I'm getting ready to go through this very process with an investor who is wondering whether the all-Flash experience he's been investing in will be adopted by users once it's rolled out. They keep on building, never release beta, and have spent a lot of time and money making assumptions with no data to support. It's a huge all-Flash product. No idea why these guys bet on Flash for the entire UI, but I'll soon find out.
I have a 5-day assessment schedule planned. The first morning will be spent analyzing the product (I've already seen some screen and read the b-plan). In the afternoon, I will meet with the four main stakeholders individually and poses a set of prepared questions regarding the project, their involvement in it, the assumptions made, technology implementation and more. On day two, I'm preparing a small usability study with a few individuals walking through a prototype and reviewing screen grabs. The budget is tight, so I am planning on keeping it to 5 or so max, from the early adopter through the person who was unlikely to use the technology, but may do so if it's simple to use. On day three and four it's market research--reaching out to other experts, designers, programmers, etc...to get their take on where the market it heading, what they've been working on and what they're thinking about. Days 5 through 10 will be spent incorporating all this data into a structured document with some recommendations as the best path to move forward. I'm not a buzzword guy, so please forgive the lack of catchy phrases and terminology thrown around here on the list. Best, Tony Zeoli On 11/24/09 2:13 PM, "Jonathan Abbett" <[email protected]> wrote: > Paul is right on. > > In the middle of a big project this year, our client came to us with another > piece of software they were working on, but were having a hard time get off > the ground. They asked us to "do interaction design" to it, but there was > no budget or time for research. > > What did we do? We did research anyhow. We took our own time to have coffee > with half a dozen people and talk to them about the problem space. It > quickly became clear, despite the informality and the relatively small > sample size, that the product concept was destined for failure. We reported > back to the client, they axed the product, and spent their resources in more > productive ways. > > A victory for our team, and only possible because we talked to people. > > Think of it this way: you are a painter, and your paint is user research. > Fancy brushes, canvases, or gallery space are useless without the paint. > > -Jon > > > > On Sat, Nov 21, 2009 at 4:21 AM, Paul Bryan <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Understanding what real people will do when presented with your design >> requires data. If you don't have budget for research, I suggest >> taking a weekend to go to a place where people do whatever activity >> you are designing for, observe them for a few hours, and jot down >> attributes and behaviors that you feel are germane to the overall >> context and experience. How do charcteristics like age, affluence, >> preparedness, experience in the topic, flexibility, hurry, etc. >> impact what they do? >> >> The list you create from this activity is a starter set of attributes >> and behaviors that you can bring into your exercise that might carry >> more weight than making it all up. It doesn't cost you anything >> other than a weekend. >> > ________________________________________________________________ > Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! > To post to this list ....... [email protected] > Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe > List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines > List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [email protected] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
