A design sprint is an intensive, several-day process (classically 5 days) in which a team goes from problem to a user-tested prototype of a solution – without months of meetings and documents.
The format developed at Google Ventures compresses a typical product process: Monday: understand the problem and pick the target; Tuesday: sketch solutions; Wednesday: decide and storyboard; Thursday: build a realistic prototype; Friday: test with five users.
A sprint shines when the stakes are high and the team is going in circles: a new product, a key feature, a strategic direction. The output is not a finished product but a verified decision – knowing whether the idea carries, before it consumes the budget.
We use sprint elements in our product workshops: condensed work with decision-makers in one room achieves more in a week than a quarter of emails.