Ryan Singer shows his work through the process of shaping a new feature for a product he’s building. This is a great detailed example of a process following the Shape Up philosophy.

Looking over the virtual shoulder of someone’s process as they think through a problem from abstract → concrete is incredibly helpful at sparking ideas to help unstick my own projects. I like the nonlinearity here in his procedure. It doesn’t go unidirectionally from coarse to fine; along the way he’s using lower- or higher-fidelity tools to work through questions based on the need that arises at the time:

The chain didn’t become more concrete over time. It didn’t start in words and end in mock-ups. There were sketches, mockups, and code spikes along the way, but they appeared in the middle of the process to resolve specific questions. When the level of abstraction dipped down to resolve a doubt, it climbed again afterward, and in the end the pitch had the latitude it should so the development team can still determine the final form.