Rapid Innovation on a Budget
Have you ever started a new job and wondered ‘Where do I begin?’
Implementing a unified product design strategy and a way to account for innovation enabled Razoo to align its teams, optimize limited resources, and foster measurable continuous product development.
Rapid prototypes of concepts to test mobile product designs for Razoo.
Situation
Razoo, a pioneering non-profit crowdfunding startup, developed an online platform allowing any 501(c)(3) nonprofit or educational institution to raise awareness and funds for their causes.
Challenge
Despite dedicated efforts from product, engineering, and marketing teams, there was a lack of a common goal and strategy to achieve business objectives, leading to misaligned work streams and inefficient use of resources.
Question
How can Razoo establish a clear design strategy to align its teams and effectively guide continuous product development?
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UX’s role is to align and ensure we get there, balancing the needs of the business and technology with the needs of the people.
Collaborative diagram using intent planning framework to align on a shared product vision.
Fostering alignment
- I hosted workshops to help teams collaborate to define a shared mission: ’Razoo provides the giving ecosystem to help everyone change the world.’
- This statement was further detailed to specify actionable steps, such as ’enabling people to make a positive impact by funding meaningful causes and harnessing relevant networks using various technologies.’
Actions with accountability
- Due to insufficient site traffic for statistically significant metrics, the team adopted innovation accounting, a Lean Startup technique, to evaluate design iterations and monitor progress.
- This approach allowed the team to assess progress, facilitating informed decision-making when traditional metrics were ineffective.
Rapid prototyping
- With a clear strategy in place, the team utilized rapid prototyping to gather ad hoc, guerrilla-style user feedback.
- The results from this rapid feedback loop informed decisions on whether to pivot or persevere in pursuing business goals.
Innovation accounting framework used to plan product design and document hypotheses outcomes.
Results
Shared Mission
The collaborative workshop led to the creation of a unified mission statement and a detailed product design strategy, aligning team efforts toward common objectives.
Accounting for Innovation
By implementing innovation accounting, the team established a method to track and monitor innovation, enabling continuous assessment and iteration of product designs.
Rapid Feedback
The use of rapid prototyping and immediate user feedback allowed the team to make swift, informed decisions, optimizing the product development process within the constraints of limited resources.
Conclusion
By integrating a clear product design strategy with innovation accounting, Razoo effectively aligned its cross-functional teams, optimized resource utilization, and fostered a culture of continuous development, ultimately enhancing its crowdfunding platform’s impact.
