Hotel atmosphere video material

I believe everyone knows the importance of user research. In the author's mind, practical research ability should be a necessary skill for designers, not just a plus item.

In a company with a clear division of labor, although there are specialized human factors research teams and user research teams, designers need to participate in research activities and undertake part of the work to ensure the development and promotion of the project under the condition that resources are limited and cannot be scheduled in time.

In daily business, the most common research activity of designers is small-scale scheme testing, which can get feedback from colleagues and friends around to judge the development direction of design.

In addition, in large-scale research activities, designers sometimes participate in the whole process, create research questions and draw up research ideas with researchers, and also need to carry out research activities and analyze research results with researchers.

Today, based on my past experience, I want to talk to you about what is the most important job for designers to participate in research projects. My humble opinion, please forgive me if there is anything wrong > <

Since the company is equipped with a professional research team and can devote all its manpower to the research project, why do designers still need to spare some time to participate?

The author believes that it is very important for designers to personally participate in user surveys, and there are two points:

1. Designers can get in touch with real users in the first time, and by getting in touch with the voices of first-hand users, they can directly understand users' demands, and may find new problems that have not been considered before in the research process. Being able to get close to the whole picture of users is my greatest personal advantage;

2. After all, the designer is personally responsible for the design. Whether verifying the feasibility of the completed scheme or paving the way for the future design scheme, designers know better how to convey the intention of the scheme to users and ask correct questions and questions more clearly. In this process, sometimes you can ask some questions that may not be in the applied research outline and the researchers can't express.

The data obtained through user research activities are true and reliable, which can help designers build future usage scenarios. Through the analysis and improvement of the scene, it will lay a solid foundation for the future director design.

Designers have different responsibilities in different kinds of practical research activities. Next, the author takes several common scientific research activities he has participated in as examples. .

1. Questionnaire

2.F2F interview

Design seminar

1/? questionnaire

In the questionnaire initiation and recycling activities, designers are relatively less involved in the work, mainly focusing on the design of the initial questionnaire.

When designing the questionnaire initially, researchers usually have several discussions with designers. First, you need to confirm:

1. What do we need to investigate and what part is the design aimed at?

2. Who are our target users and what are our hard requirements?

Designers often need to list what kind of questions need to be asked at this time, and then give them to researchers to help us optimize our speech skills and check the gaps.

Give a chestnut? ：

Last year, the author participated in the demand of communication function optimization, and designed a questionnaire with the user research team to test the usability of the new scheme. When researchers collect questionnaire questions from designers, we all ask questions related to the function of the scheme, mainly focusing on users' demands for the current scheme and the acceptability of the new scheme. For example, "What Top3 functions did you use when using this product in the past?" "Is the interface design of the new design easy to understand?" "Which do you prefer for different visual styles?" There are both multiple-choice questions and multiple-choice questions; In addition, there are some open-ended questions, such as "In what scene do you usually talk", "What is your preference for the interface design of video calling" and "What are your suggestions and shortcomings for the current scheme".

While communicating with designers, researchers will sort out the data according to their own experience, cut and sort the questions according to the Q&A process, and organize them into tables after optimizing the expression. Generally, after two or three rounds of communication, the whole questionnaire is sorted out. After discussing the number and duration of questionnaires, the researchers are responsible for entering the questionnaire distribution process.

After the questionnaire is collected and the research report is output, the researchers will make a round of report to the design team, pointing out the key information for us and explaining the conclusion of the report. The researchers sorted out and counted the questionnaire data, and the designer picked out what we needed from the conclusion of the report for further study. If the designer thinks that a certain kind of problem has not been effectively fed back, which will not help the next design work, we can organize the next research activities for the key problems.

When designers finally read the summary of the report, they should not remember the data expressed in the long and short tables; We want to dig out users' preferences and tendencies from these data, understand what users like and pay attention to, and turn those quantitative data into users' needs as the fulcrum of subsequent design work.

2/? F2F interview

Before the F2F interview, designers also need to cooperate with researchers, ask questions and design interview ideas. If the questionnaire has been put in before, it can be adjusted and optimized on the basis of the questionnaire and used in the interview, which can help us to know more about the information we didn't know enough when collecting the questionnaire, and also save us time in designing questions now.

There are usually two ways for us to participate in the F2F interview. One is to meet the interviewee face to face with the researcher, and the other is to listen to the interview process in the observation room behind the scenes.

When facing the interviewer, we should pay attention to the following points:

1. Arrive at the destination before the interviewee arrives and prepare the working materials and equipment;

2. If users are not invited to the company or special interview room, we can choose quiet cafes and dessert shops, which are close to the interviewees and convenient for them to arrive;

3. Have a correct attitude, be modest and polite, and make the interviewee feel relaxed from chatting;

4. Clearly inform users of our research purpose from the beginning, so that users can understand our intentions;

5. Focus on the interviewee and don't bury your head in taking notes, which will make the interviewee nervous or ignored; At the same time, by observing the user's physical behavior and facial expressions, we can also better understand the user from the side;

6. During the interview, you can ask the user some questions temporarily, but don't interrupt or guide the interview direction;

7. Cooperate with researchers to sort out data, help record information and reduce workload;

8. Finally, thank the interviewees for their participation and cooperation.

In the author's mind, F2F interview is not only a means of work, but also an opportunity to communicate closely with real users, and you can ask questions directly to the interviewees. In this process, we must be approachable and not put pressure on others, which is also the way to get along with people in daily life.

In the observation room, we also need to observe the words and deeds of users while taking notes. The advantages of behind-the-scenes observation are: first, the interviewees face fewer staff (one or two people) and less pressure; Second, we can observe and discuss with colleagues around us to discuss whether a certain problem or link is reasonable. We will record the questions, and when the researchers finish the interview, they will return to the observation room for our advice. If they have supplementary questions, they can return to the interview room to ask users more in-depth questions.

3/? Design seminar

There's one thing to say. Although I think Workshop is the most time-consuming and laborious research activity, it is also the most interesting and participatory. * * * The innovation link cannot be pressed for the time being. When participating in workshops to brainstorm with users and discuss solutions, designers need to fully integrate into that atmosphere and personally verify what "from the masses to the masses" means.

When we participate in Workshop with invited users, we should not expose our real company and position, but pretend that we are ordinary users like everyone else, so as to better observe and participate in the discussion. Users will not feel uncomfortable, so as to prevent them from creating "communication barriers" for us intentionally or unintentionally.

The most important thing is to pay attention to "talk less and do more".

1. "Talk less" means:

Designers may have some preliminary ideas about the design scheme, so be careful not to expose the scheme that has been formed in their minds. The author's personal approach is to be "ignorant" (acting, untrue-) in the discussion process, leaving room for other users to listen to their own opinions and understand the real thoughts of real users.

2. "Doing more" means:

We should guide users to speak as much as possible and output their own ideas; Disguised; In addition, the designer has an indispensable task, that is, to be an "activist" in the team, responsible for bringing an active atmosphere to the hot spots, guiding users to concentrate and maintain vitality and enthusiasm.

Because a design workshop takes four or five hours as short as a whole day. From the introduction of the thermal field, to the project guidance, to the next two or three rounds of brainstorming and scheme discussion, and finally to the activity summary, users will inevitably feel tired, sleepy and absent-minded during this long period of thinking and discussion.

Give a chestnut? ：

Two months ago, the author just attended an offline workshop to discuss the demands of target users for large-screen equipment. The invited users are all self-media creators, and the author and two other colleagues sneaked in.

These self-media creators focus on different fields, such as Vloger, hotel evaluation bloggers and documentary directors ... Based on their different professional backgrounds and working methods, we ask them questions in different ways, and consciously or unconsciously expose our "weaknesses", guide them to say what they usually do and test their pain points in the process of work. For example, "What's your general process of editing videos?" "I've encountered problems like xxxx before, but I haven't figured out how to solve them." "What should I do to prepare such video materials?" balabala and so on.

When we help users remember the details, they will suddenly have some inspiration or ask some problems that they find difficult but can't solve. It is the most important task for designers to participate in Workshop to understand the identity and hobbies of users, to explore the potential needs of users, and to turn what they say on the spot into solutions in their minds.

When the workshop is over, the designer needs to stay and review the disk with the researchers, look through the notes and drawings left by the users, and sort out the materials and equipment. Generally speaking, we will discuss the following points:

1. What part of this workshop was well done and what part was lacking, and how to improve it next time;

2. Have we collected all the information we need and whether we need to add it?

3. What the user outputs is effective is what we need to focus on;

four .......

In addition, sometimes the workshop is completed by the research team of the design team and the outsourcing research company. If the output of the final workshop is not satisfactory, it may be necessary to go through the process of wrangling with the research company in the resumption stage (for example, the last time I attended ...). This is a small probability event and does not happen frequently.

Let's sum up:

Designers participate in user research, not to "compete for researchers' jobs", but to assist researchers in research work and tap users' real needs through the advantage of close contact with users. Designers should keep empathy in the process of participating in the survey and observe users' behaviors with an open and sincere attitude, which can help us to judge our preset answers more accurately, make the subsequent design work more effective, eliminate "false demand" and complete "real demand".

The above is the author's sharing of user research activities today. Welcome everyone to exchange and discuss ~

Thanks for reading ><