Diverse solutions and feedback: the value of multitracking
As designers, we often hear 'we are not our design', or 'to not fall in love with our design'. This can be hard if we don't have the habit of designing more than one solution, usually due to lack of time, or if there is no incentive on doing so.
In their book, 'Decisive: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work' by Chip Heath and Dan Heath, the Heaths shared a study that illustrates the value of parallel design, which they called multitracking.
Below is a quick summary of the study they mentioned.
For more details, check out the study: Parallel Prototyping Leads to Better Design Results, More Divergence, and Increased Self-Efficacy.
Quick summary
- 33 Participants were recruited
- Participants were tasked to make a web banner
- Randomly assigned to use 2 creative processes:
1. Serial condition: participants created 5 prototypes in a series, received feedback after each prototype, then made a final version
2. Parallel condition: participants created 3 prototypes and got feedback, then made 2 more and got more feedback, and then made a final version
In both conditions, participants created five prototype ads and then a final ad.
The difference: in serial condition, participants received feedback after creating each prototype, as in the parallel condition, they created three prototypes, received feedback on all three, then made two more prototypes, and received feedback again before creating a final ad design.
The results
Parallel condition ads were judged superior by the magazine’s editors and by independent ads execs, and they earned higher CTR on a real-world test of the banners on the website.
Why?
The study’s authors say in p. 16:
“Since parallel participants received feedback on multiple ideas simultaneously, they were more likely to read and analyze critique statements side-by-side. Direct comparison perhaps helped parallel participants better understand key design principles and led to more principled choices for subsequent prototypes. In serial prototyping, participants’ ideas tended to follow directly from the feedback. This serial approach may implicitly encourage refinement at the expense of exploration.”
Results on more confidence in the ad-design ability
- Parallel participants reported self-efficacy gains, while the serial participants reported no change
- Serial participants also perceived the expert feedback more negatively
- 13 of 16 parallel participants said the feedback was helpful or intuitive compared to 6 of 17 serial participants
- 8 of 17 of the serial participants reported the feedback as negative
Curiously, participants were asked to leave their email if they wanted to later volunteer for Ambidextrous magazine.
- 12 out of 16 parallel participants provided their email
- 5 of 17 serial participants did the same
It suggested that a parallel process may have helped motivate future action.
“Multitracking keeps egos in check” — Heaths
Hearing feedback in only one alternative can make it harder for us to hear the truth.
Counterintuitive finding
But, executives can be reasonably worried that exploring multiple options will take too long. Here is another research about it:
Kathleen Eisenhardt has found the opposite is true.
In a study of top leadership teams in Silicon Valley, a place that tends to place a premium on speed, she found that more options actually make faster decisions.
Here were her three explanations:
1. Comparing alternatives helps executives to understand the "landscape":
- What's possible and what's not,
- What variable provided the confidence needed to make a quick decision
2. Multiple alternatives seem to undercut politics. More options, people get less invested in any one of them, freeing them to change positions as they learn. It keeps egos under control.
3. Leaders weighing multiple options have given themselves a built-in fallback plan. One example was a company that pursued negotiations with several partners simultaneously and when failed, they had another one on the radar.
Rule of thumb: keep searching for options until you fall in love at least twice.
You don't need a plethora of choices to improve decisions. Just one extra choice, or two. No need to produce decision paralysis.
