User research
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After this lesson, you will be able to:
- Describe the skills required to conduct and recruit for an effective user interview
- Define contextual inquiry and articulate its benefits
- Prepare unbiased interview questions
- Conduct an effective user interview
- Draft a research plan and write a discussion guide for final project interviews
STUDENT PRE-WORK
Before this lesson, you should already be able to:
- Identify the steps in a user-center product development approach
INSTRUCTOR PREP
Before this lesson, instructors will need to:
- Print out and share enough copies of the Research Plan Template to be used in class
Opening (5 mins)
As developers who practice design thinking, our number one concern is to design solutions and products that work best for our users. We cannot do this unless we understand who our users are and what their needs are. This is why we spend so much time on user research.
Check: Why not just ask people what they want?
Well, people are experts in their own problems, not in the solutions. Honestly, people have no idea what they want. It’s up to you to interpret what they say. Get them to tell you as much as they can about why.
What people say to you said accounts for only a portion of their insights. Watch their body language for any additional clues.
Remember, while doing user research, it’s your responsibility to hear about problems of many people, addresses a potentially diverse set of problems.
Introduction: User Research (10 mins)
Research falls into two categories: Generative and Evaluative
- Generative research is exploratory and gives direction and new ideas about what a product should be. We’re doing this today.
- Evaluative research determines if an idea works. It can validate if your current product is meeting user needs.
User research ensures you’re solving a problem that actually exists in people's lives and reduces risk. Making up needs can be a big gamble. It’s an expensive risk of money and time. Validating needs beforehand increases the likelihood of success.
Remember, you are not the user. You may be one of them, but you can’t speak for everyone. We do user research to help create empathy for other people and their struggles—to walk a mile in their shoes.
Another important insight to explore are your user's habits? Don’t assume you know why they do things. People lie all the time, especially to themselves.
Check: What are the reasons to conduct user research?
Provided a problem statement, figuring out how people are dealing with this problem can reveal really interesting information: Are they hacking their own solutions together? You can study those workarounds. This gives you a good idea of what they consider important.
Contextual Inquiry
What if you weren’t in this classroom, and wanted to research someone in their natural environment? What sort of study could you plan? How would that be different from user interviews?
Example: If you were working on a cooking product, you might arrange to meet participants and have them cook you a meal, so you could observe them doing the things they found most relevant. Then, you would follow that up with an interview, to clarify your observations.
Instructor note: Contextual inquiry is not required by the course, but occasionally someone’s research topic will need it, so it’s good to give a concrete example of how it could be executed. failblog.cheezburger.com/thereifixedit
Guided Practice: Writing a Research Plan (20 mins)
Today you’ll be researching a vacation guide app. We’re going to write a research plan. It shouldn’t be more than a page; it’s only to keep ourselves focused during the research process.
Let's go ahead and open the Research Plan Template.
Instructor note: Walk through each section with students before you show them a completed version.
Now, take a look at an example of a user research plan SoundCloud put together to look into a live collaborative DJ feature.
These questions, at a high level, will be used to answer the following:
- Who is your target audience? Write down some basic details about these people.
- What do you want to learn about, related to this topic? (These are your research goals.)
- What can you ask about, that would help you learn about the topic? Can you break your research out into smaller pieces to make the scope more manageable?
In pairs, use the Research Plan Template to come up with a plan that would help you understand people’s pain points when searching for vacation destinations. Don't actually write interview questions for the script portion - we’ll be writing actual questions soon.
Introduction: Interview Prep (15 mins)
First thing is first: make sure you define the research goals. Make sure you put them in the research plan and/or share with your team so everyone is on the same page.
You may need to interview your clients or stakeholders. Do your clients know their research goals? Help them along by asking key questions to make sure you’re researching the right subject.
You should also prep a discussion guide. This will guide your interviews and help you ask about all the important topics you don’t want to forget.
Let's review the dos and don'ts of interviewing users - everyone open the guide provided.
During the Interview / Moderator tips
Let's go over some tips to make sure your user interviews are as successful as possible:
You should record your interviews if possible. Always ask permission, explain that it’s for private use, and ask for their consent. This will allow you to focus on the interview itself, instead of taking notes.
Make participants feel comfortable. Start off with small talk, even if you hate it. It relaxes people and gets more honest results.
Mind your body language. If you seem open and relaxed, it will be easier for others to be relaxed as well. If you are slumped in the chair, arms crossed, seeming uncomfortable, your interviewee will pick up on that. Show no fear.
Guide the conversation, don’t control it. Use active listening techniques to refocus their thoughts without leading the conversation
Ask open-ended questions to uncover feelings, beliefs, and personal stories. Never settle for "yes" or "no" answers
Be prepared to improvise. You never know what people will tell you. Diverge from your discussion guide if your interview turns into a more organic conversation — think of it as a checklist of topics you want to cover.
Take Observational Notes. You’ll never remember everything, and that’s ok, but notes should not consist of solutions! Focus on observations, quotes, an inferences.
Cognitive bias.
Cognitive bias is a term used to describe many observer effects that may lead to perceptual distortion, inaccurate judgment, or illogical interpretation. You may exhibit the same exact behavior as an interviewee, but you cannot assume their reason for doing so is the same as yours. Be aware of this concept and avoid it during your interviews!
Guided Practice: Preparing a Discussion Guide (10 mins)
Go back to the Research Plan you wrote earlier for the vacation app: you jotted down a few different areas you could ask questions about.
Now, take a few minutes and write down the questions you want to ask people, building off of those areas of discussion you identified. If you’re not sure what to ask, go back to the goals you defined in your research plan. If you’re really brave, you can wing it and just write a list of conversation topics, but be careful to ask unbiased questions.
Independent Practice: Practice Interviewing (15 mins)
Pair up and take turns interviewing each other for 7 minutes using your discussion guide. Remember to take observational notes and save your notes for later—we’ll be using them during the next class. Switch partners and do another interview.
Guided Practice: Debriefing the interview (5 mins)
Check: How did it feel to be the interviewer?
Instructor note: They usually answer that it felt awkward and weird. Reassure them that it’s ok, and will get easier with practice.
Check: How did it feel to be the interviewee? Did you feel like the other person was paying attention to what you said?
Instructor note: They usually say yes, they were very attentive. If they say no, ask why. How could this be improved for next time? Point out that even if they felt awkward as an interviewer, the other person felt like they were being listened to. How they feel internally isn’t necessarily obvious to others.
Conclusion (5 mins)
- How are you feeling about the status of your research plan?
- What questions still exist for approaching project 3?