Personas: creating space at the table
Crating the personas was my first mandate in VOSKER&SPYPOINT.
The company knew that we weren’t speaking the same language. Each team had their own mental model of "the customer." Sometimes they overlapped. Often, they didn’t.
We needed clarity. We needed shared understanding. And we needed nuance - not to simplify our audience, but to finally start seeing them more fully. That’s where the work began.
When building personas, there are endless ways to segment:
by age, location, income, profession, channel.
We didn’t start with who they are.
We started with how they relate.
But what we cared about was the relationship between a person and the product.
GUIDING QUESTIONS
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How does their relationship with the product differ?
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How do different types of users perceive its value?
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What do they expect from it?
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Where does it fit into their lives?
These questions led us to clearer distinctions - between not just users,
but ways of being a user.
I started with internal voices.
My first task wasn’t to research the customer. It was to understand how the company saw the customer.
Leaders. Sales teams. Customer service. Marketing. People who had stories to tell — but not always the same ones.
I listened. Not just for facts - for narratives.
What did each team believe about our users?
What did they need to believe?
Where were the blind spots?
Then came the outside voices.
Past surveys
Interview notes
Support logs
online review
Competitor messaging
I held interviews with users, both long-time customers and those new to us.
I listened to the language they used, the frustrations they repeated, the expectations they carried.
I started seeing patterns. Clusters.
And eventually: distinct ways of relating to our product - and what people hoped to get from it.
Some personas, we realized, were clearly emerging from our existing base.
Others represented segments we hadn’t fully served yet - but knew we wanted to reach.
Personsas: A declaration of focus.
A persona isn’t just a description. It’s a decision.
It says:
"This is who we’re choosing to serve".
Some patterns didn’t make the cut
Some weren’t aligned with our direction.
Others simply weren’t realistic for where we were as a business.
We built
together.
With the help of my CX team, we ran workshops to co-define the personas.
We mapped
Motivations
Needs
Pain Points
Value Points
We validated
with stakeholders.
We asked for feedback, especially from the voices we knew might resist.
We humanize with names and faces.
But more than that we gave them stories -
I included real customer quotes throughout, not just to humanize, but to root the personas in lived experience.
The goal was simple:
To make each persona feel real enough to walk into a meeting.
To embed them in daily decisions, we started small:
snapshot cards, shared language, presence in planning docs.
We partnered with leaders to advocate for usage.
We shared stories of how personas helped unlock a campaign, reframe a feature, or solve a support issue.
Today, people say things like
“this is totally a persona A feature.” Or “persona B wouldn’t get this.”
That’s how I know the personas worked - they became part of the conversation.
Creating personas was just the first step. The harder part is making them useful.
That means helping people embed them into how they think, decide, and communicate - across all departments.
We're still on that journey. But every time a product manager asks, “which persona is this for?” - we’re one step closer.
We’d created a shared frame.
A way to talk about complexity without losing clarity.
In the end, it wasn’t about a document.
It was about creating space at the table for the customer. Giving our teams something, someone, to design with, not just for.
Summary of the process
1
Internal Listening
Gather beliefs from inside the org
3
External Signals
Analyze surveys, reviews, support logs
5
Pattern Recognition
Identify clusters, gaps, emerging segments
7
Validation & Feedback
Align with stakeholders, refine, adjust
9
Embedding in Culture
Introduce cards, language, and live usage
2
Organizational Alignment
Map team assumptions and blind spots
4
User Interviews
Hear language, expectations, real pain points
6
Persona Framing
Define user types based on relationship with the product
8
Narrative Building
Add names, stories, and real quotes
10
Ongoing Advocacy
Ensure personas guide real decisions
“Can I see the actual personas?”
I wish!
But the personas themselves are confidential and belong to the company.
What I can share is how I built them, how we brought them to life, and how they became part of everyday decision-making.
Curious to dive deeper? I’d be happy to chat one-on-one.