Conducting group feedback sessions for particular features allows the product team to share their thoughts, raise any concerns and ask technical and consumer focused questions during the analysis, design and development stages of a potential product solution.

Ensuring feature critiques happen early and often allows the team to tackle problems early on, well before it becomes too difficult to approach them in a different way. It will help to identify any other potential problems in this and other features and provide designers with insight that could help them change course if needed.

Especially important is when a product sits within a broader landscape of products or services. The critiques are able to ensure that the people involved can provide support for each other across product areas and not only establish a base for improved product design quality but also drive brand consistency.

The optimum opportunity to run a feature critique is at the earliest stage of a potential solution outline. It doesn’t matter what the team has to present as long as there is something to show, that could be a process flow diagram, some simple interface wireframes or higher fidelity visual designs to discuss. It’s also important to note that the critique doesn’t have to be a full feature; it can just be interface or experience options for a key part of that journey.

Remember — there should never be any surprises at a critique session as work should always be discussed and on show to the whole team for ongoing collaboration and improvement.