JD Photography

There’s a card game called crazy ’8s, and the object is to be the first player to play all of their cards. The initial deal is five cards and you must play your hand to “match the card on the starter pile in suit or in denomination.” Eights are wild and can be play at any time during a turn, with the player only specifying suit, not a number.

Near the end of Day two in a sprint comes a new kind of crazy eights. This one comes at a time after you’ve conducted interviews and shared notes and mapped out a plan for the problem. The team has addressed How Might We’s.

Pattie Belle Hastings writes in The Sprint Handbook, “This rapid ideation exercise builds on the best concepts from the ideas generation. Each participant folds a sheet of paper to create eight sections. They then have eight minutes to sketch the idea with eight different variations.”

This is what I love about this process. The crazy eights phase is a fast paced improvisation to see what my mind can come with based on what my team has set in motion. This is so much fun. As the mind keeps working it keeps evolving ideas spring boarding on previous thoughts and ideas.

If I don’t like something great, but there might be something useful to the group. A nugget. A small sliver that could help the process. There are no bad ideas, bad drawings, or bad designs. All ideas will help.

“It’s a Design Sprint method used for rapid idea generation. Any team member can be involved in a Crazy 8’s workshop, even if they are not designers. Each person brings a unique perspective on the user and the problem. Non-designers may be intimidated by sketching, but just assure them that their sketches don’t have to look nice. They are just a visual way to communicate your ideas,” writes Eric Chung in his article, Generate Crazy Ideas With This Design Sprint Method, published on UXPlanet.org.

I am no artist. Well, not a sketch artist. I’m a photographer, a visual artist. What my eyes and mind see don’t always communicate with my hands and fingers.

That’s not the point.

I’m communicating ideas. If my ideas come across it mission accomplished.

Jake Knapp writes in Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days, “Even though we’re total tech nerds, we’re believers in the importance of starting on paper. It’s the great equalizer. Everyone can write words, draw boxes, and express his or her ideas with the same clarity. If you can’t draw (or rather, if you think you can’t draw), don’t freak out. Plenty of people worry about putting pen to paper, but anybody – absolutely anybody – can sketch a great solution.”

Back to the card game. The premise is to play all your cards first. That same idea is true for the Design Sprint sketch and crazy eights, except instead of playing all your cards, you’re playing all your ideas. Don’t hold back and don’t sell yourself short because some of the best ideas for a solution come from people brainstorming.