designing better experiences - ux london 2013
DESCRIPTION
Slides from the workshop @danny_bluestone and @duckymatt from Cyber-Duck Ltd gave at UX London 2013. The workshop focused on how by putting the user at the centre of design decisions you can deliver a better experience. With a mixture of theory and hands-on activities the workshop covered user research, activity mapping, card sorting and participative sketching techniques.TRANSCRIPT
DESIGNING BETTER EXPERIENCES
THROUGH A USER CENTRED APPROACH
Danny Bluestone | @danny_bluestone Matt Gibson | @duckymatt
WHAT IS USER CENTRED
DESIGN?
The central premise of user centred design is that the best designed products and services result from understanding the needs of the
people who will use them.
SOME BENEFITS OF UCD
1. Qualitative - Find out what customers actually want. 2. Context – Discover the exact context to design for.
3. Creativity – Combine UCD with branding. 4. Focus - Avoid ‘analysis paralysis’.
5. Remove egos– Verify decisions with real customers.
h"p://xkcd.com/773/
GIVING USERS WHAT THEY NEED NOT WHAT YOU THINK THEY NEED
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/matski_98/8259750205/
TAKE TIME TO OBSERVE HOW PEOPLE USE YOUR DESIGN
TIMOTHY PRESTRO, CEO of DMT
DESIGN FOR PEOPLE, NOT AWARDS
h"p://designthatma"ers.org/por@olio/projects/
DESIGN FOR OUTCOMES
www.ted.com/talks/Cmothy_prestero_design_for_people_not_awards.html and h"p://www.designthatma"ers.org/pictures/dtm_blog/Baby_in_Firefly.JPG
If the engineers could, they'd give you 40 buttons, but
when you're driving it's not that easy to use them all, so it's better to have the ones you really need.
The key thing is to make it simpler without getting rid of
stuff that I might need to make the car go quicker.
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/simonw92/8534697674/
LEWIS HAMILTON ON UCD
As we reform the delivery of public services, they are designed around the needs of the user, rather than has been far too often the case in the past, being designed to suit the convenience of the government.
Francis Maude, MP
Approaches Disciplines
User centred design
Self design
Activity centred design
Genius design
Interaction design
Information architecture
Usability testing
Research
IS UCD ALWAYS THE BEST APPROACH?
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/centralasian/5577225117
USERS ARE NOT DESIGNERS
IT IS USER CENTRED DESIGN, NOT USER CONTROLLED DESIGN
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A ONE-SIZE-FITS-ALL
APPROACH
FOCUS ON OUTCOMES NOT DELIVERABLES
USABILITY IS NOT A FEATURE
IT DEPENDS ON THE USER, THE ENVIRONMENT, THE TASK, AND OTHER CONTEXTUAL FACTORS
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/oewf/2924217723/
HOW WE APPROACH UCD
1. Research
2. Design / prototype
3. Test
4. Improve
RESEARCHING REQUIREMENTS
FRONT-LOADING STAKEHOLDER INTERVIEWS
• Why is it being made?
• Who are the key stakeholders and what are their goals? • How does it fit in with the wider company objectives? • Gain insight into market and target audiences • Identify competitors early on
h"p://goodkickoffmeeCngs.com/2010/04/stakeholder-‐frontloading/
TECHNIQUES FOR EFFECTIVE INTERVIEWS
• Create an informal and relaxed atmosphere • Stay flexible • Keep it one-on-one • Allow them to speak ‘off-the-record’
The turning point in many interviews is when the interviewee gets up and closes the office door and
lowers their voice.
Paul Boag, Headscape
h"p://boagworld.com/business-‐strategy/how-‐to-‐improve-‐your-‐site-‐using-‐stakeholder-‐interviews/
DEFINING CONTEXT OF USE
1. User profiles
2. Activities
3. Environment
• Speak to existing users if possible • Competitors • Ethnographic studies / research • Expert insight
TIPS FOR GETTING INSIGHT INTO USER PROFILES
THE BEST USER PERSONAS ARE BASED ON REAL USERS
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/patloika/7946438528
• Ethnio for existing users • Social media • Go to the physical locations where you’ll find
your users • Use professional recruiters
HOW DO I FIND MY USERS?
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/oatsy40/6783078815/
Accessibility is the degree to which anyone can access and use a website using any web browsing technology.
RNIB h"p://www.rnib.org.uk/professionals/webaccessibility/background/Pages/background.aspx
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/furbyx4/2968376257/
WHAT ACTIVITIES DO YOUR USERS NEED TO PERFORM?
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/fernando/36759033
FREQUENCY
WHAT WILL THE USER NEED TO DO MOST OFTEN?
CRITICAL
CAN BE INFREQUENT, BUT IT IS CRITICAL TO SUPPORT THEM
ENVIRONMENT ANALYSIS
• Physical
• Social / cultural • Technical
DESIGN / PROTOTYPING
CARD SORTING
• The ‘base’ for your information architecture.
• Gets insights and patterns into users ‘mental model’.
• It helps to increase findability in a system.
The current recommendation is to test 15 users for card sorting in most projects, and 30 users in big projects...
Jakob Nielsen, Nielsen Norman Group
TECHNIQUES FOR CARD SORTING
• Use lots of post-it notes or cards • Get users to sort the cards in open or closed groups • Your main job is to observe and keep the momentum • Learn from the patterns of different groups via analysis • Helps to create a record of the structure/taxonomy
HICKS’S LAW
“THE MORE CHOICES YOU HAVE TO CHOOSE FROM, THE LONGER IT TAKES FOR YOU TO MAKE A DECISION.”
h"p://www.cirencalui.com/
INTRODUCING INTERACTION DESIGN (IxD)
• Helps to map out ‘flows of control’ • Progresses to sketching and prototyping • Pivotal at delivering functional specifications
“THE TIME REQUIRED TO RAPIDLY MOVE TO A TARGET AREA IS A FUNCTION OF THE DISTANCE TO AND THE SIZE OF THE TARGET”
FITT’S LAW
h"p://modetro.com/mb-‐games-‐simon-‐says-‐vintage-‐retro-‐game-‐70s
TECHNIQUES FOR INTERACTION DESIGN (IxD)
• Use personas and interviews to inform the design. • Competitor research see what is already out there. • Ethnography can help you to understand real users. • Validate what you do with real users as early as possible.
IxD –FLOW OF CONTROL EXAMPLE
h"p://wc1.smartdraw.com/examples/content/examples/01_flowcharts/4_other_flowcharts/control_flow_epc_diagram_flowchart_l.jpg
IxD – PROTOTYPE
h"p://www.infoq.com/resource/arCcles/wireframes-‐start-‐development-‐projects/en/resources/3fig1.jpg
START PROTOTYPES WITH PEN AND PAPER
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/furbyx4/2968376257/
I do not know the cognitive reasons behind this, but I have never seen this not be true. The more human your
picture, the more human will be the response.
Dan Roam, Back Of The Napkin
h"p://www.thebackokhenapkin.com/
PARTICIPATORY SKETCHING TIPS
• Encourage low fidelity
• Review as a group
• Frame critique with user stories
TEST / EVALUATE
DESIGNS ARE HYPOTHESES
ITERATE QUICKLY AND TEST ASSUMPTIONS
ETHNOGRAPHY
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/alui0000/4814280779
GUERILLA USER TESTING
h"p://www.flickr.com/photos/5tein/3609261904
Lets us see how our study participants scan the search results page, and is the next best thing to actually being able to read their minds. Anne Aula and Kerry Rodden, User Experience Researchers, Google
GOOGLE ON EYE TRACKING h"p://www.japantoday.com/images/size/x/2013/03/urn%3Apublicid%3Aap.org%3A83a7bae63f044nc938d2f4bea94d862.jpg
INTERVIEWS
h"p://uxmag.com/arCcles/eye-‐tracking-‐the-‐best-‐way-‐to-‐test-‐rich-‐app-‐usability
OTHER METHODS OF USER FEEDBACK
• Click tracking tools • A/B and MVT testing • Remote user testing • Expert reviews
BALANCING UCD WITH CLIENT’S NEEDS
WHAT WE’VE COVERED • What is user centred design – Benefits / pitfalls • Usability is not a feature • Researching users and activities • Paper prototyping • Getting user feedback
THANK YOU!
Danny Bluestone | @danny_bluestone Matt Gibson | @duckymatt