embiggen your knowledge: how cromulent design would make the simpsons less funny

Embiggen Your KnowledgeHow Cromulent Design Would Make The Simpsons Less Funny

1

A Talk By Matthew Oliphant. Refresh Boston, January 28, 2010

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

2

OR!



Working With Users Something Something Boring Title

3



4

The Thing Is...This is a workshop.



In Memory Of...Matt Wallens. August 9, 1974 to February 4, 3010.

5



Users Are ChildrenChildren With Money and No Curfew

6



7

The Bad News Is...You have to care. A little. Somewhat. Sorta.



8

More Bad News...Users will lie. And youʼ’ll base your design on that lie.



Walk in Their ShoesThough, Running Would Be Better Since You Stole Their Shoes

9



Talking With Listening to Users

The most important thing to do when you want to design stuff is listen to the people you are designing for.

Who are those people? Clients, users, support workers...

How do you listen to them without being either driven crazy or hearing things you donʼ’t need to know?

Ask the right questions, the right way. And how do we do that, Matthew?

10



Open Questions

✤ “Can you tell me the last time you had a problem with this site?”

✤ “Can you show me how you think itʼ’s supposed to work?”

✤ “Whatʼ’s the best way you can think of to make it work?”

✤ Open questions can be hard for some people to answer.

✤ They can generate a lot of cruft.

✤ They are sometimes the best way to find out what to do next without leading people to your idea of the answer.

11



Closed Questions

✤ “Doesnʼ’t it suck to have to use this software that looks like Win95 & Cobol had babies?”

✤ “Should these fields always display instead of hiding them lie youʼ’ve done there?”

✤ “Should bulk-adding work like this?”

✤ Closed questions are good follow-up questions, used for clarification.

✤ Use them sparingly to prompt users who get lost in their answers or wonʼ’t talk.

✤ They often say more about you than what youʼ’re asking about.

12



Importance of a Proper ThesisBe Solution-Agnostic. Lisa Will Respect You More.

13



Begin Correctly

Typical...

✤ “What should the Web app do?”

✤ “Where does the button go?”

✤ “Our users are just like me, when I was in the field 15 years ago!”

Better...

✤ “Whatʼ’s the goal?”

✤ “How do the users actually get work done today?”

✤ “What slows down or stops a task?”

14



“...Defile what I defile!”

Ethnography (contextual inquiry, artefacts)

✤ See what users actually do, versus what they (or management) say.

✤ It takes time to do it right.

✤ It reveals good insights.

✤ It lets you find better questions.

✤ It doesnʼ’t fit into Agile. Stop trying to cram it in!

✤ It can give you too much information.

✤ It lets you say big words like Ethnography!

15



Users Tell You What They WantEspecially When You Tell Them What They Want

16



Focus Group or Lack Thereof

The Good

✤ Lots of people.

✤ Fast feedback.

✤ Snacks.

The Bad

✤ Few talkers.

✤ Hard to manage.

✤ Can be a huge waste of your time and theirs.

17



Bring Focus

How to make it go well:

✤ Recruit carefully and well.

✤ Recruit well and carefully.

✤ Plan all details of the conversation.

✤ Lead the conversation (but not the people).

✤ Bring other-->s<-- to take notes for you.

✤ Have your own opinions and share them when the time is right.

✤ Keep people for less time than expected.

18



“Powerful. Like a Gorilla.”Letting Users Design. It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better.

19



Participatory Design

✤ Collaboration or Committee?

✤ One voice = One idea

✤ Plus: Users tend to create their own efficiencies that the software, the process, you, and management donʼ’t know about.

✤ Minus: Theyʼ’ve internalized everything so much they have a lot of trouble expressing their ideas.

✤ Buy-in can become more important than good design decisions.

20



Plays Well With Others

How to make it go well:

✤ Recruit carefully and well.

✤ Listen to what the user means, not what they say.

✤ Let users draw, but do not consider their drawing to be design.

✤ A userʼ’s POV is only one POV.

✤ Involve the same user(s) at each step of the project; just donʼ’t forget they arenʼ’t the only users in the world.

✤ Their agenda is not your agenda. See bullet 1.

21



DesignThe cause of & solution to all lifeʼ’s problems.

22



fin

23



embiggen your knowledge: how cromulent design would make the simpsons less funny

Design

matthew oliphant

matthew people

curfewa talk

funnya talk

wont talk

shoesa talk

wanta talk

boring titlea talk