Why Problem Framing is essential in UX?

In UX and service design, the first step to crafting effective, user-centered solutions is understanding the problem at hand. Yet, it’s common for teams to dive into solutions before clarifying the problem. This rush can lead to misaligned projects, unmet user needs, and wasted resources.

“In any and all UX work, right problem definition is the single most important obligation. Without defining and designing for the right problem, you’re UX is in fantasyland”.

– Frank Spillers

Problem framing is a disciplined approach to defining and understanding the issue before jumping to solutions. It brings clarity, alignment, and purpose to a project, ensuring that everyone involved is tackling the right challenge.

What is Problem Framing?

Problem framing is a structured process for identifying and defining the core issue that a project seeks to address. It necessarily involves stakeholder management tactics. Instead of stakeholders focusing on possible solutions, problem framing centers on uncovering what exactly needs solving. This involves examining assumptions, understanding user needs, and aligning team members on a shared problem definition.

And Problem Framing Workshops? A way to bring this together to align stakeholders around solving the right problems, from a user’s perspective. See 25 Mantras of Stakeholder Collaboration

Want to learn first hand? Join our January 10th 2025 Problem Framing for UX Workshop (paid member benefit, join or upgrade from free to get this and 200+ videos, mentoring and more…)

The Benefits of Problem Framing

1. Brings solutions back to understanding your Problem Space
When teams rush into solution-building, they risk creating experiences that don’t fully address user needs. Problem framing helps designers step back and see the problem from real user data, aligned with real user needs. All good design decision making starts with appreciating your user’s problem space– the context of use of your product or service.

2. Aligns Stakeholders and Teams
In many projects, stakeholders may have different interpretations of the problem. This can lead to conflicting goals, fragmented solutions, and wasted effort. Problem framing brings everyone together, facilitating open discussion to align on a single problem statement. This shared understanding minimizes misunderstandings later on and unites the team around a common purpose.

3. Saves Time and Resources
By tackling the right problem from the start, teams can avoid costly redesigns and course corrections. Problem framing ensures that design and development efforts focus only on meaningful solutions. While it requires an upfront time investment, the clarity it provides ultimately reduces the need for mid-project pivots.

4. Uncovers Assumptions and Biases
Teams often enter projects with assumptions about user needs, technical constraints, or business goals. Problem framing surfaces these assumptions, making them open to examination and challenge. This process helps identify biases that might lead to ineffective solutions and ensures that solutions are rooted in facts and research rather than assumptions.

5. Encourages long-term Problem First thinking
A well-defined problem statement is the foundation for articulating user needs. The more teams ‘fall in love with the problem’ first, the better their design decision making will be. With a clear priority of real problems, ideation becomes more focused and productive, often leading to breakthrough solutions. This can result in more momentum and better mileage from ongoing UX efforts.

Problem Framing in Practice
Imagine a UX team tasked with redesigning a customer support portal. Without problem framing, the team might dive into making the interface visually appealing or adding new features. But with problem framing, they uncover the core issue: customers struggle to find information because the search functionality is ineffective. This clarity shifts the project’s focus from visual design to search experience improvements, leading to a solution that truly addresses user needs.

Six Practical Steps for Effective Problem Framing:

1. Context Review: Gather all relevant project and user insights.
2. User Research: Gather qualitative and quantitative data to ground the problem in user needs, goals, tasks, context.
3. Stakeholder Interviews: Understand each perspective on the problem. (Join for this free Stakeholder Tactics masterclass)
4. Assumption Mapping: Identify and examine initial assumptions.
5. Conduct a workshop: Try a Problem Framing workshop to bring together stakeholders to prioritize and create problem statements.
6. Problem Statement Drafting: Summarize the core issue in a concise, agreed-upon statement.

Take-Away

In UX and service design, getting the problem right is more than half the battle. Problem framing may seem like a preliminary step, but its impact on project success is profound. By investing in problem framing, teams can create solutions that are focused, grounded in real user needs, and strategically aligned—leading to better products, happier users, and more efficient projects.

Remember: The best solutions solve the right problems. And problem framing is the compass that keeps projects on course.

🖐Learn hands-on>>> Join our January 10th 2025 Problem Framing for UX Workshop (paid member benefit, join or upgrade from free to get this and 200+ videos, mentoring and more…)