for W3c validation
Last week we were invited by Corina Raduescu and Andrew Knevitt, Lecturers in Business Information Systems at the University of Sydney Business School, to run a design workshop with their Business Analysis in Practice students. This particular unit has a strong practical emphasis, including hands-on exercises on real case scenarios – so we asked them to help design a next generation learning platform.
Assisted by Celeste Humphrey and Joel Gralton from our team, I provided a quick overview of the theory and then ran them through an accelerated three hour version of our discovery workshop process. For this workshop we used a range of classic techniques including personas, post ups, affinity mapping, dot voting and storyboarding.
My goal was to emphasis the importance and growing recognition of this design-led approach in information technology. One of the best examples I’ve sent recently is the UK’s Government Digital Service, who have embraced user-centred design and agile technology practices (read more about how they are reducing cost and complexity).
During the workshop the feedback from the students was that they really enjoyed the interactive nature of the process and being introduced to the new techniques.