Build the foundation for every other decision
Indecision starts when teams rush ahead without agreeing on what matters. Features pile up. Feedback comes too late. Confidence fades.
Define is the first light that cuts through that Fog. It slows you down just enough to see clearly again and to ask: What do users need? Who are we designing for? What proof will guide our choices?
This is the Credibility facet of Glare.
It is where signals gain meaning and where intuition turns into evidence. Every later metric, comparison, and result only works if what you define here is solid.
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Define focuses on four building blocks that make design credible and user-centered:
<table xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" style="min-width: 536px;"><colgroup><col style="min-width: 25px;"><col style="width: 153px;"><col style="width: 179px;"><col style="width: 179px;"></colgroup><tbody><tr><td colspan="1" rowspan="1"><p><strong>Building Block</strong></p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="153"><p><strong>Core Question</strong></p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p><strong>What It Reveals</strong></p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p><strong>Why It Matters</strong></p></td></tr><tr><td colspan="1" rowspan="1"><p><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://glare.zurb.com/docs/decision-map/define/user-needs">User Needs</a></p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="153"><p>What are users actually trying to accomplish?</p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p>Reveals the goals, expectations, and friction shaping behavior.</p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p>Anchors design decisions in real user problems instead of assumptions.</p></td></tr><tr><td colspan="1" rowspan="1"><p><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://glare.zurb.com/docs/decision-map/define/audience">Audience</a></p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="153"><p>Who are we really learning from?</p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p>Defines whose signals matter, where they come from, and how credible they are.</p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p>Keeps research, feedback, and decisions grounded in the right people and contexts.</p></td></tr><tr><td colspan="1" rowspan="1"><p><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://glare.zurb.com/docs/decision-map/define/collecting">Collecting</a></p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="153"><p>How do we gather useful evidence?</p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p>Shows the methods, signals, and inputs needed to understand behavior clearly.</p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p>Turns scattered input into measurable evidence teams can act on.</p></td></tr><tr><td colspan="1" rowspan="1"><p><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://glare.zurb.com/docs/decision-map/define/situations">Situations</a></p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="153"><p>What conditions are shaping the behavior?</p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p>Reveals the recurring circumstances, pressures, and friction surrounding user actions.</p></td><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" colwidth="179"><p>Gives signals context so teams understand why behavior keeps happening and what deserves attention.</p></td></tr></tbody></table>
Together, these four blocks turn hunches into hard data and loose ideas into user-backed decisions. This is where good design begins, with proof that what you’re building is useful, relevant, and aligned with what both users and businesses need most.
User Needs
Start with what people are trying to do
User Needs help teams understand what people are trying to accomplish and where the experience starts breaking down.
Most user needs are not stated directly. They show up through behavior:
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Hesitation
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Confusion
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Workarounds
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Repeated friction
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Inconsistent decisions
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Support requests
A single usability issue rarely tells the whole story. A support ticket might point to a trust problem. Strong engagement might still hide confusion. A good satisfaction score might not mean users are succeeding.
User Needs help teams move past surface feedback and ask:
What is the person trying to do, and what is getting in the way?
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Audience
Know whose signal you are trusting
Every design decision starts with people. But not all people carry the same signal for the same decision.
Audience helps teams understand who they are learning from, where the signal came from, and how much confidence to place in it. A customer segment, ad audience, stakeholder opinion, Helio participant group, and internal assumption can all be useful. They are just not interchangeable.
Audience helps teams ask:
Where did this signal come from, and what kind of decision can it support?
Without that clarity, everything gets weighted equally. The work drifts toward the loudest voice instead of the strongest signal.
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Collecting
Turn input into usable signals
Collecting is where teams gather the evidence that decisions stand on.
It connects the user need and audience to actual input:
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Behavior observed
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Reactions captured
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Perceptions recorded
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Performance measured
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Feedback compared
The goal is to collect the right data, from the right people, at the right time, tied to the decision the team needs to make. Collecting follows a simple rhythm:
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Define what you need to learn
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Capture the right signal
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Connect it back to the decision
Without Collecting, teams keep debating from instinct. With it, decisions have something real to push against.
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Situations
Find the conditions behind the behavior
Situations is where Define comes together.
User Needs names what people are trying to accomplish. Audience clarifies whose signal matters. Collecting gathers the evidence. Situations explains the conditions that keep producing the same behavior.
A metric can tell you what happened. It cannot tell you why it happened.
Situations helps teams understand:
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what triggered the behavior
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what the user was trying to do
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what stood in the way
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what success meant in that moment
This is where isolated signals become useful context. One user hesitating is an observation. Ten users hesitating in the same moment, across similar conditions, starts to reveal a situation.
Check out Situations
Closing the Loop
Define makes every later decision stronger
Define creates the foundation for Measure, Focus, and Lead.
Without it:
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User needs stay vague
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Audiences get mixed together
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Evidence arrives too late
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Metrics lose context
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Teams misread behavior
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Decisions reopen again and again
With it:
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Signals become easier to trust
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Teams know who they are designing for
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Research connects to action
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Recurring friction becomes visible
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Ideas move forward with stronger confidence
Define is where product and design teams build shared understanding before they test, compare, prioritize, or lead.
The goal is not perfect certainty.
The goal is stronger directional confidence while the work is still evolving.
