Design review that catches what CI cannot Workshop · fictional case
Team collaborating with sticky notes

Workshop · fictional case

Design review that catches what CI cannot

A 90-minute working session. Leave with a review plan and three guard rules.

Facilitator: M. Chen · 12–20 participants · tables of four

Objective

By the end, each table has:

1 · A flow

One real task mapped end to end, including the states.

2 · A plan

Static, dynamic, and real-surface evidence for that flow.

3 · Three rules

Guard rules that would have caught the failures you found.

Warm-up · 5 min

A bug passed CI. Where would you look first?

Think for one minute, then share at your table. Write one place CI cannot see.

Concept · evidence triangulation

Three kinds of evidence, not one

Static

Source, tokens, copy, structure. Cheap; blind to behavior.

Dynamic

Built artifact, scripted probe, states. Catches behavior; misses context.

Real

Device, keyboard, screen reader, projector, paper. Catches what the others cannot.

A finding is strongest when two of the three agree. A single source is a hypothesis.

Example · 7 min

CI was green. The keyboard was trapped.

What CI saw

  • Build passed
  • Snapshot passed
  • Contrast tokens passed

What the walkthrough saw

  • Focus entered the modal
  • Escape closed the page, not the modal
  • Focus never returned to the trigger

Exercise 1 · 15 min

Map one real task

15 minutes · table of four

Choose a task a real user does weekly.

Map the steps, the states (empty, loading, error, partial), and the handoffs. Mark one place CI cannot see.

Worksheet page 1. One flow per table. Work at the level of screens and states, not components.

Exercise 2 · 15 min

Write acceptance criteria that can fail

15 minutes · same table

Take the riskiest step from Exercise 1.

Write one criterion that fails today and passes when fixed. Name the evidence source and the surface.

Worksheet page 2. A criterion without a source is a wish.

Share · 15 min

Three tables, three minutes each

Show

The flow and the riskiest step.

Tell

The criterion and the evidence source.

Ask

One thing the room would test differently.

Close · 5 min

Three rules to take back

  1. Review the flow, not only the screen.
  2. Write criteria that fail today.
  3. Put the real surface in the room.

Worksheet, templates, and the reading list are in the shared folder.