I've heard it said, "To learn a new truth read an old book." Today I want to tell you about an essential conversational skill that I learned from an out-of-print book that I absorbed many years ago. What I learned positively impacts my design leadership work to this day.

The skill described in this book is a proven game-changer for me as I face the predictable challenges that occur in leading groups of people on the journey of product and solution design. It also measurably improves my ability to connect with people in my personal life.

Anyone can learn this skill. Mastering it is a lifelong and worthy pursuit. It provides a clearer understanding of issues and what to do about them. As a result, design conversations stay on track when issues occur. They get identified with greater understanding...and they get resolved.

If you want more confidence in how to handle issues when they occur, the life skill taught in an out-of-print book, and that I introduce in this video, will absolutely help you in your work and throughout your life.

Good design conversations don't happen by accident. Facilitators who understand where people are coming from and where they are taking them have a markedly improved chance of getting great contributions and producing good conceptual design work.
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Here are a few ideas to help facilitate learning and discovery design conversations with busy people.

Good design conversations don't happen by accident.

They are started and sustained by capturing ideas in the moment and in a way that people can perceive.

Here are some ideas to help you lead the design conversation and to capture the learning and discovery that occurs in a collaborative meeting.

​Getting people to collaborate creatively in meetings is easier and more effective when it is done in a pleasurable, fun and trusting environment.

​I know from experience how hard this can be.

So here are a few tips for leading a creative, collaborative meeting...

As a solution designer or marketer, tuning into the context and experience of a person in a predicament is fundamental. There is no side-stepping these questions:

• Who is experiencing the problem?
• What problem are they experiencing?
• When and under what circumstances does the problem happen?
• How would they describe it in their own words?
• How does it make them feel?
• How does it affect their quality of life?

​A cogent, well-crafted problem statement answers these questions and provides clarity of context to solution designers and product marketers.

A problem involves a person in the context of a specific predicament. The problem is the raison d'être for any solution under consideration and, by extension, the solution designer and marketer engaged in addressing it.

A person experiencing a problem expresses it through emotion. Describing the circumstances that are causing that emotion, in words a user would use however strong or subtle, provides a foundation of empathy through which to envision an ideal solution. It is important to not overlook the emotion because it creates personal resonance with the problem and with the solution being marketed. A problem statement depicts the moment of opportunity when a transformational solution would make all the difference in a person's quality of life.

From a marketing perspective, borrowing a concept from Pragmatic Marketing, a “market” is a group of people who share the same problem. Therefore, understanding and clearly defining the problem is the cornerstone of any solution to be created and/or marketed. This makes a highly refined problem statement or set of statements all the more valuable.

Who needs or uses problem statements?

• Solution designers and architects
  They need to understand the context under which a problem occurs. The more empathy the designer or architect has for the person experiencing the problem the better.
• A product manager
  They need to identify which ones are urgent and pervasive. That particular subset of problem statements represents the high-potential candidate problems to research, assess, verify and build a business case for solving.

A problem statement is a sentence or two that contains these descriptive elements:

1. A description of the person 
   Name or describe the business role or life role of the person.
2. When or under what conditions the problem occurs
   Describe what goal they are trying to achieve or when does it happen?
3. An emotion they experience
   Describe this in language that they would use or that you have observed so that an empathetic sense of connection to the person experiencing the problem is established.
4. A description of the effect the problem has on their quality of life
   Use language that the person would use in their business or life context.​​

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​Actual Statements and Mad-Lib Styled Templates
You may be fortunate and have the ability to describe the problem statement by simply transcribing what you have actually observed people say in the context of experiencing a problem. That's a preferable way in which to produce a problem statement.

But, if you don't have that form of recall handy, or if you need some help constructing a statement that can be easily understood, then some fill-in-the-blank templates might prove helpful to help demonstrate what this looks like.

To that end, here are some Mad-Lib styled templates:
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• As a       (1)      , when       (2)      , I am       (3)        because       (4)      .
  
  
• As a       (1)      , I am       (2)      , when       (3)        because       (4)      .

​Examples
Here are two examples of problems statements based on conversations I've or observations I've had in just the past day:

• As an iPhone user, when I can't find my AirPods case I panic and scramble looking all over the place retracing my steps because the darned thing is so easy to lose and would cost me a fortune for me to have to replace.
• As a coach, in a live practice or game setting when tensions are already high to begin with, someone lets something denigrating fly out of their mouth to one of the players. At that moment, I’m flustered because I’m supposed to lead here and I draw a blank on what to say or do. I’m unsure of what to do in response because I’m not experienced in how to handle something like this. Over the long-haul, letting this kind of communication go unchallenged affects the team, our institution, our relationships, and our friendships.

Best Practices and Pitfalls to Avoid

• Do use the first person
• Do use descriptive statements that you have actually observed people saying
• Do create multiple statements rather than trying to blend multiple problems into one
• Don't describe the solution or use solution jargon
• Don't embellish using false emotion or projection (do keep your BS detector on)

An ideal solution statement is a sentence or two that:

• Begins with the phrase, "The ideal solution would..."
• May contains the phrase "so that" or "the ability to"

​Examples
Here are ideal solution statements based on the aforementioned problem statements:

• The ideal solution would provide me the ability to know where my AirPod case is located right now so that I can find it easily.
• The ideal solution would give me the know-how and confidence to respond appropriately in the moment and over the long-haul so that values of personal respect and dignity are established and reinforced in our team and in our institution.

​Best Practices and Pitfalls to Avoid

• Do use the first person
• Do describe the business or quality-of-life improvement delivered
• Do write the first draft of the statement soon after producing the problem statement because it so naturally flows afterward
• Do create one ideal solution statement per problem statement
• Don't describe components of the solution or use solution jargon

​Subscribe to my free blog updates to receive content that vividly describes the techniques and leadership skills that embody the practice of agile design methods. The blog contains not only my ideas on the topic but the insight of others who actively work and thrive wholeheartedly in the realms of collaborative creativity and solution design.

Be prepared for the moment in advance by having your co-facilitor serve as a scribe, recording the person’s name on a single sheet of paper or in a note-taking tool like Evernote.

Then your scribe should listen for and record any of the following items that the person mentions:

​Nouns

• Their name
• Their organizational role name
• Workproducts (things they or their organization produce or services they deliver)
• Collaborators (people they work with or interact with to get things done or do things for)
• Systems or applications they use to help them
• Things they respond to

Verbs

• What they do or produce
• ​When they do it
• Triggering business events that they respond to

Pain Points / Opportunities

• ​Problems they describe​

Hold on to them. They will come in handy in the structured conversation that will unfold in the hours and days that lie ahead.

Nearly every one of these nouns are added to a Glossary. Many of them will eventually be placed around a Circle of Interaction (COIN) diagram that clearly summarizes the process, collaborators and deliverables on a single page.

However, in my experience, having a glossary available to collaborators is worth the effort because it serves as an accelerator an work effort accelerator whereas the absence of a glossary causes delays and other negative side-effects.

Here is an approach I use and recommend while facilitating collaborative meetings;  

1. Prepare: Make sure that someone (you or a designated person in the meeting) serves as a scribe to record words and their meanings. When meeting in a room, I suggest having 8" x 6" Post-it Super Sticky Notes and a Sharpie permanent marker available at all times. When meeting virtually online or over the phone, I suggest having the Evernote application open at all times.
   
   
2. Listen: While facilitating the collaborative conversation, listen for concepts or notions that might not be easily understood by others not as invested in the conversation. When the you hear a word or phrase, stop the conversation briefly, "Let's capture that idea as a glossary term."
   
   
3. Record:  Typically there is one person in the conversation who can authoritatively verbalize the glossary term. Have that person state it while the scribe records it.
   
   
4. Confirm: Have the scribe read it back to the group to get confirmation. Record any refinements and then move on with the meeting.
   
   For example, in a recent cross-functional human resources effort, our team came up with these terms. One of them had a single meaning. Another had multiple meanings stated in separate sentenced.
   
   exit interview – A final meeting to collect specific assets from the employee. A survey conducted with an individual who is separating from employment.
   
   involuntary – The condition upon which separation occurs that is not initiated by the employee.
   
   line management – A set of managers in the lower layers of the management hierarchy (e.g., team leader, supervisor) that manage employees who have no supervisory responsibilities.
   
   
5. Publish: Long after the meeting, because you were intentional you now have the corporate memory to reconstruct what was said by publishing the recorded glossary terms in whatever form is appropriate (e.g., appendix in a published document, page on a collaborative website or wiki).

Making your glossary accessible to all stakeholders provides a clarifying reference resource that accelerates understanding and positively affect the progress of your collaborative work effort. I hope this has been a helpful perspective for you.

​- Chuck

Subscribe to my free blog updates to receive content that vividly describes the techniques and leadership skills that embody the practice of agile design methods. The blog contains not only my ideas on the topic, but the insight of others who actively work and thrive wholeheartedly in the realms of collaborative creativity.

​I look forward to you joining us.
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When asked authentically, this three-syllable question creates connectedness, trust and understanding with anyone, even a person you have just met.

This matters because empathy, the ability to understand and share the feelings of others, is an essential ingredient in the process of designing solutions for people.

How can we understand how others are feeling unless we ask? Asking the question unlocks the potential to observe problems that would otherwise go unobserved. This is a gold mine of understanding for solutions designers.

Understanding how people in the world are feeling is easy. Just ask them. They'll tell you. Listen to them and learn what problems they are experiencing. It will inform your design decisions.

When the woman you are talking with senses that you care enough about her to ask how her day is going, it breathes fresh life into the conversation, even if she is having a bad day. Somehow when you care enough to ask, it reaffirms her humanity and causes her to reflect on how she's feeling.

If we, as solutions designers, practice this kind of authentic caring, listening and learning on an ongoing basis, we tap into a limitless supply of priceless insight for free by simply exercising a common courtesy towards another person.

Your empathy for people and willingness to be vulnerable enough to go there immensely affect your solution design.

- Chuck

Subscribe to my free blog updates that contain not only my ideas on the topic, but the insight of others who actively work and thrive wholeheartedly in the realms of collaborative creativity.

I hope you'll get a lot of benefit from it.