As a follower of Agile development and Lean Manufacturing, I am drawn to the natural simplicity behind these processes. When it comes to websites, simplicity is important both in the user experience (how a site looks) and in the development process (how a site is built).  When we visit at a website that is overwhelming with too many goals and missions, we actually feel the underlying suffering the organization experienced when creating the website. The site interface is busy and confusing; we don't know where to look because the site content competes with itself for marque billing.

My theory is that this happens when an organization has too many goals or loses site of its goal for the website. And therein lies the problem (without getting into a big commentary of our cultural issues), goals are arbitrary.  Yet, most website development processes are based on goals (i.e. "We need to launch a new homepage design next month").  But focusing a development process purely on goals is comparable to having a fundraiser when you don't know how much money you need or what you plan to buy in the future.  First we must ask "Why?".

In struggling to make sense of a flawed system, I have been reevaluating the entire website development process. The result of which is a new approach called the Question Driven Process (QDP), which has roots in Agile and Lean development.

About the Question Drive Process (QDP)

The Question Driven Process (QDP) approaches development by asking questions to determine a direction for each stage of development, instead of setting goals.  In keeping with the Lean idea of "Just in time" the QDP only solves problems it needs to address in the moment and as they emerge.  The typical "Big Build" or Waterfall Process of solving all problems upfront is expensive and ineffective; too many features are created without knowing what the user wants, which results in an overbuilt site.  

Instead, the Question Driven Process focuses on minimizing expense for the entire team, improving efficiency, and learning quickly by framing each release around on one or two core questions.  Here are some examples of the QDP in action...

1. When developing a new website, the first most critical question to ask is "what's the least amount of work we can do to launch this site and see if people get the idea?"  This alone will save you months of work and endless expense.

2. For existing websites try and test a few smalls elements at a time with a specific question for each test, such as "Can we increase traffic on our site by changing the link color?". 

Implementing a Question Driven Process 

The next time you want to improve something on your website, or when creating a new site, begin from the most basic starting point. Take one tiny step.  Start with a question that will drive all the choices you make for that first step.  In the example above: "What's the least amount of work we can do to launch this site and see if people get the idea?" Using something like Squarespace or Wordpress, can you create a simple site in a few hours (minimal expense), then test with an informal audience to see if they get the idea?  

Once you have your answer, either abandon, run another test with a different strategy, or move to the next step and create a new question.  For example, "How much money will this website make money if we use an affiliate program?".  And so on, until you reach your goal (whatever that might be, or become).

The hardest part in applying the Question Driven Process is not the complexity (because it is fundamentally simply process), it will be restraining the natural desire to diverge or brainstorm.