Surprise, surprise the project manager is writing another post about process.... however, it's becoming quite a recurring theme in this conference and given that we are currently investigating ways to improve ours I thought I'd share some of what just came out of the workflow panel discussion.  First off, I'll start by saying that I was convinced that this discussion was going to be a long, drawn out hard sell on how awesome the Microsoft tools are and how they will solve all of our workflow issues and improve our lives immensely... What I discovered was that since these tools were developed, yes, to help with workflow they are in response to the fact that everyone in this industry is facing some of the same challenges and it resulted in the realization that we do a lot 'right' and that we, along with everyone, have some room to improve.

Roles v. Process:  IdentiyMine has hired people called "Integrators" - these are the 'dev-igners' Microsoft references frequently. They are the people who do both design and development and bridge the gap between.  There was quite a bit of discussion around wether or not you can actually find these people and if you do, if you can keep them. I'm a firm believer (as were many on the panel) that the answer lies more with 'how' we all work together vs. who is doing the work - our designers are very talented even if they don't want to work on a PC or know the details of the 'how'. The process answer to this question included a lot of discussion around: early prototyping, collaborative teams, simultaneous phases (basically getting to functional builds much more quickly).  We are starting to do a lot of this at Tribal and I think we will see a lot more of it in the future.

Common Workflow Pain Points: 3 points that all agreed were pain points in this more collaborative workflow process were 1) Distributed teams (how to I get teams in multiple offices to 'collaborate' and work this closely), 2) Finding single resources with collective skill sets - the problem of finding the 'dev-igner' and 3) The absence of tools that can be used much earlier in the process to show intended function, actions and interactions (we are currently using Axure as this tool - something no one mentioned as an option - yes we really are doing a lot right at Tribal)

This is all great but how do you pay for this?:  This question had to have come from a PM.  Working collaboratively is expensive. There are more people on the team throughout the process at greater allocations.  This is something we discuss a lot in our group and as much as I would love for all our teams to be large, collaborative and consistently dedicated to a project, that gets very expensive very quickly. No one denied this and agreed they all have had these discussions. For some it is about educating the client on why they should pay more, while for others it was simply starting with the ideal team structure and backing out from there to a budget and plan your clients (and teams) can live with - no real light-bulb moment here or big solution but it was good to see this recognized as I do feel it is one of the greatest obstacles we will need to overcome - creatively staffing our projects so that we can enable collaboration while making sure our clients aren't choking on the estimate.

How we might see changes in the TDDB process:  There were some interesting suggestions of how these companies are integrative and working collaboratively. It's a bit of a culture shift from a beautiful design that gets handed off to developers who see it for the first time during a production kickoff meeting.  One of the more interesting steps was what was termed the "Architecture Meeting" or the "Tear Down Meeting".  This would be a step where upon approval of IA documentation and Design you essentially meet with the entire team inclusive of developers, designers and UX (and this is prior to a production kickoff) and you essentially 'tear down' the design - component by component, with everyone in the room really figure out the 'how'.  How should it be built? What should it do? ... look like... act like... etc.... a meeting that would set the stage for the production process moving forward.

Essentially, as the internet and our usage (and our clients' customers' usage) of it has changed so have the solutions we create and the products we deliver for them changed. That shift I believe necessitates a shift in how we all actually work together to deliver these solutions and products.  So, for those of you still reading, thanks, and for those of who who dropped off at the title that included 'process' I hope you gain a new appreciation for this discussion as it will impact how and what we do everyday.

**  Update:

2ndFactory team outline - Roles and Hierarchy

Nothing totally new here but some interesting role titles - This company seems to operate somewhat similar to us - Project Management oversees the overall process and interactions with the team members but the 2 roles who work most closely throughout the process to ensure that their teams collaborate are the Experience Architect and the Experience Designer...

PM = Project/Product Manager

XA = Experience Architect

XD = Experience Designer

SD = System Developer

ID = Interaction Designer

GD = Graphic Designer

- Nicole