design Sprint is its ability to neutralize politics. When I work with teams, I have frank conversations about politics and team dynamics going into the Sprint. The agenda I design takes into consideration the realities of those dynamics. I use methods to draw out ideas from everyone in the room and facilitate sharing and dialog so that politics aren’t what matters and great ideas can shine through.

These methods used are both a means to solve the challenges at hand and as practice so that educators walk away with tools they can use to continuously improve and refine on their own. First: we identify our “to solve” and refine by putting the human beings we aim to help at the center of our problem solving. Then: we come up with new ideas rapidly. Last: we define solutions that will be tested and tried after our work together.

If you are excited about something, jealous of someone or have a desire to say no so that you can say yes to something else, ask yourself: “How you are standing in your own way?” I’m out on my own running collaborative design sprints for clients to solve problems and come up with new ideas for products, services or experiences in the world.

When I facilitate Design Sprints, physical movement is a part of the equation. We get up and move around the room. We stand and gather round for sharing ideas. We go out into the world to observe the environments that people live and work in. Motion creates a noticeable shift and more ideas come forth than they do when a group is sitting still around a table.

In terms of advertising, what’s holding back responsive web design is our desire to apply an old monetization model to new ways of publishing content…and it’s not working.