VanUE World Usability Day 2009

Agenda ✴ About World Usability Day ✴ What is Sustainability? ✴ The Design Challenge: Pine St Garden ✴ Our Goals ✴ The Team ✴ Timeline / Process ✴ ObservaAons ✴ Problem Areas ✴ Design ImplicaAons ✴ Possible Strategies ✴ Conclusion

Designing for a Sustainable World How do usability people tackle this?

Sustainability “Use and development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future genera9ons to meet their own needs.” Brundtland Commission 1987

Don’t do things today that make tomorrow worse. ! Nathan Shedroff Design is the Problem: The Future of Design Must be Sustainable (2009)

Design Challenge How can we use our professional exper=se as usability and user experience prac==oners to improve the Pine St Community Garden? * And do it in 12 hours on Nov 12/09 for World Usability Day?

Pine Street Community Garden

Team Members (pictures) Theresa Chris Katja Ben Gord Gagan Barb *not shown: Cat, Selma

Roles ✴ Liaison ✴ Online Researcher ✴ Project Manager ✴ InformaEon Designer ✴ Observer / Ethnographer ✴ Visual Designer ✴ Photographer / Videographer / Scribe ✴ Prototyper ✴ Interviewer ✴ PresentaEon Producer ✴ Online Surveyor ✴ Curator

8AM 12PM 7PM Timeline

VanUE Goals Apply our professional exper=se as usability and user experience pracAAoners to improve the quality of human life (the fundamental goal of usability), while living within the capacity and constraints of our environmental, social, and economic systems (sustainability deﬁned).

Why Pine St? ✴ Support urban agriculture ✴ Foster community ✴ EducaEonal opportunity about how we interact with the environment.

VanUE Outcomes Educate Advocate Volunteer Deliver

Research Methods

Observational Research

Comparative Research

Online Survey to Members

Phone & In-person member interviews

Online Research: City Guidelines & Policies

Inspiration, Ideation, Implementation

Observations

Problem Areas ✴ DemarcaEon of space ✴ Volunteer Time Constraints ✴ CommunicaEon ✴ EducaEon ✴ Managing waiEng expectaEons ✴ AestheEcs ✴ Funding

Focus → Community

What is Community? Where do we start?

Our Answer: We start with one person

Our Goal: Foster the conditions to create The “Engaged” Member

Meet Patricia The “Engaged” Member

The Engaged Member ✴ 66 year old woman. ReEred ✴ Trades stuﬀ. Shares tools and city worker seeds with community ✴ Lives in an apartment. ✴ Gardens 3 Emes/week during Downsized when her husband good weather died ✴ Likes teaching. Knows ✴ Wants community garden to gardening neighbours. ﬂourish ✴ Takes pride and aUends social acEviEes

If everyone was like Patricia they would... ✴ Love their garden and have pride in it ✴ Care for the community garden as a whole ✴ Care for their neighbour. Teach them, help them, not encroach in their area ✴ Clean up and do addiEonal duEes as needed

The Engagement Model (Not everyone is Patricia)

The New Member ✴ 23 year old UBC Grad in ✴ Excited to be “in” with the Resource Management garden ✴ Lives in an apartment with a ✴ Didn’t realize how much work small balcony a garden needs ✴ New to gardening ✴ RomanEc, wants to impress his girlfriend

The Active Member ✴ Mid 30’s. Has 2 small children ✴ Busy life. Wants to teach children how to garden ✴ Lives in a townhouse but eventually wants a house ✴ Like to relax and gardening is a good way to do that. ✴ Garden once or twice per week. Kind of know their ✴ Takes pride and aUends social gardening neighbours. acEviEes

Pine St. Community Garden Engagement Model Engaged Member Enthusiast and an acEve member, values the garden, helps regularly on the board, thinks about improvements, communicates with other members regularly, aUends all garden related events Active Member Enthusiast, acEvely contributes to common areas, openly interacts with other gardeners at events. AUenEve to board emails and google group, considers volunteering, aUends garden events Participating Member (majority today) Uses and acEvely tends to plot, generally is aware of google group and email but does not parEcipate/ respond. AUends at least one member event per year Member in Good Standing Minimally uses/maintains plot, o_en new and novice members, minimally parEcipates with other members, does not make an eﬀort to aUend member events Inactive Member Does not acEvely tend plot and has/will receive a noEce

How do we “design” an engaged member?

1 Better Signage, Wayfinding promote ownership, pride and public awareness

show website, email etc anything we have Signage

Demarcation of Space

Plot Owner Info

2 Better Communication polite, consistent, timely

Website IA

3 Education & Training if I know better, I will do better

Bulletin Board

Signage

Summary ✴ Foster the condiEons for community to happen, engagement to emerge ✴ Start with the user and the “real world” ✴ Small things can make a big diﬀerence ✴ Think about the system: online and oﬄine ✴ Leave things beUer than you found them

VanUE World Usability Day 2009

by Gordon Ross

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VanUE World Usability Day 2009 Presentation Transcript

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