Week Notes: Vol. 2 – № 3

Candyland journey mapping

We talk about the user journey as though it’s one path, one moment in time.

But rarely is it that simple.

A Candyland journey map is a research artifact a colleague and I came up with while trying to quickly understand the complex nature of horizontal directional drilling.

Its purpose is to capture someone’s experience step by step. It looks like a curvy, segmented trail with a beginning and an end, which can help you see where you may need to ask more questions.

While interviewing people involved in directional drilling, we heard about all the variables crews would account for as projects are underway.

People eagerly told us stories, but they often ended with, “That doesn’t always happen.” Since we were still learning about the industry, we mentally earmarked this as something to come back to.

We knew we needed to understand how typical those stories really were. The software we were asked to design had to support drillers when things didn’t go as planned — whether that was intentional or not.

That’s when the Candyland journey map was born.

We realized that in one user interview, we could document many project stories. We could see where problems came up, who was involved, and important decisions made along the way.

Then we could compare to see patterns and outliers.

Since my colleague and I both had messy handwriting, we printed icons on stickers to make it easier to quickly mark important events. We only wrote things on the board for context.

In all, we mapped out dozens of drilling stories by the time we finished these interviews.

One journey. Several stories, each unfolding in its own unpredictable way.