Strategy
Empathy Mapping
An empathy map helps teams deeply understand their users. It's a visual tool for capturing user needs, thoughts, and feelings. The map is divided into sections: Says, Thinks, Does, Feels, Hears, Sees, Pains, and Gains. Use it to align on a shared user understanding and inform decisions.
Duration
1 hour
Group Size
4-6
Category
Strategy
Difficulty
Easy
The goals of this exercise are to:
- Build empathy with users and stakeholders.
- Capture user behaviors, attitudes, and emotions.
- Identify unmet user needs and pain points.
- Create shared understanding across teams.
- Guide product and service decisions.
- Synthesize observational research.
- Challenge assumptions about users.
You'll finish with:
- A completed empathy map.
- A deeper understanding of the user perspective.
- A solid foundation for empathy-driven decisions.
- Base the map on actual research, not just assumptions. It's easy to let personal bias creep in.
- Prioritize direct quotes when possible. They add weight to the insights.
- Focus on one user segment per map. Combining segments muddies the waters.
- Look for disconnects between what users say and do. These are often key areas for exploration.
- Consider environmental and social influences on the user.
- Update the maps as you learn more. They're living documents.
- Display maps prominently for team reference. This reinforces user-centric thinking.
- Use different colors for different data sources to easily distinguish them.
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