Affirmations

weeknotes

Sep 18

This week I tried to experiment with affirmation-setting and it’s been a nice metric to measure my day. I used to look at this from the productivity perspective (at my therapist’s dismay), which as life goes, is usually hit/miss. Now, I’m trying out a design futurist approach on my life (envisioning what is preferable to inform the present).

Anyways, an extra reflective week for me, lots of 1-1s at work and wrapping up some bits before I head back to my Masters for two weeks!

What happened

Some fun: tried golf for the first time, explored Hampstead Heath, sunny day in East just eating away
Kicked off our first customer journey development session with the client UX/R team
Refined the Retail Discovery journeys from the feedback received
Drafted the Retail Replenishment journeys, ahead of the session (week after next)
Mapped a view of all detailed journeys by product
Show and tell — 15 mins to present a service design/blueprint 101 to one of our executive sponsors
Mid-project feedback convos (here’s your reminder to collect regular feedback, it’s good for you)
Tying up loose knits and knots as it’s my last week before I head back to class for 2 weeks!
Getting used to markdown formatting (once-and-for-all)…

Our first customer journey development session

Last week I tried to push the remaining customer journeys as far as possible, before my 2-week return to my Masters. We’re only on session 1 of 4, where we walked through the journeys so far — Discovery is looking in shape in terms of detail and complexity, which is great. We only had one strategic hour to lay context and walk through the journeys to the UX/R team, so most of this was spent on the actual walkthrough and getting on the same page. These sessions have been a milestone as it marks our first point of collaboration with UX (first, of many).

The feedback we got helped to fill some gaps and refine our knowledge of the channels, particularly notifications (which aren’t being delivered in-app today). Since Discovery is all about search and personalisation, a lot of this thinking has been around surfacing relevant promotions, getting help (manual/self-serve) and enhanced filtration (auto/manual) — think product comparisons, data > preference, appointment consultations. We’ve been trying to exhaust the product epics (particularly the essential features) into all the macro-journeys, ensuring that no key epic gets missed. It might not be the most realistic path, but it’s exhaustive and does justice to the service complexity.

On feedback

It’s the mid-point of the project which calls for feedback discussions. I’m still tailoring my approach but I find that 1) on giving feedback, it’s much easier to take sporadic notes throughout the project for people rather than think back when the time comes, 2) on requesting feedback, it’s much more helpful to share your goals, so other people can better support your development (and you, them). This transparency has worked really well this week, and the key things I heard back were:

Communication: misalignment between quality of communication + quality of work. As a small team, we all represent a very different skillset, making us all experts in our own regard. I’ve conscious that I can let my expertise speak beyond empathy, which doesn’t always bode well in disagreement. Going forward, my priority is to work on skillful empathy —this looks like dedicating more of my time to embedding into an inclusive team culture, extend opportunities to junior designers and being more responsive in times of tension.
Style of leadership: segways nicely to my second point about the type of leader I want to be known for. I received a variation of this feedback in the past but it feels a lot more relevant now that I’m more senior. I haven’t spent enough time thinking about this, but its something along the lines of becoming a compassionate coach/educator rather than someone more hands-off, like a facilitator or decision-maker.
Building beyond advocacy: I’m a designer, now so what? There’s a role in upselling this a a value (one of which is my core goals), but also a responsibility in translating this into tangible outcomes. As a service designer, it can sometimes feel like so much of the job is about convincing others rather than the actual work. My future thoughts for development will look like letting the outcomes speak for themselves, rather than getting bogged down on communicating to stakeholders.