Illustration & Storytelling

These are critical tools which can make or break a design. By making an early concept understandable before artifacts such as prototypes and wireframes are available, understanding of pain points and validation of solutions can be rapidly captured and presented. Defining a persona down to his dog’s name or his favorite food may seem excessive in some scenarios but this helps everyone empathize with the user. Once this high level of empathy has been shared with others such as the cross-functional team, the wall between the people using the tool and the people building the tool begins to break down. This results in a more dedicated team because they’re working to help John who is not simply a name and need statement. He becomes a real person.