Explore the Future of Files Go

VISION

We needed to align what was built with what was coming next
STATS
Sprint Type
VISION SPRINT
Where
not set
Teams
None
Team Size
9 Participants
No. of Days
3 Days

The Challenge

Have you ever lost your phone and realized you did not backup your photos? Imagine experiencing that same loss almost every day. In developing markets like Brazil and India, many smartphone users carry low capacity, low bandwidth phones with limited storage space. These “entry-level” smartphones require users to purge files and apps frequently.

To make this easier, Google’s Next Billion Users team developed Files Go, a data storage manager that saves users an average of 1GB in just the first month of use. Even before File Go’s official launch, the team was looking ahead to the second version of the app. What would the future of Files Go look like?

Explore the future of Files Go after Android Go launch

The Sprint

Planning the Sprint

Koji invited Sprint participants across two teams, including a UX researcher, two UX designers, two product managers, and four engineers. He broke the team into two groups and invited a second Sprint Master to help facilitate, plus booked two conference rooms next door to each other for splitting up for heads-down work.

There was a second Sprint Master so I could sketch and participate with my team.

While nailing down the Sprint logistics, Koji invited the team to collaborate on the Sprint Brief and planning. From printing current mockups and gathering beta testing research to organizing user challenging and creating a visioning exercise, the team divvied up tasks in preparation.

While every Sprint includes all six phases and foundational methodologies, no two Sprints are alike. For this Sprint, Koji also referenced Google’s internal Product Playbook, a toolkit to help teams develop strong value proposition for products, for the Understand and Define phases.

Sprint Deliverables:

  • Define and sketch low-fidelity ideas for Files Go V2 and beyond
  • Create a plan for design and research to be executed after the Sprint
  • Create a one-pager for each idea including scope, key insight and key opportunity

case-study-caption-files-go-1@2x.png

Organizing stickies mid-sprint

Sprint Highlights

Day 1: Morning

After setting the stage by sharing the ground rules for the Design Sprint and leading the team through an icebreaker, Koji explained the six phases of a Design Sprint and presented the Sprint schedule. Rather than generating How Might We statements during Lightning Talks, Koji asked the team to generate sticky notes of User Problems according to the Product Playbook. After discussion, User Problems were clustered and prioritized.

Day 1: Afternoon

The team then evaluated the top priority User Problems by impact and effort. Those that ranked high in both impact and effort were then organized with existing Files Go features or in theoretical solutions to the problem. The team identified missing functionality and gaps in existing features, as well as benefits and value proposition statements for each proposed feature.

End of Day 1 Completed

By the end of Day 1, the team created a list of problem/solution/benefits.

Day 2 Morning

The morning kicked off with a visualization exercise for where Files Go is today, where they want to be in two years, and what they imagine Files Go would be known for. Based on this exercise and the problem sets developed in Day 1, Koji lead the team through Crazy 8s and a Dot Vote.

Day 2 Afternoon

After lunch, the team created individual Solution Sketches of their best ideas. After sharing designs, the team conducted another Dot Vote for most compelling ideas of each Sketch. Based on the sketches, the team created one-page proposals for each of the eight elements with the most votes. These included the sketch, User Problem, solution and benefits.

End of Day 2 Completed

The team ended the day by sharing out the one-page proposals developed and recapping next steps.

Day 3 Morning

After Day 2, the team passed their one-pager “prototypes” for overnight validation with the research team in India. The researcher shared the ideas with Android Go users and gathered feedback.

End of Day 3 Completed

The Sprint team debriefed on the results and made plans to iterate on the feature set.

The Outcome

Files Go launched in late 2017 and has more than 10M downloads from the Play Store, and many of the features developed in the Sprint are live in the current version of the app. As a result of this Sprint, the team went on to lead several more Files Go Sprints to further refine the feature set for V2, develop the visual design and define product principles. The team continues to practice Sprints every 2-3 months today.

case-study-caption-files-go-2@2x.png

Evaluating sketches mid-sprint