When Design Research is Evil
by bolt peters on Sep 15, 2009
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A rough outline for the discussion around when design research is evil.
A rough outline for the discussion around when design research is evil.
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po-hsien Yang
1. Recruiting in an evil way?
(and when it’s not). Jared has a strong take on this. I think Nate may totally disagree (selecting the right people vs remote recruiting). Could be fun.
2.Conducted in an evil way? Methods (qual vs quant / opinion vs behavior)
3.Commissioned for evil purposes? Brochure sites. Test the colors.
4.Examples of good versus evil methodologies?
Examples
Evil: Pepsi vs Coke – new coke came from the sweeter pepsi. One of biggest marketing disasters of all time.
Good: Chunky Tomato Sauce by big Malcolm.
2.What do you do when stakeholders disagree on interpretation of results?
3.What is the perception of UX research in our culture? Designers think of it? Developers?
4.How do you inspire? How do you make research actionable?
5.Are presentations worthless? (reports / doing designs instead of presentation)
6.Do you do reports? Why and why not?
a.I think Peter: no reports, only design?
b.Nate: live observation. Reports get thrown away.
2.Circumstances out of your control. Oracle buys peoplesoft. Bankruptcy.
3.Features creep and nobody thinks about the research
4.Stakeholders
5.Information is useless. Inspiration gets things done. (this is not a question it’s Nate’s opinion)
Quote: Fire Them All
Andy Budd: “If you work with people who are not fascinated and dying to be involved in user research, fire them.”
Example: The Aeron chair vs Yogurt Shampoo
Marty’s example in the book “designful company” about the Aeron chair versus Yogurt-scented Shampoo – weird but good. Research showed people thought the chair was really weird and, AT FIRST, uncomfortable. Opinion vs behavior. They said it looked weird AND it was hella uncomfortable, so they chose not to worry about the looked weird part.
Example: Apple & 37 signals
They allegedly ignore research. But it’s not true.
Stakeholders / Politics / Organizational Structure Can Be Evil
In the name of consensus, people play nice on teams, but nice isn’t always what’s best for the interface. So what happens is consensus. Research can fight consensus, but research can’t attend meetings, can’t call to follow up, can’t be courageous. That takes someone…with balls.
2.What inspires organizations to make dramatic improvements to their UX in general? What role does research play?
Examples from The Face
•Clotaire Rapaille: PT Cruiser
•Hindsight fairytales of technology innovation blind us – kuniavsky.
•New paradigms for research like perpetual beta
•Windowing UI's come from research at Xerox and other places.
•Flickr, Google, Amazon, Typed, Twitter, etc can be considered transformative interfaces that included a more broad definition of research.
•IDEO – Palm V
Opinion: Information is useless.
Raise of hands. How many of us know how to eat better and exercise more? Would it help if I wrote up a report and handed it to you telling you that you should eat better and exercise more? No, you would say fuck you. But that’s what we do with research a lot. We hand them over, and then nothing happens.