Desk/purse/briefcase tour. Ask subjects to give a tour of their desk or the contents of their purse of briefcase. How people use their desks and what they carry with them can reveal a lot about their personalities and work habits. Are they messy or neat? Organized or disorganized? Do they have special systems for working? Are there family pictures?
When talking to subjects, it's best to have what the Buddhists call the "beginner's mind." Designers should be open and nonjudgmental and should not assume that they know the answer beforehand. Simple questions can reveal powerful answers. When possible, designers should avoid questions that can be answered with a yes or no; instead focus on drawing out stories and answers to how, what, and why questions.
Activities
A recent trend in design research calls for designers to not only observe and talk to users, but also to have them engage in an activity that involves making an artifact. This process allows designers to draw out emotions and understand how people think about a subject. Doing activities frees subjects' creativity and allows them to express themselves differently than they would in an interview. Here are some methods for making artifacts with subjects:
Collaging. Using images and words, have subjects make a collage related to the product of service being researched. For a mobile phone project, for example, designers might have subjects make the Web, or stock photographs and should contain a wide range of subjects and emotions. The same is true for the words. About 200 words, both positive and negative, should be printed on strips of paper for use. Subjects should have a way to write their own words as well.
Modeling. Using modeling clay, pipe cleaners, Styrofoam blocks, cardboard, glue, and other modeling tools, designers can have subjects design their version of a physical or even digital product. For example, a designer could have gamers design their ultimate game console or have air traffic controllers design an ideal set of controls.
Draw your experience. Give subjects drawing materials and paper and tell them to draw their experience with a product or service. A project about e-mail, for example, might have subjects draw the life cycle of e-mail on their computers.
An important part of having subjects make things is having them explain their choices after they are done. Otherwise, the designer may be left with a perplexing object and no way of understanding it. Ask, for instance, why a subject chose negative words in the collage or why a subject built the robot that way. However, for the best results, designers shouldn't tell subjects beforehand that they will be explaining their choices; this could inhibit them as they complete the activity.
Making artifacts requires more advance preparation than other forms of research. Designers need to gather and choose the materials for making the artifacts as well as the tools to do so.
Self-Reporting
Another type of activity is self-reporting. In this approach, subjects, not the researcher, record their activities and thoughts, and the researcher then collects and analyzes these records after the subjects are done. Self-reporting is an excellent tool for longer studies in multiple locations, when it would be impractical to send designers to do all of the research in person. Self-reporting can also be good for documenting moments that subjects might be reluctant or embarrassed to present to a designer in person. Self-reporting methods include the following:
Journals. Subjects keep a journal of particular activities. A classic example is the journals kept by the Nielsen families, who write down what they watch on TV for two weeks' time so that the Nielsen ratings can be compiled.
Beeper studies. Subjects wear a beeper, which the designer sets off occasionally during the day. When the beeper goes off, the subjects record in a journal what they are doing at that time.
Photo/video journals. Subjects are given cameras and told to document activities and their daily lives. Research on dining experiences, for instance, might ask subjects to document every time they cook or eat something.
Self-reporting requires a lot of time and effort from the subjects, so the subjects should be selected (and compensated) accordingly.
Design Implications
All the design research in the world is useless unless designers lay out the implications of the research. It's astounding how often this crucial step is overlooked.
At the end of any research period, designers will have an unstructured mass of data: in notes, in pictures, and in their heads. All this data is, frankly, useless (and perhaps worse than useless: overwhelming and confusing) unless it is distilled into information that the designer can use. The designer has to give shape and meaning to the idea-that is, design the data.
The first task is to put all this data into some sort of order: in a spreadsheet, in a table, even (or especially) on sticky notes all over a giant board. The designer needs to cluster the data in meaningful ways, to give it form, so it can be thought about. One approach is to make a conceptual model of the data, but even looking at the data laid out in any sort of way should be enough for the designer to begin to draw design implications from it.
Let's say a designer is researching a new watch that sends and receives e-mail. As part of her research, she observed and recorded the moments when people most often glanced at their watches. In looking over her data, she discovers that the people she observed looked at their watches most often when they were late and in a hurry. What is the design implication of this data? Well, one implication might be that users first and foremost need to see the time on a watch/e-mail device, since they are usually glancing at the device in times of stress. Users also might like a device built to detect faster movement (hurrying) so as not to distract the wearer with incoming e-mail until the wearer slows down.
Or here's another example: A designer has been interviewing stereo aficionados about how they use their stereo systems. He finds that a large number of them are jazz aficionados as well. One design implication is that any new stereo system should be optimized for playing jazz, or have an option that allows such optimization.
Some of the design implications the designer will draw out of the data may seem simplistic ("The new mobile phone should fit in a pocket or purse"), but later in the process, these implications can offer a good check on what is being designed. Does the new product or service address all the design implications from the research?
Brainstorming: "And Then a Miracle Occurs..."
There is often a moment of panic once the research is done and the design implications have been teased out. Now the designer has to start digging in and actually designing something. An idea about what the product or service is going to be needs to appear. It's here, in this moment, that a miracle occurs.
As the cartoon wryly notes, this is a mysterious process. For some designers, the research and interviews have already started to suggest solutions to pursue. Others, however, may be clueless at this point about how to proceed. For the latter, it may be best to simply plunge into documenting their design and wait for solutions to arise. But most designers live and design somewhere between these two examples. The solutions arise (or at least start) in periods of focused brainstorming.
When brainstorming, designers should have all the research and problem definition documents such as the design brief close at hand and in view (taped to walls perhaps) for reference and inspiration. The hunt statement, too, should be displayed for reference and consideration. Tools for writing and sketching quickly are essential: white boards, sticky notes, blank sheets of paper, pens, pencils, markers, and so on.
Start with a warm-up exercise. For instance, first dwell on the subject at hand in the broadest possible sense. For example, on a project to build a Web site for a museum, spend 10 minutes doing a word association game on what art is or what a museum is. Or do drawings based on famous artists. Or have all the people in the room talk about their best (or worst) experience at a museum. What the exercise is doesn't much matter: the point of the warm-up is to get brains, hands, and mouths engaged before starting to generate ideas.
Set aside a fixed amount of time for brainstorming-usually not more than two hours at any given stretch. During that time, try to generate as many ideas and variations on idea and variations on idea as possible. Don't self-censor or censor others. Sometimes from even terrible ideas, great ideas can later spring.
Stay focused. Put stray thoughts or unrelated ideas into a "parking lot": a physical place in the room where those sorts of wayward ideas can be captured, but not discussed.
Don't spend a lot of time on any one idea. In the initial brainstorming sessions especially, the goal is to generate as many ideas as possible. Save going into depth on any one idea for later. for now, more is, indeed, more.
Use the whole room. Post things up on walls. Simply seeing all the ideas may generate connections between them or generate new ideas. Document what has been done. Take pictures of what gets drawn and put up. This information will be invaluable later.
Where do these ideas come from? From two places: invention (the creation of something wholly new through imagination) and reinvention (the combination of old forms into something new). The latter is far more common. It is always fruitful to ask, "What is this product or service like? What is it not like? in the search for existing patterns and forms that can be used for the project at hand.
But it is also useful to explore the unknown, to take giant leaps of imagination. To do that requires changing perspective, or how you think about something. For example, stop thinking of a computer as a machine. Don't think of it as a thing at all (if you can). Think of it instead as an action. It is a rush though wires. Or a thrown punch. Now imagine a computer as a thought itself. It is a jolt? A vision? A nightmare? Changing perspective allows us to toss out convention and again a fresh look at the project at hand.
Summary
Design research and brainstorming are interaction design's secret sauce. Spending time observing, interviewing, and interacting with subjects and then drawing implications from that research fuel designers' empathy and imagination. That imagination is the heart of brainstorming, where invention and reinvention happen.
After research and brainstorming, designers need to document what they've learned and the design to be created. That is the subject of the next chapter.
When talking to subjects, it's best to have what the Buddhists call the "beginner's mind." Designers should be open and nonjudgmental and should not assume that they know the answer beforehand. Simple questions can reveal powerful answers. When possible, designers should avoid questions that can be answered with a yes or no; instead focus on drawing out stories and answers to how, what, and why questions.
Activities
A recent trend in design research calls for designers to not only observe and talk to users, but also to have them engage in an activity that involves making an artifact. This process allows designers to draw out emotions and understand how people think about a subject. Doing activities frees subjects' creativity and allows them to express themselves differently than they would in an interview. Here are some methods for making artifacts with subjects:
Collaging. Using images and words, have subjects make a collage related to the product of service being researched. For a mobile phone project, for example, designers might have subjects make the Web, or stock photographs and should contain a wide range of subjects and emotions. The same is true for the words. About 200 words, both positive and negative, should be printed on strips of paper for use. Subjects should have a way to write their own words as well.
Modeling. Using modeling clay, pipe cleaners, Styrofoam blocks, cardboard, glue, and other modeling tools, designers can have subjects design their version of a physical or even digital product. For example, a designer could have gamers design their ultimate game console or have air traffic controllers design an ideal set of controls.
Draw your experience. Give subjects drawing materials and paper and tell them to draw their experience with a product or service. A project about e-mail, for example, might have subjects draw the life cycle of e-mail on their computers.
An important part of having subjects make things is having them explain their choices after they are done. Otherwise, the designer may be left with a perplexing object and no way of understanding it. Ask, for instance, why a subject chose negative words in the collage or why a subject built the robot that way. However, for the best results, designers shouldn't tell subjects beforehand that they will be explaining their choices; this could inhibit them as they complete the activity.
Making artifacts requires more advance preparation than other forms of research. Designers need to gather and choose the materials for making the artifacts as well as the tools to do so.
Self-Reporting
Another type of activity is self-reporting. In this approach, subjects, not the researcher, record their activities and thoughts, and the researcher then collects and analyzes these records after the subjects are done. Self-reporting is an excellent tool for longer studies in multiple locations, when it would be impractical to send designers to do all of the research in person. Self-reporting can also be good for documenting moments that subjects might be reluctant or embarrassed to present to a designer in person. Self-reporting methods include the following:
Journals. Subjects keep a journal of particular activities. A classic example is the journals kept by the Nielsen families, who write down what they watch on TV for two weeks' time so that the Nielsen ratings can be compiled.
Beeper studies. Subjects wear a beeper, which the designer sets off occasionally during the day. When the beeper goes off, the subjects record in a journal what they are doing at that time.
Photo/video journals. Subjects are given cameras and told to document activities and their daily lives. Research on dining experiences, for instance, might ask subjects to document every time they cook or eat something.
Self-reporting requires a lot of time and effort from the subjects, so the subjects should be selected (and compensated) accordingly.
Design Implications
All the design research in the world is useless unless designers lay out the implications of the research. It's astounding how often this crucial step is overlooked.
At the end of any research period, designers will have an unstructured mass of data: in notes, in pictures, and in their heads. All this data is, frankly, useless (and perhaps worse than useless: overwhelming and confusing) unless it is distilled into information that the designer can use. The designer has to give shape and meaning to the idea-that is, design the data.
The first task is to put all this data into some sort of order: in a spreadsheet, in a table, even (or especially) on sticky notes all over a giant board. The designer needs to cluster the data in meaningful ways, to give it form, so it can be thought about. One approach is to make a conceptual model of the data, but even looking at the data laid out in any sort of way should be enough for the designer to begin to draw design implications from it.
Let's say a designer is researching a new watch that sends and receives e-mail. As part of her research, she observed and recorded the moments when people most often glanced at their watches. In looking over her data, she discovers that the people she observed looked at their watches most often when they were late and in a hurry. What is the design implication of this data? Well, one implication might be that users first and foremost need to see the time on a watch/e-mail device, since they are usually glancing at the device in times of stress. Users also might like a device built to detect faster movement (hurrying) so as not to distract the wearer with incoming e-mail until the wearer slows down.
Or here's another example: A designer has been interviewing stereo aficionados about how they use their stereo systems. He finds that a large number of them are jazz aficionados as well. One design implication is that any new stereo system should be optimized for playing jazz, or have an option that allows such optimization.
Some of the design implications the designer will draw out of the data may seem simplistic ("The new mobile phone should fit in a pocket or purse"), but later in the process, these implications can offer a good check on what is being designed. Does the new product or service address all the design implications from the research?
Brainstorming: "And Then a Miracle Occurs..."
There is often a moment of panic once the research is done and the design implications have been teased out. Now the designer has to start digging in and actually designing something. An idea about what the product or service is going to be needs to appear. It's here, in this moment, that a miracle occurs.
As the cartoon wryly notes, this is a mysterious process. For some designers, the research and interviews have already started to suggest solutions to pursue. Others, however, may be clueless at this point about how to proceed. For the latter, it may be best to simply plunge into documenting their design and wait for solutions to arise. But most designers live and design somewhere between these two examples. The solutions arise (or at least start) in periods of focused brainstorming.
When brainstorming, designers should have all the research and problem definition documents such as the design brief close at hand and in view (taped to walls perhaps) for reference and inspiration. The hunt statement, too, should be displayed for reference and consideration. Tools for writing and sketching quickly are essential: white boards, sticky notes, blank sheets of paper, pens, pencils, markers, and so on.
Start with a warm-up exercise. For instance, first dwell on the subject at hand in the broadest possible sense. For example, on a project to build a Web site for a museum, spend 10 minutes doing a word association game on what art is or what a museum is. Or do drawings based on famous artists. Or have all the people in the room talk about their best (or worst) experience at a museum. What the exercise is doesn't much matter: the point of the warm-up is to get brains, hands, and mouths engaged before starting to generate ideas.
Set aside a fixed amount of time for brainstorming-usually not more than two hours at any given stretch. During that time, try to generate as many ideas and variations on idea and variations on idea as possible. Don't self-censor or censor others. Sometimes from even terrible ideas, great ideas can later spring.
Stay focused. Put stray thoughts or unrelated ideas into a "parking lot": a physical place in the room where those sorts of wayward ideas can be captured, but not discussed.
Don't spend a lot of time on any one idea. In the initial brainstorming sessions especially, the goal is to generate as many ideas as possible. Save going into depth on any one idea for later. for now, more is, indeed, more.
Use the whole room. Post things up on walls. Simply seeing all the ideas may generate connections between them or generate new ideas. Document what has been done. Take pictures of what gets drawn and put up. This information will be invaluable later.
Where do these ideas come from? From two places: invention (the creation of something wholly new through imagination) and reinvention (the combination of old forms into something new). The latter is far more common. It is always fruitful to ask, "What is this product or service like? What is it not like? in the search for existing patterns and forms that can be used for the project at hand.
But it is also useful to explore the unknown, to take giant leaps of imagination. To do that requires changing perspective, or how you think about something. For example, stop thinking of a computer as a machine. Don't think of it as a thing at all (if you can). Think of it instead as an action. It is a rush though wires. Or a thrown punch. Now imagine a computer as a thought itself. It is a jolt? A vision? A nightmare? Changing perspective allows us to toss out convention and again a fresh look at the project at hand.
Summary
Design research and brainstorming are interaction design's secret sauce. Spending time observing, interviewing, and interacting with subjects and then drawing implications from that research fuel designers' empathy and imagination. That imagination is the heart of brainstorming, where invention and reinvention happen.
After research and brainstorming, designers need to document what they've learned and the design to be created. That is the subject of the next chapter.