Behavior Lens: The facilitation playbook
How to run the session that surfaces what process maps miss.
The process map is clean.
The pain? Still there.
Because what people should be doing isn’t the same as what they actually do.
That’s where the Behavior Lens comes in.
This playbook walks you through how to run it: when to use it, what to ask, and how to spot what matters.
When to use it
You’re hearing: “That’s not how it works in real life.”
The process map looks fine, but the pain persists.
You suspect workarounds are doing more heavy lifting than the actual system.
This tool is best used when the gap between what’s documented and what’s experienced is too big to ignore.
The setup (10 min)
Use the template in Miro, MURAL, or a physical whiteboard.
You’ll map behavior across four quadrants:
Inefficiencies – clunky or slow steps
Bottlenecks – where things stall
Workarounds – unofficial fixes
Misalignment – what’s unexpected or invisible
With three levels of impact:
Root Causes (center)
Daily Friction (middle ring)
Occasional Issues (outer ring)
Let people place stickies where they think they belong. Don’t over-explain the categories. The conversation will do the work.
What to ask
Use these prompts to spark reflection:
“Where do people hesitate or get stuck?”
“What happens that shouldn’t?”
“What unofficial workarounds are in play?”
“Where do expectations and reality not match?”
“If we fixed just one thing, what would change everything else?”
Ask. Pause. Let it land.
Don’t rush to fill the board. Let people think. Some of the best insights come in the silence.
What to watch for
Items clustering at the center? That’s your likely root cause.
One quadrant overloaded? That’s a blind spot.
A noisy outer ring? Zoom in together.
Don’t aim for completeness. Aim for what’s true.
Clarity doesn’t come from more stickies. It comes from sharper ones.
What comes next
Once the map feels solid:
Highlight 1–2 insights you’d bet are root causes.
Pull those into your Evidence Box under User Behavior.
Ask: Do we need to dig deeper? Or are we ready to test a fix?
You can run this in 45 minutes or stretch it across a working session. The value isn’t in how long it takes. It’s in what finally gets said out loud.
Want to try it?
The Behavior Lens is a core part of the Proof Sprint method. But you don’t need the whole system to get value from this tool.
Not sure where to begin? Drop into a live Proof Lab to see Proof Sprint in action.