Labs: work better
Helping the Labs team navigate the discovery phase
This year, Whiting-Turner officially announced Labs, an internal research and development group. Our team comes from many educational backgrounds and offices scattered across the country.
Work Better is a process initiative that aims to lead our Labs projects through the discovery phase, helping them collaborate to build stronger, more intentional products and customer experiences.
Project Type
Professional
Whiting-Turner
project timeline
2024
2 Months
My Role
UX/CX Engineer
my contributions
Design Research
Strategy
Process
Visual Design
Background
Labs: Who are we?
WHITING-TURNER'S LABS TEAM PERFORMS TWO KEY ROLES
Evaluating and delivering emerging technologies
Construction is an inefficient industry, and new tools are constantly being developed to help. When someone in the company wants to know if one of these technologies could benefit their job site, Labs evaluates the product's viability for our industry and our workflow.
Developing custom tools
When no product is available, the Labs team develops custom products including mobile applications and IoT devices to solve problems that arise on WT's jobsites.
The Problem
we need a map
WE NEED PROCESSES THAT HELP SUPPORT AND TRAIN OUR TEAM
We need guides to lead our team of engineers and project managers through an unfamiliar process.
Our team comes from a diverse range of backgrounds, which makes us stronger, but also makes many of us new to the design research and development process. We need internal standard practices to help any member of our team conduct a successful product discovery phase.
We need to helping our team to know how to use their findings to deliver more valuable solutions.
Labs was only established as an official team in 2024. Before that, most internally developed products were designed to address a specific issue of one Whiting-Turner project team or job site. Then these products are released to the rest of the company, whose wants and needs might differ from that first job. We need to introduce a discovery phase into our process that helps us design broader solutions.
strategy
breaking it down
SCOPE: THE DISCOVERY PHASE
We want our products to be backed by data, so we need data
Our goal is to help our teammates have a productive discovery phase that informs them about the market, user, industry, and anything else
START BROAD AND THEN REFINE
Research beyond the expected scope
By researching with wide margins, we find more actionable insights. Outside industries, analogous domains, and diverse interviewee roles will all provide deeper understanding of the space and the potential solutions.
Thorough research leads to well-defined goals entering the design/develop phase
THINGS TO KEEP IN MIND
A decentralized team needs scheduled collaboration, not spontaneity
Our team members sit in five offices across the country, which makes it harder to arrange impromptu brainstorm sessions or workshops without advanced planning. Any collaborative activities need to be designed to fit within scheduled time frames. They should be intermixed with tasks and activities that can be completed independently.
Labs doesn't have just one role.
The same process should work for evaluating existing products and building new ones. Our processes should feel like tools our project team can use to build stronger products, not like a rigid list of boxes they must check. If we explain the purpose of each activity or deliverable, our team can decide which tools best fit their needs.
New processes should build on existing ones
Instead of overhauling all of our current processes and requiring our team to learn a buzzy new program, we can build on the processes we already have, and make intentional changes when they are necessary. Our workflows should be compatible with standard company workflows whenever possible.
+ Miro for workshops & diagraming
+ Smartsheet for data & project tracking
+ Word for documentation
+ Powerpoint for sales
The results
introducing our new strategy
FOLLOW THE MAP
We developed a standard process map to walk our team members through discovery.
For each step in the process map, we provide resources such as workshop templates, research strategies, and documentation required for project charter proposals. The process map explains the purpose of each tool so our teams can choose the tools that best fit their project's needs.
In addition to what we provide in the process map, we also compiled additional resources such as lists of industry expert contacts for background interviews. All of the resources are available to our team through our Sharepoint site.
01
PROOF OF CONCEPT
Everything we need to pitch the idea to the Labs Team Leader for approval to work. Prove there is a market need for the product.
TASKS:
+ Benchmark Research
+ Market Analysis
+ Analogous Domain Inspiration
TOOLS:
+ Best Practices Intro
+ Miro Workshop
+ Concept Documentation
02
risk assessment
Every problem solution is not necessarily something we want to build. Prove there are no egregious concerns to human safety or data security.
TASKS:
+ Assess user safety
+ Assess team safety
+ Assess WT data safety
TOOLS:
+ Labs Risk Go/ No-Go
+ Risk Evaluation Form
+ Compiled WT Resource List
03
research & study
The biggest part of the phase. Explore the problem, and how it affects potential users, industries, regions, and aspects of work.
TASKS:
+ User Interviews
+ Expert Interviews (IE)
+ Industry & Region Study
TOOLS:
+ User Interview Guide
+ Expert Interview Guide
+ Miro Workshop(s)
+ Research Methods Toolkit
04
Plan to build
Decide and document your design approach strategy. Determine roles and responsibilities. Define project objectives and strategies to achieve them.
TASKS:
+ Find Goals and Guardrails
+ Identify KPIs and Required Deliverables
+ Complete Project Charter
TOOLS:
+ Deliverable Templates
+ Development Launch Guide
+ Miro Workshop(s)
+ Project Charter Documentation
TOOL EXAMPLES INCLUDING TEMPLATES AND GENERAL KNOWLEDGE
COMPLETE THE WORKSHOPS
We developed a series of collaborative workshops in Miro.
We use the post-it method to allow teams to work together remotely from Teams calls. Each workshop is a collection of guided activities aimed at helping our team organically discover the information they need to deliver intentional product solutions.
For each workshop, we've provided recommendations for number of participants and time spent on each activity, as well as step by step instructions. When our team members grow more familiar with the discovery process, they can start to tailor these templates to their project needs.
DOCUMENT THE RESULTS
We provide step-by-step translation of workshop discoveries to project deliverables
Our teams will fell confident arguing the case for their product solutions thanks to our guides, and will enter the next phase of development armed with actionable insights.
Design and development phase aids coming soon!