Overview
- In general, processes are more efficient when they are arranged in a pipeline of batched operations
- That principle equally applies to creative processes
- When designing a product with a significant amount of unknowns it is good to separate information gathering from information refinement
- With such a division, Scoping is the information gathering phase and Design is the information refinement phase
Scoping
Friction Free
- A good scoping process creates minimal friction for capturing information
- Scoping should be optimized for writing, not reading
- Organizing captured scoping information is not a priority
- With repeated scoping the process can be gradually refined and more structure added without increasing friction
- After scoping is finished the collective scoping documents can act as a long-term archive
- The information in this archive may rarely be needed, and querying it may require some rummaging and interpretation, but the information is there when needed
Scoping Composition
- Depending on the nature of the product being designed, scoping commonly contains some or all of the following elements:
- Notes
- Brainstorming
- Existing reference samples
- Links to external resources
Design
Transition
- Ideally Design doesn’t begin until Scoping has finished
- Often circumstances do not permit such separation and the two phases overlap
- When there is overlap between Scoping and Design it is good to treat them as separate contexts, consciously switching back and forth between Scoping mode and Design mode
Channeling
- The output of Scoping is the primary input for Design
- Design takes raw scoping information and refines it into well organized and easy-to-use documentation
- It can be useful for individual elements of design documents to link to scoping artifacts so that design decisions can be traced back to their motivation origins