Articles

Sarah Gibbons

Sarah Gibbons is a former NN/G employee who worked on teaching, leadership, and design thought leadership. At NN/G Sarah published ground-breaking insights on service design and service blueprinting, design thinking, and artificial intelligence (AI).

Articles and Videos

  • UX Strategy: Definition and Components

    A UX strategy is a 3-part plan that fosters shared understanding of direction toward achieving goals before designing and implementing solutions. It serves to intentionally guide the prioritization and execution of UX work over time.

  • The 4 Factors of UX Maturity

    4 main factors (and 12 subfactors) should be considered to assess an organization's UX maturity: strategy, culture, process, and outcomes.

  • UX Maturity Model Stages

    Companies and organizations progress through 6 stages as user experience becomes more systematic and integrated with development and corporate goals/budgets. From stage 1 (absent) to stage 6 (user-driven), we give tips for recognizing your current stage and how to move up a level.

  • Service Design: Study Guide

    Unsure where to start? Use this collection of links to our articles and videos to learn about service design and blueprinting.

  • Creating a UX Research Plan

    Before starting any user research project, write down a research plan, preferably using a template that ensures that you don't overlook something. This keeps stakeholders informed and structures your own thinking.

  • 3 Types of Roadmaps

    Roadmaps cover future work and vision, but this can be done at different scopes, from everything related to the product to only the UX activities and priorities, possibly narrowed to a sub-specialty of UX.

  • Sympathy vs. Empathy in UX

    Sympathy acknowledges that users are having difficulties, but empathy goes further by understanding the users' needs and motivations.

  • 5 Prioritization Methods in UX Roadmapping

    The best prioritization method depends on project context, team culture, and success criteria.

  • UX Roadmaps in 6 Steps

    A roadmap documents upcoming and future priorities for your user experience. The process starts with gathering goals, proceeds through the creation and sharing of the UX roadmap, and never ends, since the last step is to update.

  • Design Thinking Learner's Journey

    Research with people who are learning Design Thinking shows that they progress in a nonlinear manner through 4 phases of increasing competency and confidence. Understanding these phases helps both learners and educators/managers.