From problem to product in 40 minutes

I use design challenges to practice product thinking. In this case study, I tried to come up with a product solution for a problem in a 40-minute design brainstorm session.

There are more challenges on UXchallenge.co that I created to help designers practice product thinking and level up design skills.

The Challenge

"It’s one thing to know what the weather is like in your travel destination, and it’s quite another thing to be totally prepared for temperature or altitude changes so that you stay fit and healthy during the trip. How can you design a product that helps travelers prepare and acclimatize fast for their trip so they don't miss a minute of fun?"

Using Jobs to be Done Framework for Problem Solving

Defining target customers

Creating job story for target customers

Creating customer persona

Identifying desired outcomes

Desired outcomes are listed and rated for their importance and current satisfaction to find opportunities where a new product could fill the need.

Product idea generation

Success metrics

Storyboard

Uesr Flows

Product Sketches 

AND...40 minute is up!

Usually, a productive 40-minute problem to product brainstorm session ends with quick sketches of the screens and ideas for interaction. 

Wireframes, visual designs and prototype creation would take much longer. Fortunately for me, the fun has just begun! =)

Wireframes

Visual design guidelines based on Material Design

Splash screen and product branding

Personalized comfort quiz

Main pre-travel weather screen

Forecast by the day and prep tips

Location-based hyper-local forecast and prep tips during trip

Night mode

Yes, everybody needs a bit of night mode during the night!

The winter-is-coming mode

A little animated prototype

Click the video to play!

Learnings

I love brainstorming product ideas from problems. It's a rare opportunity to generate product ideas from scratch, so I really enjoy using design challenges to practice product thinking. Although the brainstorming process was done in only 40 minutes, the execution of the high fidelity designs and prototype took well more than a week! Next time around, I'd line up all the design resources so the execution step would be faster.