Making research fun and productive based on the book Gamestorming

2. Agenda

3. About Me
Tracey Nolte
UX Practice Area Lead
Slalom Consulting
Over 20 years in IT
Worked for / consulted for:
ExxonMobil, AT&T, McAfee, JC Penney, Sally
Beauty, Dr Pepper, American Heart
Association, Microsoft, Oncor, Glazers,
Freeman, Radio Shack, Centex Homes,
Continental Airlines, EDS, and many more
Started as BA, moved into BI/Analytics,
moved in to Development then Design, then
UX.

4. What is Gamestorming?
Combines brainstorming
with
GAMES!

5. BY
Dave Gray
Sunni Brown
James Macanufo

8. Can one person discover &
innovate?
Yes, but many ideas are
better!

9. Are the elements in your
meetings producing
OUTSTANDING results?

10. Could you get more results with
specific direction, engagement &
participation?

12. Typical User Centered Design
Process
Build
• Seek to understand
• Gather input & feedback
• Brainstorm
• Plan
User meetings = BORIN
Gamestorming = FUN

13. Old way….

14. New way….

15. Why Brainstorm?

16. Why Brainstorm?User
Adoption
Get ResultsExplore &
Organize
Innovate

19. Which method?
Paper / Post It Online
www.innovationgames.comwww.postit.com

21. Prepare & Supplies
Prepare play
area with
supplies and
instructions.

23. Moderate & Collaborate
Moderators
You create the experience
of the game…
make it enjoyable by …
BEING
ENJOYABLE!

24. Moderate & Collaborate
Collaborate
With shy people and get
them engaged by asking
questions…
Set goals and rewards
FOR
COLLABORATING!

26. Collect & Analyze Results
Collect
Results from participants
into excel for analysis.
Create columns & rows for
Pivot Tables &
Graphs!

27. Collect & Analyze Results
Analyze
Results in the pivot tables
and graphs.
What do the results
MEAN and what
actions need to occur
next?!

30. What is your objective?

31. Elevator Pitch
Object of Play: What has been a time-proven exercise in product
development applies equally well in developing any concept: writing
the elevator pitch. Whether developing a service, a company-wide
initiative, or just a good idea that merits spreading, a group will benefit
from collaborating on what is-and isn’t- in the pitch.
Often this is the hardest thing to do in developing a new idea. An
elevator pitch should be short and compelling description of the
problem you’re solving, who you solve it for, and one key benefit that
distinguishes it from its competitors. It must be unique, believable and
important. The better and bigger the idea, the harder the pitch is to
write.
Number of Players: Works as well individually as with a small working
group
Duration of Play: Long- save at least 90 minutes for the entire exercise,
and consider a short break after the initial idea generation is complete,
before prioritizing and shaping the pitch itself. Small working groups will
have an easier time coming to a final pitch; in some cases it may be
necessary to assign one person follow-up accountability for the final
wording after the large decisions have been made in the exercise.
How to Play

32. Empathy Map
GOAL: The goal of the game is to gain a deeper level of understanding
of a stakeholder in your business ecosystem, which may be a client,
prospect, partner, etc., within a given context, such as a buying
decision or an experience using a product or service. The exercise can
be as simple or complex as you want to make it. You should be able to
make a rough empathy map in about 20 minutes, provided you have a
decent understanding of the person and context you want to map.
Even if you don’t understand the stakeholder very well, the empathy-
mapping exercise can help you identify gaps in your understanding and
help you gain a deeper understanding of the things you don’t yet
know.
How to Play

33. 7 Ps Framework
How to Play
Every meeting deserves a plan. Note that a great plan can't
guarantee a great outcome, but it will help lay down the
fundamentals from which you can adapt. Sketch out these
fundamentals by using the 7Ps framework.Use these items as a
checklist. When preparing for a meeting, thinking through the 7Ps
can improve focus and results, even if you have only a few
moments to reflect on them.

34. Forced Ranking
How to Play
In all work of reasonable complexity, there is a moment-
to-moment risk that equally important tasks will
overwhelm the human mind. In knowledge work this may
be doubly true, due to the intangible “fuzziness” of any
particular task. For groups that are charting out how they
will work one of the most practical and useful things they
can do is build a checklist.
Although creating a checklist may seem like an open-and-
shut exercise, often it uncovers a manifest of issues.
Because a checklist is a focusing object, it demands that
the team discuss the order and importance of certain
tasks. Team members are likely to have
different perspectives on these things, and the checklist is
a means to bring these issues to the surface and work
with them.

35. Speed boat
How to Play
Identify anchors that keep your product or
project at risk. Identify things that customers
don’t like about your services, products or
project.

36. Context Map
How to Play
We don’t truly have a good grasp of a
situation until we see it in a fuller
context. The Context Map is designed to
show us the external factors, trends, and
forces at work surrounding an
organization. Because once we have a
systemic view of the external
environment we’re in, we are better
equipped to respond proactively to that
landscape.

37. Cover Story
How to Play
Cover Story is a game about pure imagination. The purpose
is to think expansively around an ideal future state for the
organization; it’s an exercise in visioning. The object of the
game is to suspend all disbelief and envision a future state
that is so stellar that it landed your organization on the cover
of a well-known magazine. The players must pretend as
though this future has already taken place and has been
reported by the mainstream media. This game is worth
playing because it not only encourages people to “think big,”
but also actually plants the seeds for a future that perhaps
wasn’t possible before the game was played.

38. Dot Voting
How to Play
In any good brainstorming session, there will come a
time when there are too many good ideas, too many
concepts, and too many possibilities to proceed. When
this time has come, dot voting is one of the simplest
ways to prioritize and converge upon an agreed
solution.

39. Story boarding
How to Play
This game asks players to envision and describe an ideal
future in sequence using words and pictures.
Storyboarding as a technique is so versatile that it can
be used to show any topic, not just an ideal future. But
it is particularly powerful as a visioning exercise since it
allows players to imagine and create possibilities. The
players tell a story with a happy ending, planting tiny
seeds for a different future. You can also use
storyboarding to let employees describe their
experience on a project, to show approaches to solving
a problem, or to orient new employees on policies and
procedures—its uses are limited only by the
imagination.

40. Post Up
How to Play
The goal of this game is to generate ideas with silent
sticky note writing. Generating ideas is an opening
activity, and a first step. From here you can create an
affinity map or a bottom-up tree, or further organize
and prioritize the thoughts.
The Post-Up game is based on the exercises in Rapid
Problem-Solving with Post-it® Notes by David Straker.

41. SWOT analysis
How to Play
Begin by explaining your desired end state to your players. Draw a picture of it and add
fun descriptions to create a playful atmosphere. Next, create a chart with four
quadrants and provide dot stickers, sticky notes — preferably a different color for each
quadrant — and pens to the participants. In the upper left quadrant, write “Strengths.”
For 5 – 10 minutes, have players write their ideas on the sticky notes, describing
anything that will help excel toward the goal. Repeat this process for each of the other
quadrants in the following order:
Quadrant 2: Strengths – what you have going for you
Quadrant 3: Weaknesses — anything that can be improved upon
Quadrant 1: Opportunities – leads that you can focus your energy on
Quadrant 4: Threats – obstacles that you must surpass
After everyone has written their ideas, have them post their sticky notes on the
respective quadrants. As a team, go through each category and cluster the related
ideas together. Have players dot vote with the stickers you have provided to identify
the most relevant clusters.
Next, collaborate with the participants to create broader categories for the clusters,
such as “Customer Service,” or “Leadership.” As before, dot vote to find the most
important categories.
To conclude the game, summarize your findings and work together to identify how you
can use the results to your advantage to reach your desired end state. Engage the
participants and encourage them to come up with fresh insights.

43. GAME: Cover Story
RULES
• Groups of TBD
• Each group will create a magazine cover and
inside story.
– imagine the best-case scenario for their
company and to take that scenario one step
further. Spend five quiet minutes imagining
their own stories before they work together
to agree on one. 30–45 minutes to generate
this “story of the year” and represent it on
their template.
“Cover” tells the BIG story of their success.
“Headlines” convey the substance of the cover story.

45. GAME: Affinity
Stars
RULES
• Groups of TBD
• Each group identifies all the
things they have learned or
want to learn as a benefit
during their time at Big D
• The groups will organized and
group those things into
summary categories
• The summary categories will
be posted on a separate
sheet with lines for voting.
• The opposite groups will then
DOT VOTE on each other’s

47. GAME: Cover Story
RULES
• Groups of TBD
• Each group will create
an ideal future state of
Big Design for NEXT
YEAR
• Create what you think
would be the most
stellar event including
speakers, topics, visuals,
images, headlines, or
activities that would be
exciting for next year
PRIZES
• Most innovative and creative
team wins a book “Visual
Meetings” by David Sibbet.
• Group with most innovative
partition and collaboration will
be entered to win an Xbox with
Connect and 2 games