Customer 2010

Empathy Map Canvas

One person, one page: what they see, say, do, hear, think, and feel. The fastest route out of your own head.

What it is

A head in the middle of the page and the world around it: what this person sees, says, does, and hears, and inside the head, what they think and feel, split into pains and gains. Twenty minutes of filling it in and the room stops designing for themselves.

Reach for it when

• A team is about to build for a user nobody in the room has met
• Interview notes exist but everyone quotes a different interview
• A persona document is three pages long and nobody reads it

Running it

1. Pick one real person or one sharply drawn segment. Name them at the top.
2. Go around the outside first: sees, says, does, hears. Sticky notes, direct quotes where you have them.
3. Finish inside the head: pains, then gains. 20 to 30 minutes total.
4. Ask the room what surprised them. The surprises are the findings.