Fundamentals of 
Lean UX 
Agile on the Beach 2014 
Adrian Howard (@adrianh) 
quietstars.com
Hello!
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applies please
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participants are free to use the 
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identity nor the affiliation of the 
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participant, may be revealed”
Disclaimer: Eh?
I ♥ feedback
Swear Jar
Who are you?
Exercise: 
You're founding a 
startup!
Lean UX
www.flickr.com/photos/usnationalarchives/4727573934
Origin Story
UX
1993
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e6/Donald_Norman_at_AWF05.jpg
“Don also described and solicited discussion 
on, the "User Interface [sic] Architect's 
office" (hereafter UEA).” 
- Meeting notes made by Tom Erickson, 1993
“I invented the term because I thought Human 
Interface and usability were too narrow: I 
wanted to cover all aspects of the person's 
experience with a system, including industrial 
design, graphics, the interface, the physical 
interaction, and the manual.” 
- Don Norman
2000
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e6/Donald_Norman_at_AWF05.jpg
http://www.jjg.net/elements/pdf/elements.pdf
http://www.jjg.net/elements/pdf/elements.pdf
“The model outlined here does not account for 
secondary considerations (such as those 
arising during technical or content 
development) that may influence decisions 
during user experience development. Also, this 
model does not describe a development 
process, nor does it define roles within a user 
experience development team. Rather, it seeks 
to define the key considerations that go into 
the development of user experience on the 
Web today.” 
- Jesse James Garrett
“The model outlined here does not account for 
secondary considerations (such as those 
arising during technical or content 
development) that may influence decisions 
during user experience development. Also, this 
model does not describe a development 
process, nor does it define roles within a user 
experience development team. Rather, it seeks 
to define the key considerations that go into 
the development of user experience on the 
Web today.” 
- Jesse James Garrett
http://www.jjg.net/elements/pdf/elements.pdf
www.designcouncil.org.uk/about-design/How-designers-work/The-design-process/
Late 1990’s
.com bubble
Exercise: 
Elevator Pitch
UX?
2001
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowbird,_Utah#mediaviewer/File:May_28_2006_Snowbird_UT_USA.jpg
http://agilemanifesto.org/
2006
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Steve_Blank.jpg
“A startup is a temporary organization 
designed to search for a repeatable and scalable 
business model.” 
- Steve Blank
“A startup is a temporary organization 
designed to search for a repeatable and scalable 
business model.” 
- Steve Blank
From “The Startup Owner's Manual” by Steve Blank
Marriage vs Date
Plan vs Map
UX?
From “The Startup Owner's Manual” by Steve Blank
2008
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Eric_Ries2.jpg
The Lean Startup 
“A true experiment 
follows the scientific 
method. It begins 
with a clear 
hypothesis that 
makes predictions 
about what is 
supposed to happen. 
It then tests those 
predictions 
empirically”
The Lean Startup 
• Come up with hypothesis 
• Design experiment 
• Run experiment 
• Validate/Invalidate hypothesis 
• Repeat
http://xkcd.com/54/
The Lean Startup
Product certainty 
Market certainty
Product certainty 
Market certainty
Product certainty 
Market certainty
Product certainty 
Market certainty 
WTF
Product certainty 
WTF Build it and they 
will come! 
Market certainty
Product certainty 
WTF Build it and they 
will come! 
Market certainty 
You know, for kids!
You know, for kids! $ 
Product certainty 
WTF Build it and they 
will come! 
Market certainty
Product certainty 
Market certainty
Product certainty 
Market certainty
Product certainty 
$ 
Market certainty
The Lean Startup
Lean Startup = 
Continual Delivery + 
Cust Dev + Agile
Example 
• Zappos 
• Annual sales > US$1 billion 
• Hypothesis: Is there a demand for 
superior online shoe shopping 
• Experiment: Took photos from shoe 
shops, came back and bought them full 
price if customer bought them online 
Example from The Lean Startup, p57-58
Example 
• Allowing users to register with twitter 
will drop abandoned registrations by 5% 
• Built fake “register with twitter” link 
which led to nice error message 
• Released to segment of customers on live 
site 
• Measured how many new users tried it 
• <1% - hypothesis invalid
Exercise: 
Hypotheses
The Lean Startup
UX?
Lean Startup
Lean UX
The question we have to solve for is not “What 
does Lean User Experience mean?” The question 
is “In a lean environment, how can we make 
great user experiences?” 
- Janice Fraser, 2010, LUXr
Lean ?
1948-1975
Toyota Production 
System
TPS begat 
Lean Manufacturing begat 
Lean Thinking begat 
Lean $whatever
Designing out: 
muri 
mura 
muda
Designing out: 
muri (overburden) 
mura(inconsistency) 
muda(waste)
7 kinds of muda 
1. Over production 
2. Waiting 
3. Transportation 
4. Processing 
5. Stock at hand 
6.Movement 
7. Making defective products
Lean ≠ Low Quality
Lean ≠ Fast
Lean ≠ Cheap
Lean ≠ No deliverables
Lean = efficient and 
with no wastage
Exercise: Waste 
1. Over production 
2. Waiting 
3. Transportation 
4. Processing 
5. Stock at hand 
6.Movement 
7. Making defective products
Problems 
● Silos 
● Ownership 
● Alignment 
● Communication 
● Understanding of customers 
● Understanding of business 
● Features not Value
Agile UX vs Lean UX?
Product vs Learning
Exercise: 
Experiment Map
http://www.slideshare.net/7thpixel/experimenting-in-the-enterprise-agile2013- 
v11
Lean UX
Interviewing
Persona
http://www.slideshare.net/toddwarfel/data-driven-personas
http://www.slideshare.net/clevergirl/luxr-oneday-workshop/73
Usability Testing
http://www.argazkiak.org/photo/codesyntax-usability-lab/size/o/
http://allthingsoracle.com/red-gate-live-lab-source-control-for-oracle/
Design
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Robert_Edmond_Jones.jpg
Documentation
https://www.flickr.com/photos/doos/4689874175/
http://designcomics.org/
http://plasq.com/products/comiclife3/mac
“Getting out of the deliverables business” 
- Jeff Gothelf
“Getting out of the deliverables business” 
- Jeff Gothelf
“Getting out of the deliverables business” 
- Jeff Gothelf
DO LESS 
MORE OFTEN 
to do 
MORE
https://twitter.com/guspower/status/448487628107575296/photo/1
The Good, the Bad & 
the Ugly
Product Teams
UX is pervasive
Alignment on value
Helps build an 
experiment culture
It’s hypotheses 
before, during and 
after development
Encourages value-oriented 
infrastructure
Hypotheses talk 
about business 
value directly
Where’s the user?
Where’s the 
delight?
Trail of undead 
experiments
What happens 
when I can’t 
validate cheaply?
What about non-startup 
contexts?
Some folk find 
reality hurts
Where next?
agile-usability-subscribe 
@yahoogroups.com
balancedteam.org
http://bit.ly/agileleanux
Books 
• UX for Lean Startups by Laura Klein 
• Lean UX by Jeff Gothelf & Josh Seiden 
• Agile User Experience Design by Diana 
Brown 
• User-Centered Agile Methods by 
Hugh Beyer 
• Agile Experience Design by Lindsay 
Ratcliffe and Marc McNeill
More books 
• Interviewing for User Research by 
Andrew Travers 
• Interviewing Users by Steve Portigal 
• Rocket Surgery Made Easy by Steve 
Krug 
• Handbook of Usability Testing by 
Jeffrey Rubin & Dana Chisnell
Yet more books 
•Lean Startup by Eric Ries 
•The Four Steps to the Epiphany by 
Steve Blank 
•The Startup Owner's Manual by Steve 
Blank 
•The Goal by Eliyahu M. Goldratt 
•The Machine That Changed the World 
by Womack, Jones & Roos
Questions? 
(and remember — feedback please!) 
@adrianh 
quietstars.com 
slideshare.net/adrianh 
adrianh@quietstars.com

Fundamentals of Lean UX, Agile on the Beach 2014