This was a modified one-person GV sprint conducted over a one-week period (each day was modified to take 2-4 hours). I worked on the following brief provided by Bitesize UX:
Design a mobile app with the goal of making it easier for people to follow new recipes, and cook great meals at home.
Personally, I love cooking at home but I don't enjoy looking up new recipes. I hate needing to scroll through an essay and closing 5 different pop-up ads JUST to look at a list of ingredients. As someone who always wished there was an easier way, I thought this would be a great challenge.
Day 1 - Map
I started the design sprint by defining the steps that a home chef would take when using an app to try cooking a new recipe:
I wanted to design an enjoyable cooking app by focusing on providing the following:
Having clear steps to organize the cooking process
Providing visual cues to remove any guesswork - if a cooking method is new, users should still feel confident
Providing all the necessary information when needed - no going back and forth to figure out ingredient measurements
Ability to scan future steps without disrupting current flow
Day 2 - Sketch
Lightning Sketches
I looked up existing apps for inspiration on how to present information for different contexts. What makes these apps effective?
• Google Maps makes driving in an unfamiliar place an easy experience due to effectively breaking down information. I really appreciate features like the "Recenter" button, which allow users to look ahead, but easily navigate back to their current step.
• I use the All Trails app to discover new hikes and I really like how easy it is to determine if a trail is a good fit from a quick glance.
• The Lego Builder app has a unique challenge of instructing audiences that includes children. They achieve this by using NO words, just diagrams to show the materials needed for each step and how to use them.
Crazy 8's
Next, I spent 8 minutes sketching 8 different ideas for how the app could present information to users when they're following instructions.
Day 3 - Decide
Storyboarding
Based on my favorite sketch from the previous day, I sketched a solution for each step of the user flow:
Views recipes
Picks a recipe
Gathers ingredients
Follows steps (cooking)
Finishes cooking
Logs recipe to remember in the future
Day 4 - Prototype
I created a prototype using Figma. I used a familiar recipe (here's the recipe) and considered what the process of following this recipe would look like in my app:
Day 5 - Test
I conducted a usability test with five users, revealing several opportunities for improvement:
How can the app distinguish, “I love this recipe” and “I want to try this recipe?” : Four out of five testers weren’t sure how they would use the “favorite” feature because they want to save interesting recipes to try in the future, but they also want a way to collect favorite recipes.
Can I add notes? Can I add my own recipes?: Three testers asked if noting things like substitutions or changes are possible.
Where are the reviews?: All five testers said that they used reviews to guide their decision making and thought ratings on the search page would be helpful. I assumed users would find ratings more meaningful based on their own experience. I realized it's equally important to provide context for whether a recipe is good prior to asking users to invest time.
Final Thoughts
I found the modified GV sprint to be a helpful exercise for thinking creatively while being outcome-driven. Since this was a modified exercise, I didn't have an opportunity to consider and incorporate as many ideas. I think especially when it comes to selecting a design and prototyping, having a couple ideas represented for a "rumble" would make the testing phase really insightful. Overall, I think the GV sprint is an effective way for quickly generating ideas and solutions.
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