Giselle Stidston
Designer who loves learning about new problem spaces. Knows how to solve cryptic crosswords and has a knack for expressing things as diagrams.
Specialties
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thinkmill method
Kickoff
The kickoff is a document creation ceremony that serves as a high-level contract between the business and delivery team that captures the goals of the project that helps to reveal hidden assumptions which may cause issues down the road.
thinkmill method
Functional wireframing
Functional wireframing documents how the various pages and interface elements of an app or website need to come together in order to support the user.
thinkmill method
Sparring
Sparring is a way to get prompt and candid feedback on your work from others in your team. Use it to battle test your ideas by exposing them to differing points of view, and/or get clarity on gaps you can’t fill on your own.
thinkmill method
Activity Mapping
Activity mapping is a way to dynamically capture, and work on, product requirements in a format that’s more useful than a static document.
thinkmill method
User journey mapping
User journey mapping captures the steps a user takes to complete a specific task in the form of a flowchart. It surfaces assumptions about how the team expects a user to interact with the product, and highlights pain points and areas for improvement.
article
Progressive Web Apps (PWAs): A stepping stone towards a native mobile application
Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) are now a viable option for providing a mobile experience that meets users’ high expectations. This article provides an introduction to the history of PWAs for those new to the topic, as well as what can be expected from them in 2024. We also look at where PWAs sit in the mobile landscape and how they can be a practical stepping stone towards a native application experience in the future.
· 11 min readarticle
Accessibility at Thinkmill
How we approach the multi-faceted world of accessible design, and how improvements made for one user group can benefit all of us.
· 4 min readarticle
How we think about research at Thinkmill
The true goal of conducting user research is to test the assumptions that have been made, and bring confidence and clarity to a project and its vision. However, organisations often perceive research as a long, drawn-out process that won’t bring value for months. At Thinkmill, we focus on designing user research that can be acted on immediately and will make a substantial difference to your team today.
· 4 min readarticle
All about Artefacts
Artefacts are a guaranteed by-product of software development and managing them effectively is important. This article aims to give deeper insight into what we mean when we say artefacts and highlight some key shortcomings as well as the strategies we’ve found to overcome them.
· 8 min readarticle
Orienteering: A framing for software consultancy
Orienteering aims to better align a consultant’s mindset with the real-world experience and evolve their way of thinking in a more sustainable way.
· 9 min read
More posts from other Thinkmill voices
Optimise Your Context, Not Your Prompts
AI makes better engineering decisions when it can understand a project’s architecture, conventions and shared knowledge. Making that context clear and discoverable helps it produce software that fits the wider system.
· 5 min readWhere AI Actually Helps Quality Engineering
AI-assisted QA is not just about generating tests faster. By carrying product context through planning, development, review and release, AI can shorten feedback loops, surface risks earlier and help teams make better decisions, provided its output is supported by clear specifications, guardrails and human judgement.
· 3 min readWhy Great Engineering Still Wins
AI can write code faster than ever, but coding was never the hardest part. The organisations seeing the biggest gains are investing in engineering fundamentals that help both people and AI make better decisions.
· 3 min read
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