UIE Roadshow : Day 1
Today’s seminar was titled “Discovering User Needs: Field Techniques You Can Use” and presented by Kate Gomoll and [Ellen Story](http://www.gomolldesign.com/aboutus/ellen.htm) both of [Gomoll Research & Design](http://www.gomolldesign.com).
I have conducted a few field studies of my own but have been disappointed with the results. I came back with pages upon pages of notes and then struggled with the best way to analyze and present the data. I hoped this seminar would give me some ideas and inspiration and I was happy with what I learned today.
Kate and Ellen presented techniques aimed at making the results readable and even interactive. Instead of churning out thick reports, they produce “posters” that summarize various findings. They showed examples of legal-sized posters summarizing each user type or profile, storyboards showing common tasks, photo collages, and other deliverables. Some were created with the help of graphic designers that did an excellent job in summarizing attitudes through font choices, colors, and graphics.
By placing these posters in public places like hallways, they can raise usability’s profile, capture the development team’s imagination, and provide a visible point of reference for design discussions. I hope to use these ideas for my next study.
The other nice tidbit is the idea of a “top-10 task list” (where 10 is a number that makes sense for the product). There are many ways to pick the top-10, but one scheme involves getting users to rank the frequency they perform tasks and get their managers to rank the importance of the tasks. By combining those two rankings, you can come up with the top tasks the product design should focus on.
Finally, a neat idea for longer-term studies is to leave a tape recorder with the users. Ask them to answer certain questions on tape whenever they perform a task of interest. I like this idea since it doesn’t involve typing or writing and could be pretty unobtrusive for the user.