I’ve done a lot of user research – from quick prescreening interviews to full blown ethography – and no matter what the scope of what I’m doing is, I always get some nugget of insight each time I talk to the (eventual) consumers of my designs.
Such insights can be very slight, and may only reinforce a finding from previous project – and then some force you to change your entire design approach.
Because of this consistent and incredibly useful benefit, I often tell my peers that I could not do my job without such research (which often feels more like casual conversations than user study). If, someday, my budget was cut and my research was no longer funded, I’d still do it – only I would be accosting random people at a local mall.
Recently its gone past the insight and study stage – I’ve started to take advantage of the times I have with users to basically “codesign” with them. Some of my colleagues find fault with this approach (they tend to be more dogmatic about things) and my response to thier criticism is a simple and direct one – they are the user, shouldn’t you let them gave a say in the product you are going to foist upon them?
“Users aren’t designers,” is the usual response, and I can’t disagree with that. But I’m looking for inputs, feedback, and understanding of what works for the people I am interviewing; why shouldn’t I take thier design ideas with as much weight as those of one of my product stakeholders?
So, the long and the short of this? If you are a user researcher don’t be dogmatic, open yourself up to doing participatory design along with your research – you may find your users have some pretty interesting design ideas you had never thought of.
You must log in to post a comment.