The Affinity Diagram: Prep Your Sticky Notes!
With the stack of sticky notes in various colors on the table, I thought this should be fun! I mean, I already have an obsession with writing something on a sticky and then sticking it somewhere or anywhere. At the time, as I jot down my note, I think I’ll definitely see that later. When later arrives, notes 2 and 3 have unfortunately blocked note one already. However, that is ok I am sure I have got it written on another note somewhere else! Sticky notes are a great manipulable format for brainstorming and gathering data into management groups. A clustering exercise that is used not only by designers but also by other professionals to bundle and group data to help think through the problem you are trying to solve.
Affinity means likeness or similarity, and a diagram or map is the symbolic representation of those grouped likenesses. Affinity diagramming was invented in the 1960s by Japanese anthropologist Jiro Kawakita and is sometimes called the K-J method. For many years, this method was implemented as a part of the Seven Management and Planning Tools, used in Japan and worldwide to help leading global organizations make and implement better team decisions. There are several steps and questions involved in working through an Affinity Diagram. Who should participate? How much time do we have? Furthermore, what is the problem or focus question we are trying to solve? Who will be the facilitator?
Steps to Form an Affinity Diagram
- Form a group
Invite people with different mindsets to form a brainstorming group. Different, unrelated perspectives are critical. It helps avoid groupthink and allows for some out of the box solutions. Participants should come from different parts of the organization.
2. Assign a facilitator
Someone in the organization that can get participants to collaborate and involve everyone’s ideas would be most effective. A good facilitator has excellent listening skills, helps everyone express their ideas, and makes sure everyone expresses their viewpoints. The facilitator preferably plays a neutral role who only works to move the session along.
3. The Focus Question
Focus questions move the project along and drive the results. Each affinity diagram session has its focus question. Some examples of focus questions include: Who are our users? What are users looking to accomplish when visiting our site? Moreover, did our usability study help us discover? We must determine our most important focus question as a starting point. Each session can only cover one focus question at a time.
4. Wall Space and Brainstorming
Find a location such as a conference room to conduct a one-hour session with wall space and bring plenty of sticky notes in at least two colors and pens for each participant. Have each participant write down one solution per sticky note for the problem. Post all contributions posted to the wall. All ideas should be written down and shared.
5. Group, Name, Vote, and Rank
Have two colors of sticky notes; one of the colors is for all ideas. The second color is for naming each group. Start by asking all participants to group similar items. On another side of the room, have participants go over all grouped items and then name each group. There should be no discussions about the grouped items just yet. Every item should be in a group, even if one group only has one item. Next, have everyone name each group. If some groups have similar themes, some items could be combined. Every group should have a name given by each participant. After forming all group names, it is time to vote. Have each participant pick their top three choices. Each participant ranks each choice and the top choice by marking on the sticky note on the wall. The sticky notes with the most votes are ranked one more time.
6. Discussions
In the final stage of this process, we allow participants to discuss each group and look at what groups could be combined. There needs to be some consensus on grouping items together. Then the facilitator looks at the groups and ranks them according to the number of votes each one has received. The result is two or three items that are ranked the highest. These items are the top priorities for the team’s goal and to move the project along.
