User observation
Practical 2: Observation & needfinding
Purpose: Learn how to develop design ideas beginning with people, using empathy.
Due: See Learnline
brief
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The goal of this assignment is to do the groundwork for design ideas that are rooted in real people's needs/goals/values. There are five steps. 1. Read the project briefs 2. Think about some activities which relate to these briefs. Jot these down 3. Observe two different people doing the activities (some) you have written down. Pay special attention to breakdowns, unmet needs, and clever work-arounds. 4. At the end of the observation, interview people about anything that you need further information about. 5. Next, use the information gathered to create an empathy map. 6. Finally, based on your user findings and needs identified, go online to find inspiration from existing solutions. |
mission: Review the three design briefs (see Learnline/Study Guide/Project Briefs).
Use a design brief (that interests you) to observe people (in appropriate contexts related to your brief) to discover their needs in a specific area.
In next week's assignment, you will build on materials you collect in this assignment to come up with the actual solution ideas. DON’T LOOK FOR SOLUTIONS JUST YET! LOOK FOR IDEAS!
assignment
STEP 1: OBSERVE
Watching how people do things is a great way to learn their goals and values and develop design insights. This is called need finding. This assignment helps you train your eyes and ears to come up with design ideas. Your goal is to uncover user needs, breakdowns, clever hacks, and opportunities for improvement.
You will ultimately be designing a digital mobile product, but your observation may or may not include the person using a mobile device:
· If you are designing a mobile device interface for a task that doesn't yet exist on the device, you'll be observing users doing the task as they do it now. You'll identify opportunities for the software to solve existing problems this way.
· On the other hand, you may be designing a product to improve an existing device interaction. In these cases, you'll want to observe your user doing the task in situ that is, using their device to do the actual task in the actual environment.
a) Select a specific activity to observe related to ONE project brief.
· Read the three design briefs for this semester. Identify a range of activities associated with one of these design briefs.
· Select some activities that relate to one of the briefs where you can observe people ‘in situ’
b) Select two individuals to observe.
· Choose people who are NOT SIMILAR to you, e.g. a friend studying a different degree; a child; an older person.
· Your goal is to observe the successes, breakdowns, and latent opportunities that occur when mobile devices are used, not used, or could be used to support your chosen activities.
c) Ask these 2 individuals to participate in this assignment.
· Get permission from them.
· Be sure you coordinate with your participants to select a time that will be rich for observations.
· Tell the participants to perform the task as realistically as possible, while communicating to you as appropriate.
· Use the strategies discussed in the learning materials and workshops to help.
d) During the observation:
· Take notes, & digital photographs to document the activities.
· As much as possible – use photos of tasks/ activities only – keep participant’s identity anonymous unless they are happy for you to use phots that show their faces
· NO VIDEO.
e) After each observation:
· spend 5 to 10 minutes interviewing your participants about the activity you observed.
· It should take you approximately 90 mins to complete the two observations if you have planned carefully. It will take longer if you haven’t!
STEP 2: BRAINSTORM NEEDS and/or GOALS
After observing people, go over your findings and use them to create an empathy map ( https://www.nngroup.com/articles/empathy-mapping/ ) for each person.
· Use some of the data analysis skills learned during the peanut butter activity
· Based on your empathy maps, have a go at identifying user goals.
· Then, brainstorm how you could meet these goals ( at least 8) .
· Brainstorming is a group activity and should be fun!
· All ideas are good ones at this stage. You are not looking for solutions yet, focus on user needs and goals only.
An example of a need might be "Sometimes when I am at work, I forget that I have to pick up a child and take him somewhere. I need a way to be prompted no matter what I am doing so the child is not left stranded or frantically phoning his mother when he is late.”
STEP 3: FIND INSPIRATION: RECORD YOUR IDEAS ONLINE
Your next step is to find inspiration for the solutions you will be brainstorming in your next assignment.
· Inspiration can be existing applications, artefacts, products, or services that relate to your concept. Use a Trello Board (https://trello.com/) to organise your ideas
· Create cards for each of your ideas
· Then use web searches (eg Google Scholar, the ACM Digital Library, TechCrunch, Engadget, and Digg; Gizmodo) to help you find ideas for potential solutions. Also check out the Apple/Android apps store and any other sources you know to see what exists already.
· TIP: is important to interpret "related" broadly. Some things will be obvious, but
· It may be that a carrot-peeler or a measuring cup is your inspiration for an elegant and ergonomic design of a software interface.
· You may be inspired to improve upon an existing service or go in a different direction.
· Include a minimum or 8 inspirations.
· For each one note: what was the inspiration:
· how? and why? (This should be done in Trello)
Submit one document
Complete the template that includes:
1. Focus & Rationale:
a. Indicate which of the 3 project briefs your observation falls under.
b. List the potential activities you identified to observe and why
2. Process:
a. Provide an outline of the context of observation, task/s observed and the people
b. Briefly describe how you completed your Observation/Needfinding task: what did you do
3. Observations:
a. A captioned photograph showing each person you observed.
b. The photo and caption should capture a particularly interesting moment/breakdown/work-around from the observation. (You should have at least 3 photos with corresponding captions for each).
4. Analysing Findings:
a. Organise your observations into two empathy maps, one for each person observed
b. Identify the needs & goals
5. Ideate
a. Ideate: brainstorm a list of needs/goals/tasks inspired by what you observed. Go for volume (at least 8). If you brainstormed with others, please include their names in your submission. Include all of these ideas in the empathy map.
6. Finding Inspirations:
· Include a link to the Trello board you created.
· Ensure for each inspiration you explain what, how and why as appropriate
Submit document via the Learnline submission link. Ensure you clearly label your file with your name (in the file and in the document – see footer in template) .
in the workshop
· you will get 60 seconds to share the empathy maps of the people observed, one major insight/goal, and one cool idea (inspiration) found