Convergent Thinking
A cognitive process where ideas are brought together to find a single, best solution to a problem. Important for problem-solving and decision-making in design processes.
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“focused thinking”
Computational Thinking
A problem-solving process that includes logical reasoning, pattern recognition, abstraction, and algorithmic thinking. Important for developing efficient and effective solutions in digital product design and development.
Outcomes Over Outputs
A focus on the results or benefits of a project rather than the activities or deliverables produced. Crucial for ensuring that efforts are aligned with achieving meaningful results.
First Principles
A problem-solving approach that involves breaking down complex problems into their most basic, foundational elements. Crucial for developing innovative solutions by understanding and addressing core issues.
Ideation
The process of generating a broad set of ideas on a given topic, with no attempt to judge or evaluate them initially. Crucial for creative problem-solving and developing innovative solutions in product design and development.
Problem Statement
A clear, concise description of the issue(s) that need to be addressed, focusing on the specific challenge and its impact. Essential for guiding problem-solving efforts and ensuring a clear understanding of the issue at hand.
Innovation Culture
An organizational environment that encourages and supports creative thinking, risk-taking, and the pursuit of new ideas. Essential for fostering continuous improvement and breakthrough advancements.
Problem Space
The context and set of conditions surrounding a problem that needs to be solved. Essential for understanding the full scope of a problem and identifying potential solutions.
User Centric Mindset
An approach that places the user's needs, preferences, and behaviors at the forefront of all design and development activities. Important for fostering a design culture that prioritizes user satisfaction and engagement.
Business Acumen
The ability to understand and deal with various business situations, making sound decisions to ensure successful outcomes. Important for designers to align their work with business goals and make informed decisions.
Base Rate Fallacy
A cognitive bias where people ignore general statistical information in favor of specific information. Critical for designers to use general statistical information to improve decision-making accuracy and avoid bias.
Divergent Thinking
A cognitive process used to generate creative ideas by exploring many possible solutions, often contrasted with convergent thinking. Essential for fostering creativity and innovation in problem-solving and design.
Critical Thinking
The objective analysis and evaluation of an issue in order to form a judgment. Essential for making informed and rational design decisions.
Systems Thinking
A holistic approach to analysis that focuses on the way that a system's constituent parts interrelate and how systems work over time and within the context of larger systems. Essential for solving complex problems and designing systems that account for interdependencies and dynamics.
MVE
Minimum Viable Experience (MVE) is the simplest version of a product that delivers a complete and satisfying user experience while meeting core user needs. Essential for rapidly validating product concepts and user experience designs while ensuring that even early versions of a product provide value and a positive impression to users.
Backstage
Elements of a service or product that are not visible to the user but are essential for delivering the front-stage experience. Crucial for understanding and designing the full user experience, including behind-the-scenes elements.
Empathy Mapping
A collaborative tool used to visualize what a user thinks, feels, says, and does to better understand their experiences and needs. Essential for gaining deep insights into user behavior and guiding design decisions.
JTBD
Jobs-To-Be-Done (JTBD) is a framework that focuses on understanding the tasks users are trying to accomplish with a product, emphasizing their goals and motivations over product features. Crucial for designing products that meet real user needs and motivations.
Experience Design
The practice of designing products, services, and environments with a focus on the overall user experience. Essential for creating holistic and meaningful interactions.
Shallow Processing
A cognitive approach where information is processed at a surface level, focusing on basic features rather than deeper meaning, often leading to poorer memory retention. Important for designing educational and informational content that encourages deeper processing and understanding.
Product Design
The process of creating and developing new products, focusing on form, function, usability, and aesthetics to meet user needs. Crucial for developing products that are both functional and appealing to users.
Design Leadership
The practice of guiding and inspiring teams to create effective, user-centered design solutions that align with business goals. Crucial for fostering a culture of innovation, collaboration, and excellence in design practices within organizations.
LTV
Lifetime Value (LTV) is a metric that estimates the total revenue a business can expect from a single customer account throughout their relationship. Crucial for informing customer acquisition strategies, retention efforts, and overall business planning by providing insights into long-term customer profitability.
Illusion of Validity
A cognitive bias where individuals overestimate the accuracy of their judgments, especially when they have a lot of information. Important for understanding and mitigating overconfidence in user decision-making.
Bait and Switch
A dark pattern where users think they are going to take one action, but a different, undesirable action happens instead. Designers must avoid this deceptive practice and be aware of its impact to ensure transparent user interactions.
Groupthink
A psychological phenomenon where the desire for harmony and conformity in a group results in irrational or dysfunctional decision-making. Crucial for recognizing and mitigating the risks of poor decision-making in teams.
Founder’s Mentality
A mindset and approach that embodies the entrepreneurial spirit, passion for improvement, and deep sense of ownership typically associated with a company's founders. Essential for maintaining agility, innovation, and customer-centricity as organizations grow and mature.
Service Design
The practice of planning and organizing people, infrastructure, communication, and material components of a service to improve its quality and the interaction between service providers and customers. Essential for creating effective and user-centered service experiences.
NPD
New Product Development (NPD) is the complete process of bringing a new product to market, from idea generation to commercialization. Essential for companies to innovate, stay competitive, and meet evolving customer needs through a structured approach to creating and launching new offerings.
Needfinding
A research process used to identify and understand the underlying needs of users to inform the design of products and services. Essential for creating user-centered designs that address real user needs.
MRD
Market Requirements Document (MRD) is a comprehensive document that outlines the market's needs, target audience, and business objectives for a product. It serves as a crucial tool for aligning product development efforts with market demands and business goals, ensuring that the final product meets customer needs and achieves market success.
MMF
Minimum Marketable Feature (MMF) is the smallest set of functionality that delivers significant value to users and can be marketed effectively. Crucial for prioritizing development efforts and releasing valuable product increments quickly, balancing user needs with business objectives.
LeSS
Large-Scale Scrum (LeSS) is a framework for scaling agile product development to multiple teams working on a single product. It provides a minimalist, large-scale agile approach that maintains the simplicity and effectiveness of Scrum while addressing the challenges of coordination and integration in multi-team environments.
5 Whys
A problem-solving method that involves asking "why" five times to identify the root cause of a problem. Useful for designers and product managers to uncover underlying issues and improve processes and solutions.
User Story Mapping
A visual technique used in Agile development to arrange user stories in a way that helps teams understand the user journey and prioritize work effectively. Crucial for ensuring that development efforts are aligned with user needs and priorities throughout the project.
Survivorship Bias
A cognitive bias that occurs when conclusions are drawn from a non-representative sample, focusing only on successful cases and ignoring failures. Crucial for making accurate assessments and designing systems that consider both successes and failures.
Shape Up Method
A product development methodology that emphasizes shaping work before starting it, fixing time and team size but leaving scope flexible to ensure high-quality outcomes. Crucial for managing product development efficiently and delivering high-quality results within constraints.
Executive Function
A set of cognitive processes that include working memory, flexible thinking, and self-control, crucial for planning, decision-making, and behavior regulation. Crucial for designing interfaces and experiences that support users' cognitive abilities.
Design Maturity
The level of sophistication and integration of design practices within an organization's processes and culture. Essential for assessing and improving the effectiveness of design in driving business value and innovation.
Customer Empathy
The ability to understand and share the feelings of customers, crucial for creating user-centered designs and experiences. Crucial for designing products that truly meet user needs and expectations.
Cognitive Ease
The tendency for people to prefer things that are easy to think about and understand. Important for designing user interfaces that are intuitive and easy to use.
JAD
Joint Application Development (JAD) is a collaborative approach to gathering requirements and designing solutions in software development projects. It facilitates rapid decision-making and consensus-building by bringing together key stakeholders, including users, developers, and project managers, in structured workshop sessions.
Belief Bias
The tendency to judge the strength of arguments based on the believability of their conclusions rather than the logical strength of the arguments. Important for understanding cognitive biases that affect decision-making and user perceptions.
Behavioral Product Design
Designing products that leverage behavioral science to influence user behavior in positive ways. Crucial for creating products that are effective in shaping user behavior and improving engagement.
InfoVis
Information Visualization (InfoVis) is the study and practice of visual representations of abstract data to reinforce human cognition. Crucial for transforming complex data into intuitive visual formats, enabling faster insights and better decision-making.
Information Ecology
The study of the relationships between people, practices, values, and technologies within an information environment. Helps in understanding and designing systems that are sustainable and adaptive to human and environmental changes.
Algorithm Design
The process of defining and creating algorithms to solve problems and perform tasks efficiently. Fundamental for software development and creating efficient solutions.
Field Study
Research conducted in natural settings to collect data on how people interact with products or environments in real-world conditions. Crucial for gaining authentic insights into user behaviors and contexts.
Startup Culture
The set of shared values, practices, and goals that characterize a startup company. Important for fostering innovation, agility, and a collaborative environment within product design teams.
Speed Dating
A research method in which participants interact with a series of potential product concepts in quick succession, providing rapid feedback on multiple ideas. Useful for quickly gathering user feedback on various concepts and iterating based on their preferences.
Expectation Bias
A cognitive bias where individuals' expectations influence their perceptions and judgments. Relevant for understanding how expectations skew perceptions and decisions among users.
Design Tradeoffs
The compromises made between different design options, balancing various factors like usability, aesthetics, and functionality. Essential for making informed decisions that optimize overall design effectiveness.
Design Literacy
The understanding and proficiency in the principles, practices, and processes of design. Essential for empowering individuals to effectively participate in and critique design processes.
Principles Over Processes
A design philosophy that emphasizes core design principles over rigid adherence to standardized processes. Essential for maintaining creativity and innovation in large-scale, process-driven environments.
Persona
A fictional character created to represent a user type that might use a site, brand, or product in a similar way, guiding design decisions. Essential for user-centered design, ensuring that products meet the needs of target users.
Customer Development
A framework for discovering and validating the right market for a product, building the right product features, and validating the business model. Important for ensuring that products meet market needs and customer expectations.
Content Strategy
The planning, development, and management of content to meet business and user needs, ensuring consistency and effectiveness across all channels. Essential for creating cohesive and impactful content that aligns with business goals and user needs.
Competitive Analysis
A strategic research process that involves evaluating competitors' products, services, and market positions to identify opportunities and threats. Essential for informing product strategy, differentiating offerings, and gaining a competitive advantage in the market.
Lead Product Manager
A senior role responsible for guiding the product management team and overseeing the development and strategy of products. Crucial for ensuring successful product development and alignment with business goals.
Bubble Sort
A simple sorting algorithm that repeatedly steps through the list, compares adjacent elements, and swaps them if they are in the wrong order. Important for understanding basic algorithmic principles and their applications.