Session 316: How and Why to Bring End Users Into The Service and Web Design Process

• two usability consultants + Toronto Public Library "User Experience Project Manager"
• huge system with huge resources, but, the ideas can be scaled down and used anywhere by the rest of us!
• types of user involvement: ongoing / periodic / one off
• this session was FAB for me, as I'm doing a big web site usability project this year...good timing
• provide multiple ways for the peeps to be involved...phone / face-to-face / online + multiple research methods: interview / survey / town-halls / focus groups / usability testing / contextual inquiry...different levels of commitment / effort / anonymity
  
• tools: 2.0 sites to engage users...ongoing dialogue + 1.o tools like surveys, polls, live chat, forums
• capture unsolicited comments (ie. at the desk)...collect and study
• Why involve users?...work WITH them...build understanding
• make your results available widely within your organization
• start / continue / deepen converstaions with users
• pull together ALL info you have from users...customer comments, survey results, informal (from staff) etc.
• usability goals: need to decide goal...ie. is it to have 100% use with no help?...need a goal in order to evaluate success
• determine REAL requirements of users...what they say vs. what they do...tricky
• also consider industry standards and guidelines, including accessibility / best practices
  
• "ethnographic research"...user-shadowing...watching how they use the site
• consider using "personas" to profile typical users + usage scenarios...need to update / keep current as well
  
• S.M.A.R.T. objectives: Specific / Measurable / Achievable / Realistic / Time-sensitive
• new Toronto PL web site to come soon (competing priority with new ILS and Fed. Search)
• "always in beta"...quest for the Holy Grail...which keeps moving...