Sadly it turns out that the above is not an accurate representation of bodystorming and I did not learn how to do the classic Carlton dance. Bodystorming is actually a design technique where you imagine that your new product or service exists and act out using it. Some shops do this by getting an empty warehouse, building a mock store and acting out transactions with ‘customers’ to identify pinch points in systems, procedures, or new space. You could also do it by using a paper mock-up of a new app, and asking people to act out using it in real life, so that the designer can identify where it is most likely to be used and issues that may arise.
We didn’t do any of this at the conference, but it is certainly something we could be putting into practice when designing new services or changes to services. For example, walking through collecting a hold from the nascent self-service holds will help us identify the points at which our users will need direction and the most likely points at which they will suffer problems. Through identifying these early we will be able to design out or minimise the flaws in the proposals before launch and ensure our users have a good experience of the service from the outset.