User research is the foundation of user experience, but conducting user research can seem intimidating when just starting out. At its essence, though, user research is just asking users about themselves in a constructive and focused way. If you want to get to know your users better, this presentation will give you pragmatic tools to accomplish that goal.
Doing UX design in large organisations has its own set of challenges. It’s still relatively unknown in many industries but regardless of that, lots of UX teams are being mobilised for the first time in the organisation’s history. This challenge means that many professionals prefer not to work in large organisations, opting for workplaces where change can happen more readily. However, as the trend for businesses to create their own internal UX teams continues, a number of UX professionals are finding themselves in this environment. As client-side UX professionals in a newly formed UX team, we have had to figure out how to overcome all the challenges that this brings. Some techniques worked while others didn’t. Because change typically happens so slowly in large organisations, we have had to use creative strategies to stay motivated. By sharing our experience of embedding UX into a large financial organisation over the last 3 years, we will share our successes and failures.
By telling the story of our journey as a UX team within a large financial organisation participants will understand some strategies of their own to use in their own organisations. Some of these strategies not only help to further the cause of user experience design but also to stay motivated through difficult times.
Listen to your Users. Building an Intranet with User Centered Design at NovartisMarek Nowakowski
How do you decide what features and content make it on your new Intranet? Too often these decisions can get made in a meeting room full of Intranet business owners who want their stuff to be front and center. Other times these decisions might be made by an Intranet development team and perfectly suit their needs but no one else’s.
In our opinion doing anything without a very significant involvement of real users is a risky proposition.
In this session we’ll discuss:
- What User Centered Design is
- How to structure an Intranet design project with significant user engagement built-in
- Steering the steering committee with good user research
- How to get the most out of your user interactions through quality workshops and feedback sessions
- Translating research into design
- Turning users into evangelists for your project
This session is a case study where all concepts are illustrated through examples from a recently completed Intranet redesign at Novartis.
Doing UX design in large organisations has its own set of challenges. It’s still relatively unknown in many industries but regardless of that, lots of UX teams are being mobilised for the first time in the organisation’s history. This challenge means that many professionals prefer not to work in large organisations, opting for workplaces where change can happen more readily. However, as the trend for businesses to create their own internal UX teams continues, a number of UX professionals are finding themselves in this environment. As client-side UX professionals in a newly formed UX team, we have had to figure out how to overcome all the challenges that this brings. Some techniques worked while others didn’t. Because change typically happens so slowly in large organisations, we have had to use creative strategies to stay motivated. By sharing our experience of embedding UX into a large financial organisation over the last 3 years, we will share our successes and failures.
By telling the story of our journey as a UX team within a large financial organisation participants will understand some strategies of their own to use in their own organisations. Some of these strategies not only help to further the cause of user experience design but also to stay motivated through difficult times.
Listen to your Users. Building an Intranet with User Centered Design at NovartisMarek Nowakowski
How do you decide what features and content make it on your new Intranet? Too often these decisions can get made in a meeting room full of Intranet business owners who want their stuff to be front and center. Other times these decisions might be made by an Intranet development team and perfectly suit their needs but no one else’s.
In our opinion doing anything without a very significant involvement of real users is a risky proposition.
In this session we’ll discuss:
- What User Centered Design is
- How to structure an Intranet design project with significant user engagement built-in
- Steering the steering committee with good user research
- How to get the most out of your user interactions through quality workshops and feedback sessions
- Translating research into design
- Turning users into evangelists for your project
This session is a case study where all concepts are illustrated through examples from a recently completed Intranet redesign at Novartis.
Understand people to design great experiences: An introduction to user researchMing Lee
An introduction to user research for those who want to start doing user research or work with researchers. Covers how research can save you time and money, the dimensions of user research, and an overview of research methods. The presentation also includes tips on how to work with researchers and how to ensure your findings have impact on your product or service.
The User Is Always Right (Usually): 4 User Research Methods That Get ResultsMichael Hartman
Whether you’re building a new experience from the ground up or looking to improve an existing site, involving users in the design process is crucial. Their insight guides you to create an experience that meets both their needs and your organization’s goals.
In this session, we’ll cover the most common user research tools used to gain insight on what users want, what’s working well on your site and where you need to make improvements.
Having conducted over 1000 hours of user research and usability studies, we’ll share our processes and techniques for conducting user research, including which approach to use and when to use them in the design process. The approaches covered in this session are:
In-depth user interviews
Card sorting/tree testing exercises
Usability studies
Heuristic analysis
Leveraging user-centered design to create experiences that delight-2018AMPAmanda Yarnell
Leveraging user-centered design to create experiences that delight -- a case study with C&EN's metered paywall project, by Amanda Yarnell, C&EN's editorial director, and Dori Kelner of Sleight of Hand Studios. delivered June 2018 to Association Media & Publishing annual meeting in DC
Slides Ian Multon recently used in his discussion w/ mentees of The Product Mentor.
The Product Mentor is a program designed to pair Product Mentors and Mentees from around the World, across all industries, from start-up to enterprise, guided by the fundamental goals…Better Decisions. Better Products. Better Product People.
Throughout the program, each mentor leads a conversation in an area of their expertise that is live streamed and available to both mentee and the broader product community.
http://TheProductMentor.com
User Experience Service showcase lightning talks - December 2018Neil Allison
The University of Edinburgh User Experience Service ran a showcase of recent projects on 5 December 2018. The session began with these lightning talks.
UCD and Technical Communication: The Inevitable MarriageChris LaRoche
Presentation about the increasingly collaboration and needs of technical communication to work with and become competent within UX and UCD methods and principles.
Shweta Barupal User Research Case Studies & PortfolioShweta Barupal
I specialise in human behaviour with top tier academic training in psychology, sociology, economics and digital anthropology. A seasoned UX Researcher who has worked on a wide range of products, spanning web, services, AR and VR, wearables, health tech, e-commerce, and enterprise mobility apps in two continents. My diverse background (Advertising, content management, Events, E-entrepreneurship) contributes to my passion for exponential business growth. Using both qualitative and quantitative methods, I develop a deep understanding of customers. I believe good UX research begins with asking the right questions- What are the objectives? What is the goal? Who are the right participants for a survey/focus group/user testing session? How to recruit them? How can analytics, data and user behaviour inform the strategy and methods for conducting research?
I collaborate with product leadership teams to define customer focused UX goals relative to the competitive landscape, identify opportunities for differentiation, and track progress from early design to launch. Throughout product development I work closely with designers, engineers, and developers to solve interaction problems, understand attributes of good or bad design solutions, define scenarios & use cases, validate and guide critical product decisions using a wide range of methodologies and data sources.
I am passionate about improving the quality and impact of design and design research. I have a strong philosophy that guides my work on a daily basis. I am enthusiastic and derive pleasure in sharing what I have learnt and learning from others. I continuously make efforts to improve processes and methods.
Key Skills
Digital innovation
Need finding, design thinking, competitive analysis, synthesising knowledge, report delivery
Digital training
Ethnographic and User research, Usability Testing, Expert Evaluation, Use cases, Scenarios, Task Analysis, Wireframes, Cognitive psychology theories, Heuristic evaluation
I specialise in human behaviour with top tier academic training in psychology, sociology, economics and digital anthropology. A seasoned UX Researcher who has worked on a wide range of products, spanning web, services, AR and VR, wearables, health tech, e-commerce, and enterprise mobility apps in two continents. My diverse background (Advertising, content management, Events, E-entrepreneurship) contributes to my passion for exponential business growth. Using both qualitative and quantitative methods, I develop a deep understanding of customers. I believe good UX research begins with asking the right questions- What are the objectives? What is the goal? Who are the right participants for a survey/focus group/user testing session? How to recruit them? How can analytics, data and user behaviour inform the strategy and methods for conducting research?
I collaborate with product leadership teams to define customer focused UX goals relative to the competitive landscape, identify opportunities for differentiation, and track progress from early design to launch. Throughout product development I work closely with designers, engineers, and developers to solve interaction problems, understand attributes of good or bad design solutions, define scenarios & use cases, validate and guide critical product decisions using a wide range of methodologies and data sources.
I am passionate about improving the quality and impact of design and design research. I have a strong philosophy that guides my work on a daily basis. I am enthusiastic and derive pleasure in sharing what I have learnt and learning from others. I continuously make efforts to improve processes and methods.
Key Skills
Digital innovation
Need finding, design thinking, competitive analysis, synthesising knowledge, report delivery
Digital training
Ethnographic and User research, Usability Testing, Expert Evaluation, Use cases, Scenarios, Task Analysis, Wireframes, Cognitive psychology theories, Heuristic evaluation
- Why user-centered design and user needs assessment is important
- Selling user needs assessment
- Gathering good information about your users
- Understanding the information you gathered
Your resume, LinkedIn Profile, and Portfolio tell a story of who you are and what you can do. How can you tailor them to paint the best picture possible about you to a UX Manager so that you can win an interview?
Originally presented to Houston UXPA on 3 March 2016
Designing more ethical and unbiased experiencesKaren Bachmann
Humans are biased, and sadly, we are not always able to filter our deeply ingrained biases. UX designers and researchers have long understood this, but as we watch major technology companies make significant mistakes with regard to ethics and bias, the cost of not accounting for bias and ethics is becoming more evident and widely known.
Even knowing what pitfalls exist, we still miss opportunities for doing good as a result of our own human biases obscuring our vision. We need tools to explore and challenge our biases in a productive way to deliver better outcomes. We need a set of shared values within teams and, ultimately, across the industry to promote our common responsibility to deliver the greatest benefit while causing the least amount of harm. How can we work together to intensify the focus on ethical design? In this session, we’ll share ways you can empower yourself and your teams to do the right thing for people.
Know thyself: Understanding and managing biasesKaren Bachmann
Despite best intentions, all of us have biases. It’s more important than ever to understand our biases to achieve the good we want in the world and avoid pitfalls. We explore ways to discover and discuss biases constructively before they undermine work and consider pragmatic approaches to manage their influence in our projects.
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Understand people to design great experiences: An introduction to user researchMing Lee
An introduction to user research for those who want to start doing user research or work with researchers. Covers how research can save you time and money, the dimensions of user research, and an overview of research methods. The presentation also includes tips on how to work with researchers and how to ensure your findings have impact on your product or service.
The User Is Always Right (Usually): 4 User Research Methods That Get ResultsMichael Hartman
Whether you’re building a new experience from the ground up or looking to improve an existing site, involving users in the design process is crucial. Their insight guides you to create an experience that meets both their needs and your organization’s goals.
In this session, we’ll cover the most common user research tools used to gain insight on what users want, what’s working well on your site and where you need to make improvements.
Having conducted over 1000 hours of user research and usability studies, we’ll share our processes and techniques for conducting user research, including which approach to use and when to use them in the design process. The approaches covered in this session are:
In-depth user interviews
Card sorting/tree testing exercises
Usability studies
Heuristic analysis
Leveraging user-centered design to create experiences that delight-2018AMPAmanda Yarnell
Leveraging user-centered design to create experiences that delight -- a case study with C&EN's metered paywall project, by Amanda Yarnell, C&EN's editorial director, and Dori Kelner of Sleight of Hand Studios. delivered June 2018 to Association Media & Publishing annual meeting in DC
Slides Ian Multon recently used in his discussion w/ mentees of The Product Mentor.
The Product Mentor is a program designed to pair Product Mentors and Mentees from around the World, across all industries, from start-up to enterprise, guided by the fundamental goals…Better Decisions. Better Products. Better Product People.
Throughout the program, each mentor leads a conversation in an area of their expertise that is live streamed and available to both mentee and the broader product community.
http://TheProductMentor.com
User Experience Service showcase lightning talks - December 2018Neil Allison
The University of Edinburgh User Experience Service ran a showcase of recent projects on 5 December 2018. The session began with these lightning talks.
UCD and Technical Communication: The Inevitable MarriageChris LaRoche
Presentation about the increasingly collaboration and needs of technical communication to work with and become competent within UX and UCD methods and principles.
Shweta Barupal User Research Case Studies & PortfolioShweta Barupal
I specialise in human behaviour with top tier academic training in psychology, sociology, economics and digital anthropology. A seasoned UX Researcher who has worked on a wide range of products, spanning web, services, AR and VR, wearables, health tech, e-commerce, and enterprise mobility apps in two continents. My diverse background (Advertising, content management, Events, E-entrepreneurship) contributes to my passion for exponential business growth. Using both qualitative and quantitative methods, I develop a deep understanding of customers. I believe good UX research begins with asking the right questions- What are the objectives? What is the goal? Who are the right participants for a survey/focus group/user testing session? How to recruit them? How can analytics, data and user behaviour inform the strategy and methods for conducting research?
I collaborate with product leadership teams to define customer focused UX goals relative to the competitive landscape, identify opportunities for differentiation, and track progress from early design to launch. Throughout product development I work closely with designers, engineers, and developers to solve interaction problems, understand attributes of good or bad design solutions, define scenarios & use cases, validate and guide critical product decisions using a wide range of methodologies and data sources.
I am passionate about improving the quality and impact of design and design research. I have a strong philosophy that guides my work on a daily basis. I am enthusiastic and derive pleasure in sharing what I have learnt and learning from others. I continuously make efforts to improve processes and methods.
Key Skills
Digital innovation
Need finding, design thinking, competitive analysis, synthesising knowledge, report delivery
Digital training
Ethnographic and User research, Usability Testing, Expert Evaluation, Use cases, Scenarios, Task Analysis, Wireframes, Cognitive psychology theories, Heuristic evaluation
I specialise in human behaviour with top tier academic training in psychology, sociology, economics and digital anthropology. A seasoned UX Researcher who has worked on a wide range of products, spanning web, services, AR and VR, wearables, health tech, e-commerce, and enterprise mobility apps in two continents. My diverse background (Advertising, content management, Events, E-entrepreneurship) contributes to my passion for exponential business growth. Using both qualitative and quantitative methods, I develop a deep understanding of customers. I believe good UX research begins with asking the right questions- What are the objectives? What is the goal? Who are the right participants for a survey/focus group/user testing session? How to recruit them? How can analytics, data and user behaviour inform the strategy and methods for conducting research?
I collaborate with product leadership teams to define customer focused UX goals relative to the competitive landscape, identify opportunities for differentiation, and track progress from early design to launch. Throughout product development I work closely with designers, engineers, and developers to solve interaction problems, understand attributes of good or bad design solutions, define scenarios & use cases, validate and guide critical product decisions using a wide range of methodologies and data sources.
I am passionate about improving the quality and impact of design and design research. I have a strong philosophy that guides my work on a daily basis. I am enthusiastic and derive pleasure in sharing what I have learnt and learning from others. I continuously make efforts to improve processes and methods.
Key Skills
Digital innovation
Need finding, design thinking, competitive analysis, synthesising knowledge, report delivery
Digital training
Ethnographic and User research, Usability Testing, Expert Evaluation, Use cases, Scenarios, Task Analysis, Wireframes, Cognitive psychology theories, Heuristic evaluation
- Why user-centered design and user needs assessment is important
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Humans are biased, and sadly, we are not always able to filter our deeply ingrained biases. UX designers and researchers have long understood this, but as we watch major technology companies make significant mistakes with regard to ethics and bias, the cost of not accounting for bias and ethics is becoming more evident and widely known.
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Getting to know you: User research fundamentals anyone can use
1. Getting to know you
User research fundamentals anyone can use
Karen L. Bachmann
Research & Analysis Practice Lead, Perficient XD
@karenbachmann #stc14
The quote by Hackos and Redish is actually about user and task analysis. The two are frequently paired with good reason, but they answer different questions. If you are conducting a single activity to conduct both user and task analysis, you need to be certain to understand in detail what questions each should answer.
Coe speaks of the “users’ psychology.” This understanding provides the proper foundation for development.
The quote by Hackos and Redish is actually about user and task analysis. The two are frequently paired with good reason, but they answer different questions. If you are conducting a single activity to conduct both user and task analysis, you need to be certain to understand in detail what questions each should answer.
Coe speaks of the “users’ psychology.” This understanding provides the proper foundation for development.
Several reasons users may not know what they really need: faulty memory, limited perspective, resistance to change
How can the final product ensure user satisfaction?
Who: Categories of users; business plan, marketing research, and other business analysis artifacts may define users
Tasks: Business artifacts such as marketing research and competitive analysis may inform this, but you may also discover some tasks while conducting user research that were not uncovered through other means
Questions: What do you need to know to develop the product? The questioning process is iterative. You will probably want to refine your questions at each round of user research if you are able. If you are not able to have more than one round of research with target users, consider using surrogates, including family and friends.
Method: More on the next slide, but in general, watch them or ask them (Summers and Summers)
Plan and conduct: Working directly with users is often a ticklish business. Sales, account reps, marketing, and other business people may be protective of their contacts. Developing a plan that allows them to participate in the planning process to gain buy-in and allay any fears that you might adversely affect their business relationships. Beware common objections to direct interaction: “Marketing already knows the users. We don’t have enough time… money…. We are users ourselves.” (Hackos and Redish) and many more.
Present: A bargaining chip to use with other stakeholders—you will be acquiring information they might need. Also, useful to demonstrate value of research as well as share the data with other stakeholders and team members. First step to getting team members to consider user satisfaction in the project plan.
Not meaning that a big MS Project Gantt chart is required. As simple as the bullets shown here.
Research will evaluate these goals to see where they match and where they differ.
Look for gaps and questions that don’t even have a starting point.
Training includes what users have had and what they can realistically expect to receive.
Age ranges example: ages of insurance underwriters were considerably higher than that of their assistants. These older workers had already managed to work around and even outside the current computerized system by transferring the burden to the assistants or by relying on manual means that were still available.
Usage constraints: accessibility questions fall in this category as well as management imposed constraints among others.
Immediate managers of users will likely err on the side of what should be done vs. what is actually done to perform a job.
Research: if you can’t get to users, this is the only way to answer the questions. Recent experience with start-ups has meant relying on research as the primary means of learning about target users. Anticipating a user advisory board, but marketing is arranging that and expect some bias.
Krug: “Recruit loosely, grade on a curve.”
More niche the product, the more important it is to recruit target users (domain knowledge)
Honoraria and motivators
Users get hung up on the data. For target users, get meaningful and plausible data. Provide some so users don’t expend brain cycles making it up.
Methods: Barnum, Chisnell and Dumas, and other resources
Methods: Barnum, Chisnell and Dumas, and other resources
Audio: Good quality microphone
Surveys and questionnaires: May misrepresent their view to make themselves look better or provide the answer they think management wants, may forget or believe they do things differently than they do, may lie because they are hostile to the project at all.
Feedback: Especially from previous versions
Usage tracking: Better for task analysis, but can reveal superstitious behavior (DOS delete followed by directory command)
Interviews and focus groups may not provide access to real users, but instead provide at best a limited subset of the total user group (frequently the experts). At worst, these are interactions with direct managers, former users who have moved on to higher responsibilities, and the purchase decision makers (high-level management).
Additionally, focus groups introduce group dynamics and a dynamic personality may dominate more passive personalities. If this is a concern, you as the usability expert must provide opportunities to get complete input from those passive personalities
Usability testing should come at all phases of the development life cycle and ideally supplies any updated information to enhance an existing user profile.
Observations may be remote (video of a factory line, observation deck of a auction flow) while site visits are actual users in their real environment.
Even if it’s just you, make others aware as appropriate
People to share with include peers, team and project leads, and management
Recognize the limits of your data
Avoid forcing more conclusions than the data support
Acknowledge the other constraints (business drivers, schedule, budget, and so on) on development when making recommendations
Recognize that the details that may grab your attention may not be that significant
If you slant the results, you will get caught
Hackos & Redish confirm that the types of analysis you apply depends on your project:
New product: detailed user profiles including outliers
Legacy product: list of the user skills compared with what they will need
The information gathered in the user analysis will benefit all members of the project team; however, the other team members may not be quick to realize the benefits. Make the information readily available and publicize that availability. Put up posters about users.
Understand how your team views usability, whether they actively support your activities by collecting and sharing information themselves, whether they expect you to provide all the relevant information, whether they support the idea of usability at all.
Understand their experience with using direct user data. Less experience means a slower pace. Don’t try to force them to accept your conclusions.
The quote by Hackos and Redish is actually about user and task analysis. The two are frequently paired with good reason, but they answer different questions. If you are conducting a single activity to conduct both user and task analysis, you need to be certain to understand in detail what questions each should answer.
Coe speaks of the “users’ psychology.” This understanding provides the proper foundation for development.
The quote by Hackos and Redish is actually about user and task analysis. The two are frequently paired with good reason, but they answer different questions. If you are conducting a single activity to conduct both user and task analysis, you need to be certain to understand in detail what questions each should answer.
Coe speaks of the “users’ psychology.” This understanding provides the proper foundation for development.
Hackos and Redish list (pg. 13)
The objections have a grain of truth in them that provides a resource to you.
Formal request may be for a whole series of user interactions or for a single opportunity. Either way provide a detailed account of your goals for the analysis.
Develop a usability life cycle plan that mirrors current development lifecycles.
The process of user analysis will lead to new questions and new needs for information. Change also means that as the mental model of the user unfolds, some design decisions may need to be revisited.
From “Creating Effective User Surveys,” originally presented with Caroline Jarrett