Smart teams begin new design projects by getting to know their customers through design research. The best ones build models of those customers, their goals, their behaviors, and/or their environments. Models like personas do an awesome job of describing what the customer’s world looks like today. However, building models of customers and their work is only a means to the end of designing great products. Many teams struggle with using research models to inspire design. It’s just too big of a jump from a persona writeup to a new product concept.
The context scenario bridges this gap. A good context scenario clearly articulates a working hypothesis of how the customers’ lives will improve when the new product* exists. Unlike a workflow or task analysis, a context scenario is an act of design—it imagines the future, rather than describing the world as it is today. Because context scenarios can be created and iterated on very quickly, they are often the first design act the team undertakes.