We just spent ten minutes writing down our basic thoughts

on the behavior of our user.

Now comes a crucial step, putting our responses into buckets.

What is a bucket?

Simple, it's when you begin to move your post-its

into groups that are similar in terms of type or concept.

Maybe you have repetitive ideas, don't throw those out.

Just stack them one on top of another.

It's also worth noting, if you're doing this exercise solo,

it may be easier to keep track of where all your Post-its are being placed.

But the advantage of conducting this exercise with a team

is that you have multiple and

potentially conflicting points of view, which is actually what you want.

There should be tension from quadrant to quadrant because

we don't always say what we think or do as we feel.

It's a common mistake to force an empathy map to be too harmonious.

So put five minutes on the timer and

begin sorting your Post-its inside of each quadrant.

By the end of five minutes you should have themes for each of these groupings,

like fear of failure, or believe that things will get better.

These are bigger themes that will affect your user's actions.

By the end of this exercise, you should find a teammate or

a friend to tell them a bit more about what it is that makes your users tick.

Instead of reading off each Post-It, however,

try introducing them to our user as though you were introducing someone at a party.

What do they like?

What do they dislike?

What makes them who they are?

For Stable Sara, we found that she dislikes sudden social change because

she's a bit of an introvert.

She also cares deeply about financial stability so

she can stay on top of her family's budget.

This helps them afford vacations as well as her annual trip to Emmacon.

See you in the next stage, where we begin to understand where Stable Sarah's

experience in purchasing her weekender pass to Emmacon begins to fall apart