One of the most persistent factors limiting the impact of user research in business is that projects often stop with a cataloging findings and implications rather than generating opportunities that directly enable the findings. We've long heard the lament "Well, we got this report and it just sat there. We didn't know what to do with it." But design research (or ethnography, or user research, or whatever the term du jour may be) has also become standard practice, as opposed to something exceptional or innovative. That means that designers are increasingly involved in using contextual research to inform their design work. Ongoing acceptance of design research has increased the ranks of designers and others who feel comfortable conducting user research. But analysis and synthesis is a more slippery skill set, and we see how easy it is for teams to ignore (more out of frustration than anything malicious) data that doesn't immediately seem actionable. This workshop gives people the tools to take control over synthesis and ideation themselves by breaking it down into a manageable framework and process.

1. Well, We’ve Done All This Research, Now What?
Steve Portigal
1 @steveportigal

2. Click to edit Master title style
Introduction
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3. Today
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Introduction 15:00 – 15:10
Observation Exercise 15:10 – 15:40
Synthesis 15:40 – 16:30
Break 16:30 – 17:00
Synthesis 17:00 – 17:10
Ideation 17:10 – 17:50
Share 17:50 – 18:15
Prioritization time permitting 18:15 – 18:20
Q&A + Wrap-up 18:20 – 18:30
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4. Click to edit Master title style
Portigal
We help companies discover and
act on new insights about their
customers and themselves
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5. Use to edit Master title style
Clickfieldwork throughout the development cycle
Take a fresh
look at people Use existing ideas
as hypotheses
What to Refine &
Launch
make or do prototype
Iterate & improve
Explore new
ideas
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6. Synthesis & ideation process
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Fieldwork
Synthesis
Ideation
Development
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7. Click to edit Master title style
Homework/Observation Exercise
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8. Homework Master title style
Click to editCheck-in
Your mission: Dedicate at least half an hour to walking around and
observing people in your neighborhood
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9. Homework Master title style
Click to editCheck-in
Who was able to do the assignment?
Was this anyone’s first experience doing observational
fieldwork?
Is there anyone who has not done user or observational research
in the field?
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10. Observing
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Notice what… people,
places
Notice how… processes,
sequences, interactions
Suspend your point of view
Avoid conclusions
Allow confusion
Steve, practicing his “noticing.” You can tell
Do it “out loud” because he looks like he may be a little
confused.
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11. Cultural context
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You’re observing people within
their culture. Notice how cultural
artifacts reflect and define the
environment; and reveal what is
“normal”
Normal isn’t “right or wrong” – it’s
the set of background rules that
define much of what people
choose or ignore
What are they selling?
Media
Products
Advertisements
Street Culture
Trends/ Fads
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12. Cultural context
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13. Cultural context
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14. Cultural context
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15. Exercise: Explore!
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Your mission: Imagine you are
working on a project for
Gentrific8, looking for inspiration
for neighborhood redevelopment
from the Lisbon Eastern
Business District.
Form groups of 2 – 3. Mix it up
• Wander and observe people,
interactions and environments
• Do it out loud!
• Capture (photos, notes)
• What, who, where, when?
• Why, how?
This is not a design audit of
signage or merchandise displays
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16. Neighborhood observations:
Click to edit Master title style Noe Valley, San Fran
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17. Neighborhood observations:
Click to edit Master title style Noe Valley, San Fran
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18. Neighborhood observations:
Click to edit Master title style Montara, California
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19. Exercise: Explore!
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We resume
at 15:40!
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20. Click to edit Master title style
Synthesis: From data to insights
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21. Synthesis & ideation process
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Analysis
Synthesis
Insights Opportunities
Ideation
Strategies Solutions
Detailed
solutions
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22. Why to edit Master title style
Click a process?
Fieldwork
Synthesis
Ideation
Development
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23. Avoid jumping to conclusions
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24. DTDT: edit Master title style
Click toAnalysis vs. Synthesis
Analysis
Break large piece(s) into smaller
ones in order to make sense
e.g., interviews, transcripts into anecdotes, stories
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25. DTDT: edit Master title style
Click toAnalysis vs. Synthesis
Combining multiple pieces into something new
e.g., developing themes, implications, opportunities
Synthesis
Analysis
Break large piece(s) into smaller
ones in order to make sense
e.g., interviews, transcripts into anecdotes, stories
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26. DTDT: edit Master title style
Click toAnalysis vs. Synthesis
The process gradually moves from one to the other
Combining multiple pieces into something new
e.g., developing themes, implications, opportunities
Synthesis
Analysis
Break large piece(s) into smaller
ones in order to make sense
e.g., interviews, transcripts into anecdotes, stories
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27. Analthesis????
Click to edit Master title style
Combining multiple pieces into something new
e.g., developing themes, implications, opportunities
Synthesis
Analysis
Break large piece(s) into smaller
ones in order to make sense
e.g., interviews, transcripts into anecdotes, stories
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28. More narratively, what is synthesis?
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Sense-making through an iterative
process of refining gathered data
Early, Informal data in your head
First, process the experience you
had collecting data
• Refer to debriefs and conversations
• Articulate and identify themes
• Outcome: Topline Report
Process-based, Formal heavy lifting
Review, Refine, Rinse, Repeat
Then, process the data itself
• Individual and group analysis
• Pattern-identification, clustering,
models, frameworks
• Outcome: Opportunities
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29. In-field edit Master
Click todebriefing title style
Synthesis naturally begins in
the field
• Resist meaning (for now)
• Focus on observations
• Get the detail
Create time to talk after each
fieldwork experience
• Worksheet to facilitate the
debrief
Write up real-time summaries for Fieldwork highlights captured in the wild.
the team, ASAP
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30. Early, informal synthesis (data
Click to edit Master title style in your head)
After fieldwork, collate reflections
and quickly externalize a starter set
of 5 to 10 thematic areas based on
• Pre-identified areas of inquiry
• Refer to debriefs and
conversations from the field
• New patterns that we observed
Identify interesting areas;
acknowledge that you don’t
understand details yet, identify
questions
Outcome: Topline Report
All right researchers… what did you see?
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31. The to edit Report
ClickTopline Master title style
This sheds light on what excites the team and the stakeholders and
brings focus to the next stage of synthesis
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32. Process-based, formal style
Click to edit Master titlesynthesis (heavy lifting)
Go back through your raw data
very closely to move beyond the
Topline Report
Individually (heads-down) and
collaboratively (heads-up)
i.e.: What did other public announcements in
the study look like? What are the layers of
information and cultural context? What form
factors are favored? Why?
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33. Individual analysis title style
Click to edit Master(not today)
Heads down!
• Video
• Photos, field artifacts
• Transcripts
• DV→MP3→FTP→.docx
Transcript analysis
• Make marginal notes on
patterns, quotes, or what
seems interesting
• Ask yourself questions; give
labels; propose solutions
• Don’t worry about
implications, be descriptive
and reactive
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34. Individual analysis title style
Click to edit Master(not today)
If you can’t get transcripts, watch
video/listen to audio (even sped-
up) and in near real-time jot
down the rough narrative of the
session
• When you make an observation
in your own voice, do something
typographic to call it out (ALL
CAPS, highlight, etc.)
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35. Collaborative analysis
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Heads up!
Present each interview (etc.) as
a case study. Introduce each,
and pick out the provocative
highlights.
Voice and document reactions,
a-has, support and questions
• Clustering with stickies
• White-board notes
Develop a new shared point-of-
view, beyond “findings”
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36. More individual analysis (not
Click to edit Master title style today)
Spreadsheet analysis enables immersive refinement of data
Play with data by generating alternate views of the dataset
• Rewrite each sticky in a cell (adding commentary, explanation, context, quote)
• Processing each entry allows further synthesis and thought
Tag each comment with Categories of Comment
person, segment, market etc. columns will comes from
to allow you to manipulate data vary by project rewritten sticky
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37. Developing Master title style
Click to edit opportunities
Opportunities are not
• A reporting of “interesting findings”
• A list of solutions Keep the human touch in
communication
Allow people to move
Opportunities are seamlessly between places
Allow people to integrate
• Change we can envision based on seamlessly across different
what we heard and observed devices and systems
• About people
• In the context of, but reframing the What should we do?
business questions
• Generative, inviting many
solutions
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38. Summary of analthesis style
Click to edit Master title activities
Topline Individual Collaborative Individual Opportunities
Analysis Analysis Analysis
Keep the human touch in
communication
Allow people to move
seamlessly between places
Allow people to integrate
seamlessly across different
devices and systems
Externalize the data The heavy lifting Play with individual Play with the entire Determine generative
in your head data elements data set directions
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39. Exercise: Develop topline (10
Click to edit Masteratitle style minutes)
Get in groups of 4
Quickly review what happened (today
and from your homework) and what
you saw. Collate reflections. Resist the
urge to move too far towards
conclusions
• Don’t refer to notes or photos yet
• Keep your own experiences, existing
hypotheses, cultural clichés, etc. in the
background
Develop 3 - 5 themes as a “Topline
Report” sketching out the big
takeaways, leading into further
synthesis
• Don’t fuss over exact wording All right researchers… what did you see?
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40. Exercise: Develop title style
Click to edit Masterfindings (10 minutes)
Evolve your “Topline Report;” flesh out
and enrich themes
• Write your themes and put them up
• Leave space for new ones
• Now (!) tell stories from the field
(from your neighborhood and today),
using photos, notes and memory
Rethink the relationships between the
themes, pick your strongest themes
and write a sentence with a point of
view
• Go from “Graffiti everywhere” and
“Teen gangs hanging out” to “Public
spaces in the neighborhood are used to
communicate identity and
belongingness”
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41. Break!
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42. Exercise: Identify opportunities
Click to edit Master title style (10 minutes)
Build on your findings
• Start each opportunity with a verb
Keep the human touch in
communication
Opportunities are not Allow people to move
• A reporting of “interesting findings” seamlessly between places
• A list of solutions Allow people to integrate
seamlessly across different
devices and systems
Opportunities are
• Change we can envision based on what What should we do?
we heard and observe
• About people
• In the context of but reframing the
business questions
• Generative, inviting many solutions
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43. Click to edit Master title style
Ideation: From insights to solutions
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44. Ideation questions
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A simple step moves you from
Opportunities to Ideation
Questions, reframing them How can we keep the human touch in
into actionable language communication
How can we allow people to move
seamlessly between places
How can we allow people to integrate
seamlessly across different
devices and systems
Ideate!
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45. Scope edit Master
Click toof solutions title style
Solutions exist across many
different business areas
Functionality
Visual design
Marketing
Architecture
Public Services
Partnerships
Events
Software
Form factor
Packaging
Policy
Retail design
Even if you are unlikely to impact
How many business and civic areas to impact
certain business areas, it’s crucial can you spot in this picture?
that you set that constraint aside
for ideation
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46. Developing Master title
Click to edit strategies style
Responses to any ideation question can lead in different strategic directions
Finding: Students have to smoke outside, but they get cold and wet
Opportunity: Improve the experience of students who smoke
Ideation Question: How can we improve the experience of students
who smoke?
Support underlying needs Question needs and
and behavior by embracing behavior, seek change by
the finding challenging the finding
Create a protected Eliminate smoking
environment for smoking
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47. Strategies can inspire solutions
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Finding: Students have to smoke outside, but they get cold and wet
Opportunity: Improve the experience of students who smoke
Ideation Question: How can we improve the experience of students who
smoke?
Strategies
Create a protected
Eliminate smoking
environment for smoking
Solutions
Facilities Admin Partners Online Admin Partners
Build a Allocate Align with Smoking Ban Stop
pavilion interior nearby cessation smoking smoking
room cafe games coaches
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48. Solutions can suggest strategies
Click to edit Master title style
Finding: Students have to smoke outside, but they get cold and wet
Opportunity: Improve the experience of students who smoke
Ideation Question: How can we improve the experience of students who
smoke?
Strategies
Create a protected
Eliminate smoking
environment for smoking
Solutions
Admin Admin
Allocate Ban
interior smoking
room
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49. Collaborative generation
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This is a collective, out-loud activity!
Talk, listen, build on each other’s
ideas
• Don’t worry about a “bad” idea… it
may lead to a “good” idea
Don’t correct; generate alternatives
• “Yes, and…”
This is a visual activity! Sketch,
draw…
• Quantity over quality; go quickly
Individual ideas matter less than
How can a sour lemon help keep things working
what the collective produces overall smoothly?
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50. Stuck?
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Come up with bad ideas
• Immoral
• Dangerous
• Bad for business
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51. Don’t forget your second wind
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Pace of idea
generation
Obvious but
necessary,
problem-solving,
need-filling, low-
hanging fruit
Time
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52. Don’t forget your second wind
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Pace of idea
generation
Obvious but Wacky,
necessary, transgressive,
problem-solving, innovative,
need-filling, low- breakthrough,
hanging fruit weird
Time
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53. Summary of ideation exercises
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Questions Business Areas Ideation and Sharing
How can we keep the human touch
in communication
How can we allow people to move
seamlessly between
places
How can we allow people to
integrate seamlessly
across different devices
and systems
Ideate!
Shift to “How can Figure out where Remember, “Yes, and…”
we…?” we can play
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54. Exercise: Ideation questions
Click to edit Master title style (2 minutes)
Apply How can we…?
to each of your Opportunities
How can we keep the human touch in
communication
How can we allow people to move
seamlessly between places
How can we allow people to integrate
seamlessly across different
devices and systems
Ideate!
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55. Exercise: Business title style
Click to edit Master areas (3 minutes)
Let’s collectively list possible
business areas to design for
• Think about whatever Gentrific8 could do
or affect
Use this list as a starting point
Functionality
Visual design
Marketing
Architecture
Public Services
Partnerships
Events
Software
Form factor
Packaging
Policy
How many business and civic areas to impact
Retail design can you spot in this picture?
Incentives
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56. Exercise: Ideation (35 minutes)
Click to edit Master title style
Use your ideation questions to
generate strategies and solutions
• Out loud
• Visual
• Collaborative
Consider the range of possible
business areas
Apply lemon as needed.
Bounce back and forth between
generating strategies and
solutions
Most ideas will not turn out to be
winners; the goal is to practice
Don’t forget your second wind
connecting research data to
solutions
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57. Exercise: Share (25 minutes)
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Quickly align on your team’s best
ideas and message
Choose a messenger
The wise team will choose a bold, expressive
spokesperson
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58. Prioritization
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59. Big group voting
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60. Small group ranking…and reconciliation
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Color indicates voting winner Ranking factors may even
include how clear the idea is
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61. Click to edit Master title style
Wrap Up
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62. How to edit use frameworks
Click expertsMaster title style
Fieldwork
Synthesis
Ideation
Development
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63. Coming up!
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A book by Steve Portigal
The Art and Craft of User Research Interviewing
http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/user-interviews/
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64. Click to edit Master title style
I’ve got a tip
(that you
didn’t cover)
that works Yeah, I’ve
well for me… got a
question
for ya…
One new
thing I
learned
today is…
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65. Click to edit Master title style
Thank you!
Portigal Consulting @steveportigal
www.portigal.com steve@portigal.com
Well, We’ve Done All This Research, Now What? 65 +1-415-894-2001
Portigal