Persona Stories: Weaving Together Qual and Quant for a Richer Picture with Whitney Quesenbery, WQusability.com

Stories have power to add empathy and connection to our work. They can help us learn about people, culture, and context—why, when, and how our products might be used—and share this with a design team. Stories permeate UX techniques from user stories to storyboards. They come to full power when used with personas: the persona provides a fully envisioned lead character for the story, a perspective through which interactions can be explored, and a voice for the emotional reactions to design ideas.

Creating stories for personas is a craft. They are not fiction, but are grounded in the data and user research that informs the persona. They are not fact, but are imagined events, shaped to explore possibilities. They are realistic, but not perhaps real, because they represent not just one individual or event, but something that might happen, and that provides insights into a user experience.

We’ll look at some structures that are helpful in crafting persona stories. And at questions like whether to write in first, second, or third person—and when each is valuable. We’ll create a quick story and share it, showing how impromptu stories can help in design sessions.

Show, Don’t Tell: Storytelling Experience Design in Modern Comics with Mike Lonergan, Intel

Comics are a collaborative storytelling effort—many talented individuals contribute to the success or failure of each comic book, much as a good design team leverages complementary talents in delivering a stunning product. When their talents are combined, the writer (information architect) and artists (visual designers) attract attention and deliver the mood and flow (interaction design) to pull the reader along a highly stylized, deliberate path. Mike will take you on an illuminating journey of discovery, highlighting his favorite design techniques in comics that facilitate not just the mechanics of reading but the pure enjoyment of these colorful stories.

Along the way, you’ll be granted a tour of comic book storytelling techniques that can enrich your design communications such as story boarding, visual cues and iconography and unique ways to show your users the happy path without having to tell them.

Ducks, Dolls & Robots: a Genealogy of Socio-Technical Anxieties with Dr. Genevieve Bell, Intel

The introductions of new technologies are rarely seamless and silent affairs. There are the inevitable boosters and utopian dreamers who will tell us and sell us on the notion that this new technology will change our lives, in both big and small ways: we will be cleaner, safer, happier, more efficient, more productive, and of course, more modern with all that implies. The message here is everything will be different, better. There are also the equally inevitable naysayers and dystopian dreamers who worry along equally familiar but slightly different lines: we will be less social, less secure, more isolated, and more homogenous. The message here is everything will be different, but perhaps not so much better. Of course, running in between these larger conversations are the practicalities of living with new technologies—how much does it cost? where does it live? who should look after it? what will we will do with it? and, in the end, what will we do without it?

Perhaps it is no surprise then that we worry, that new technologies are frequently accompanied by anxiety, and sometimes even fear. In this talk, Genevieve traces the roots of these hopes, fears and anxieties back through our history with machines—Vaucason’s Duck, Edison’s Talking Doll, the tea-cup robots of the Edo-period in Japan, Frankenstein’s monster and Ned Ludd’s polemics are all part of this story. She takes an expansive view, crossing cultures and historical periods, to create a genealogy of our socio-technical anxieties. Ultimately, she suggests a framework for making sense of these anxieties, and in so doing, a new way of thinking about the next generation of technologies we are designing.

Speaking the Language of Meta-Principles: Consistency, Hierarchy, and Personality with Deborah Levinson, Nimble Partners

When designing or redesigning an application, Nimble Partners focuses on three core principles: consistency, hierarchy, and personality. We can think of these principles as if they’re part of a language. Consistency and hierarchy are the grammar people learn while using an application: the basic elements that define how a language is spoken. The “words” we speak—that is, the visual design characteristics we choose to convey a message—create an application’s personality. These principles are so fundamental to creating successful interfaces that we call them “meta-principles.” While technology that affects interfaces changes, the underlying meta-principles hold true.

Nimble Partners arrived at these three meta-principles after years of heuristic reviews, usability studies, and informal observation of digital applications. In this talk, Deborah will introduce these principles and show how they apply in examples, including a case study redesign of a web and mobile application to help users track diet and exercise.

Epic FAIL: Takeways from the War Stories Project with Steve Portigal, Portigal Consulting

After nearly two years in gathering War Stories about the unusual, comic, tragic and otherwise astonishing things that happen in fieldwork, Portigal Consulting has amassed a compelling archive about the user research experience. While it’s common for the members of any group to share stories of their adventures, the user research community hasn’t supported this well. For a practice that feels misunderstood by others, there’s pressure to only share successes. Yet the confidence to share the honest and human messiness of this work can help develop the skill and even prestige of the community.

In this presentation, Steve will review some of the stories collected, highlight some of the patterns revealed by the stories, and suggest some of the lessons that we can take away. We’ll also feature live storytelling from a couple of local user researchers, sharing their own War Stories. Meanwhile, we invite you to contribute your own fieldwork War Story (about contextual research only, please) here.

Give Dimensions, a Face, and a Beating Heart to Projects Through Storytelling with Leah Noble Davidson, LeahNobleDavidson.com

Since qualitative research, or market research, can largely be spit out by a computer, we’ll take a look at how one can move beyond big data and do what a computer cannot do—go inside the head of a person and learn about their motivations and goals. Humanity’s experience is constantly shifting and so is the motivation behind our fears and goals, and that shift changes how we experience and use things. Story allows one to put a finger on that pulse. Story gets right to the bottom of things, it uncovers how the user will actually use the product in this time/place, how they will experience it in their lives, in their own home/office etc. Story is research above market “fill in the blank” research. It exposes rituals, and when one works to streamline those rituals, innovation enters. Discovering this level of story has another great benefit: it can be used to created scene stealing pitches in front of clients. One can stand in front a user or a client and paint out the story of how this will be a great new part of their lives.

Lost But Not Forgetten: The Thanhouser Studio Ned Thanhouser, Thanhouser Films

Film history has forgotten the pioneering productions created by the Thanhouser studio that operated in New Rochelle, New York during the birth of cinema in America. From 1910 to 1917 the Thanhouser studio produced and released more than 1,000 films, of which some 220 have survived. Reconstructing the history of his grandfather’s studio and the stories behind key executives, actors, technicians, directors, and the films they made has been Ned Thanhouser’s focus for more than 25 years. He will share these stories, as well as the challenges posed by decades of changing video technology and the surprising results of making the films available for free online.

About the Speaker Ned Thanhouser (@nthanhou) is the grandson of silent film pioneers Gertrude and Edwin Thanhouser and is president of Thanhouser Company Film Preservation, Inc., a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation. Since 1986, he has been actively involved in the research, acquisition, preservation and publication of the history, surviving films, and related ephemera from the Thanhouser studio that operated in New Rochelle, NY from 1909 to 1918. He is a member of Association of Moving Image Archivists (AMIA) and the Society of Cinema and Media Studies (SCMS) and has presented and published research papers at the SCMS conferences (2005, 2013), the AMIA Journal The Moving Image (2011), the Women and the Silent Screen conference (2006), and the Domitor conference (2012). He is also co-founder and vice-president of the International Youth Silent Film Festival which organizes competitions for filmmakers age 20 and under to create modern versions of silent films.

Fieldwork for Human Computer Interaction: A 4-Part Workshop on Ethnographically-Informed Fieldwork

Sara Bly and Françoise Brun-Cottan

A growing number of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) researchers and practitioners use the results of fieldwork to guide the design and evaluate the user experience of interactive systems and technologies. Why? Because data about real people in real situations spurs creativity and innovation around practical challenges, resulting in more useful and usable artifacts.

Fieldwork for HCI typically consists of firsthand observations made in the naturally occurring environment of use (as opposed to studies performed in a controlled environment). Many techniques are adapted from anthropology – particularly ethnography.

As the mobile app and manufacturing industries grow in Oregon, UX designers are increasingly recruited from out-of-state. The Computer-Human Interaction Forum of Oregon - CHIFOO - recognizes a local need for more basic training in this area.

Workshop Format This practicum is a new offering by CHIFOO, separate from the popular monthly guest lecture series. Developed with industry experts Sara Bly and Françoise Brun-Cottan, this unique pilot program serves as a first test model for future educational programs by CHIFOO.

To conduct fieldwork well, the researcher needs the knowledge, ability and access to observe the activities and complexities of people within the context of their day-to-day pursuits. This makes it difficult to practice in a classroom-only or online environment. The methodology is best learned by apprenticeship and experience.

Each session builds on the prior one. Participants are expected to attend three private classroom sessions, to complete group assignments in between, and to ‘report out’ on the experience in teams at the last session, an open CHIFOO event. Sessions will be held:

• Sunday, October 5, 12-4 pm
• Wednesday, October 15 6-9 pm
• Wednesday, October 29, 6-9 pm
• Wednesday, November 12, 6-9 pm

Who Should Participate? The practicum is tailored especially towards locals who seek a better command and understanding of the skills utilized by User Experience Analysts, Design Engineers, and Interaction Designers.

To make the learning experience as rich, collaborative and personalized as possible, the # of participants is capped at 16. Group exercises are designed to be completed in teams of 2-4.

About the Instructors

Dr. Sara Bly – Head Instructor – Sara Bly has been an active researcher and practitioner in qualitative user studies for more than 25 years. Ethnographically-informed fieldwork is a major component of her user experience studies, which focus on understanding the context of an activity as well as the specific user task. During Sara’s tenure at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, she served on multi-disciplinary teams with anthropologists, designers, and computer scientists. Sara has worked in a variety of companies and development teams, and has experience teaching user study techniques for both industry and academia. She holds a PhD in Computer Science from University of California, Davis. Currently Sara Bly lives in Oregon and consults nationally.

Francoise Brun-Cottan, Phd – Instructor - Anthropologist Francoise Brun-Cottan spent over a decade as a Work Place Ethnographer and Interaction Analyst with Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center). Specialties include:

Integration of ethnographic insights with engineering research, product/services development and design to inform innovation. Ethnography - Observation and interviewing, analysis and representations of work practices and user experience. Video ethnography Conversation and Interaction Analysis Work Practice and Participatory Design Studies. Currently Francoise Brun-Cottan consults for libraries, government agencies, large corporations and research agencies.

Clodine Mallinckrodt – Facilitator – From Wall Street to MarCom Way, Clodine Mallinckrodt’s varied background spans the early days of interactive multimedia and distance learning to data security and strategy consulting. Currently, Clodine is Manager of Ambulatory Reporting & Analytics for Providence Health & Services, where she enjoys enabling analyst teams to deliver data visualization and exploration tools to healthcare executives throughout the west. She helped develop new Providence Consumer Segments, is a GE-certified Change Facilitator, and trained in Lean. Based in Portland, OR, Clodine Mallinckrodt is Program Co-Chair for CHIFOO.

Register Online Be an Early Bird! Get the best price by registering before August 20.

Art of Articulation with Lee Fain, Electrolux

Products, services and technology have a political gauntlet to conquer before they make their first appearance in the marketplace. Often the first line of defense in a corporate environment is the internal audience and invested key stakeholders.

Developing the solution is not enough. How you communicate the idea is just as important as the solution itself. Communicating your approach at the right time with the right mediums, and using the right level of fidelity to motivate the audience into action is an art. One needs to be an effective persuader. One needs to be a provocateur.

About the Speaker Lee Fain (@houseoffain) leverages the process of design provocation to develop compelling stories of technology while building deeper relationships within 3M’s culture of innovation. He currently leads design-centric initiatives for 3M’s Electronics & Energy Business Group based in Saint Paul, MN. His expertise is in contextualizing material science solutions through the tools of design and articulating big stories of innovation with high fidelity video productions.

Before this role, Lee was a strategic designer within 3M’s Consumer Business Group where he developed product design strategies for brands including Post-it and Scotch. His experience over the past 10 years ranged from website development for the US Air Force in Aviano, Italy to appliance design for General Electric to expanding intellectual property claims on emerging technologies. Most recently his design thinking was highlighted in a book titled: Solving Problems with Design Thinking: Ten Stories of What Works (Columbia University Press).

Lee Fain received a Master of Fine Arts in Industrial Design from the Savannah College of Art and Design and a Bachelor of Arts in Communications from Campbell University in North Carolina. He lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota enjoying its tropical climate with his wife and two children.

Fieldwork for Human Computer Interaction: A 4-Part Workshop on Ethnographically-Informed Fieldwork

A growing number of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) researchers and practitioners use the results of fieldwork to guide the design and evaluate the user experience of interactive systems and technologies. Why? Because data about real people in real situations spurs creativity and innovation around practical challenges, resulting in more useful and usable artifacts.

Fieldwork for HCI typically consists of firsthand observations made in the naturally occurring environment of use (as opposed to studies performed in a controlled environment). Many techniques are adapted from anthropology – particularly ethnography.

As the mobile app and manufacturing industries grow in Oregon, UX designers are increasingly recruited from out-of-state. The Computer-Human Interaction Forum of Oregon - CHIFOO - recognizes a local need for more basic training in this area.

Workshop Format This practicum is a new offering by CHIFOO, separate from the popular monthly guest lecture series. Developed with industry experts Sara Bly and Françoise Brun-Cottan, this unique pilot program serves as a first test model for future educational programs by CHIFOO.

To conduct fieldwork well, the researcher needs the knowledge, ability and access to observe the activities and complexities of people within the context of their day-to-day pursuits. This makes it difficult to practice in a classroom-only or online environment. The methodology is best learned by apprenticeship and experience.

Each session builds on the prior one. Participants are expected to attend three private classroom sessions, to complete group assignments in between, and to ‘report out’ on the experience in teams at the last session, an open CHIFOO event. Sessions will be held:

Sunday, October 5, 12-4 pm Wednesday, October 15 6-9 pm Wednesday, October 29, 6-9 pm Wednesday, November 12, 6-9 pm

Who Should Participate? The practicum is tailored especially towards locals who seek a better command and understanding of the skills utilized by User Experience Analysts, Design Engineers, and Interaction Designers.

To make the learning experience as rich, collaborative and personalized as possible, the # of participants is capped at 16. Group exercises are designed to be completed in teams of 2-4.

About the Instructors

Dr. Sara Bly – Head Instructor – Sara Bly has been an active researcher and practitioner in qualitative user studies for more than 25 years. Ethnographically-informed fieldwork is a major component of her user experience studies, which focus on understanding the context of an activity as well as the specific user task. During Sara’s tenure at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, she served on multi-disciplinary teams with anthropologists, designers, and computer scientists. Sara has worked in a variety of companies and development teams, and has experience teaching user study techniques for both industry and academia. She holds a PhD in Computer Science from University of California, Davis. Currently Sara Bly lives in Oregon and consults nationally.

Francoise Brun-Cottan, Phd – Instructor - Anthropologist Francoise Brun-Cottan spent over a decade as a Work Place Ethnographer and Interaction Analyst with Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center). Specialties include:

Integration of ethnographic insights with engineering research, product/services development and design to inform innovation. Ethnography - Observation and interviewing, analysis and representations of work practices and user experience. Video ethnography Conversation and Interaction Analysis Work Practice and Participatory Design Studies. Currently Francoise Brun-Cottan consults for libraries, government agencies, large corporations and research agencies.

Clodine Mallinckrodt – Facilitator – From Wall Street to MarCom Way, Clodine Mallinckrodt’s varied background spans the early days of interactive multimedia and distance learning to data security and strategy consulting. Currently, Clodine is Manager of Ambulatory Reporting & Analytics for Providence Health & Services, where she enjoys enabling analyst teams to deliver data visualization and exploration tools to healthcare executives throughout the west. She helped develop new Providence Consumer Segments, is a GE-certified Change Facilitator, and trained in Lean. Based in Portland, OR, Clodine Mallinckrodt is Program Co-Chair for CHIFOO.

Register Online Be an Early Bird! Get the best price by registering before August 20.

Fieldwork for Human Computer Interaction: A 4-Part Workshop on Ethnographically-Informed Fieldwork

Sara Bly and Françoise Brun-Cottan

A growing number of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) researchers and practitioners use the results of fieldwork to guide the design and evaluate the user experience of interactive systems and technologies. Why? Because data about real people in real situations spurs creativity and innovation around practical challenges, resulting in more useful and usable artifacts.

Fieldwork for HCI typically consists of firsthand observations made in the naturally occurring environment of use (as opposed to studies performed in a controlled environment). Many techniques are adapted from anthropology – particularly ethnography.

As the mobile app and manufacturing industries grow in Oregon, UX designers are increasingly recruited from out-of-state. The Computer-Human Interaction Forum of Oregon - CHIFOO - recognizes a local need for more basic training in this area.

Workshop Format This practicum is a new offering by CHIFOO, separate from the popular monthly guest lecture series. Developed with industry experts Sara Bly and Françoise Brun-Cottan, this unique pilot program serves as a first test model for future educational programs by CHIFOO.

To conduct fieldwork well, the researcher needs the knowledge, ability and access to observe the activities and complexities of people within the context of their day-to-day pursuits. This makes it difficult to practice in a classroom-only or online environment. The methodology is best learned by apprenticeship and experience.

Each session builds on the prior one. Participants are expected to attend three private classroom sessions, to complete group assignments in between, and to ‘report out’ on the experience in teams at the last session, an open CHIFOO event. Sessions will be held:

Sunday, October 5, 12-4 pm Wednesday, October 15 6-9 pm Wednesday, October 29, 6-9 pm Wednesday, November 12, 6-9 pm

Who Should Participate? The practicum is tailored especially towards locals who seek a better command and understanding of the skills utilized by User Experience Analysts, Design Engineers, and Interaction Designers.

To make the learning experience as rich, collaborative and personalized as possible, the # of participants is capped at 16. Group exercises are designed to be completed in teams of 2-4.

About the Instructors

Dr. Sara Bly – Head Instructor – Sara Bly has been an active researcher and practitioner in qualitative user studies for more than 25 years. Ethnographically-informed fieldwork is a major component of her user experience studies, which focus on understanding the context of an activity as well as the specific user task. During Sara’s tenure at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, she served on multi-disciplinary teams with anthropologists, designers, and computer scientists. Sara has worked in a variety of companies and development teams, and has experience teaching user study techniques for both industry and academia. She holds a PhD in Computer Science from University of California, Davis. Currently Sara Bly lives in Oregon and consults nationally.

Francoise Brun-Cottan, Phd – Instructor - Anthropologist Francoise Brun-Cottan spent over a decade as a Work Place Ethnographer and Interaction Analyst with Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center). Specialties include:

Integration of ethnographic insights with engineering research, product/services development and design to inform innovation. Ethnography - Observation and interviewing, analysis and representations of work practices and user experience. Video ethnography Conversation and Interaction Analysis Work Practice and Participatory Design Studies. Currently Francoise Brun-Cottan consults for libraries, government agencies, large corporations and research agencies.

Clodine Mallinckrodt – Facilitator – From Wall Street to MarCom Way, Clodine Mallinckrodt’s varied background spans the early days of interactive multimedia and distance learning to data security and strategy consulting. Currently, Clodine is Manager of Ambulatory Reporting & Analytics for Providence Health & Services, where she enjoys enabling analyst teams to deliver data visualization and exploration tools to healthcare executives throughout the west. She helped develop new Providence Consumer Segments, is a GE-certified Change Facilitator, and trained in Lean. Based in Portland, OR, Clodine Mallinckrodt is Program Co-Chair for CHIFOO.

Register Online Be an Early Bird! Get the best price by registering before August 20.

Big Story, Little Story with Jason Sack, Wieden+Kennedy

Working the last couple years in a building full of storytellers, Jason Sack has learned how powerful narrative can be in creating great products and experiences. Selling an idea, creating a sense of drama, and maintaining engagement in an experience all stand to benefit from a better understanding of storytelling. Because UX people are uniquely positioned to work across disciplines, we can act as stewards of our stories as well as those of our users. Using examples and anecdotes, Jason will walk through a variety of ways we can bring the larger story to life while reinforcing it down to the smallest interactions.

About the Speaker Jason Sack (@jasonsack) is currently Lead User Experience Designer at the global agency Wieden + Kennedy. He moved to Portland two years ago from the Bay area, where he led design teams at notable Silicon Valley companies such as Adobe and Apple. He has worked with Nike, American Express, 3M, Imation, General Mills, and many more.

Sack began his design career in Minneapolis, where he built the User Experience practice at digital agency space150. He studied at the University of Minnesota and California State University, and has taught interactive design at the Art Institutes International.

Jason is a passionate advocate of human-centered design, and has spoken throughout the country about emotional design, user experience, and innovation. When he’s not working Jason composes music, hacks wireless children’s toys, and writes an occasional post in his blog at jasonsack.com.

Fieldwork for Human Computer Interaction: A 4-Part Workshop on Ethnographically-Informed Fieldwork

Sara Bly and Françoise Brun-Cottan

A growing number of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) researchers and practitioners use the results of fieldwork to guide the design and evaluate the user experience of interactive systems and technologies. Why? Because data about real people in real situations spurs creativity and innovation around practical challenges, resulting in more useful and usable artifacts.

Fieldwork for HCI typically consists of firsthand observations made in the naturally occurring environment of use (as opposed to studies performed in a controlled environment). Many techniques are adapted from anthropology – particularly ethnography.

As the mobile app and manufacturing industries grow in Oregon, UX designers are increasingly recruited from out-of-state. The Computer-Human Interaction Forum of Oregon - CHIFOO - recognizes a local need for more basic training in this area.

Workshop Format This practicum is a new offering by CHIFOO, separate from the popular monthly guest lecture series. Developed with industry experts Sara Bly and Françoise Brun-Cottan, this unique pilot program serves as a first test model for future educational programs by CHIFOO.

To conduct fieldwork well, the researcher needs the knowledge, ability and access to observe the activities and complexities of people within the context of their day-to-day pursuits. This makes it difficult to practice in a classroom-only or online environment. The methodology is best learned by apprenticeship and experience.

Each session builds on the prior one. Participants are expected to attend three private classroom sessions, to complete group assignments in between, and to ‘report out’ on the experience in teams at the last session, an open CHIFOO event. Sessions will be held:

Sunday, October 5, 12-4 pm Wednesday, October 15 6-9 pm Wednesday, October 29, 6-9 pm Wednesday, November 12, 6-9 pm

Who Should Participate? The practicum is tailored especially towards locals who seek a better command and understanding of the skills utilized by User Experience Analysts, Design Engineers, and Interaction Designers.

To make the learning experience as rich, collaborative and personalized as possible, the # of participants is capped at 16. Group exercises are designed to be completed in teams of 2-4.

About the Instructors

Dr. Sara Bly – Head Instructor – Sara Bly has been an active researcher and practitioner in qualitative user studies for more than 25 years. Ethnographically-informed fieldwork is a major component of her user experience studies, which focus on understanding the context of an activity as well as the specific user task. During Sara’s tenure at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, she served on multi-disciplinary teams with anthropologists, designers, and computer scientists. Sara has worked in a variety of companies and development teams, and has experience teaching user study techniques for both industry and academia. She holds a PhD in Computer Science from University of California, Davis. Currently Sara Bly lives in Oregon and consults nationally.

Francoise Brun-Cottan, Phd – Instructor - Anthropologist Francoise Brun-Cottan spent over a decade as a Work Place Ethnographer and Interaction Analyst with Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center). Specialties include:

Integration of ethnographic insights with engineering research, product/services development and design to inform innovation. Ethnography - Observation and interviewing, analysis and representations of work practices and user experience. Video ethnography Conversation and Interaction Analysis Work Practice and Participatory Design Studies. Currently Francoise Brun-Cottan consults for libraries, government agencies, large corporations and research agencies.

Clodine Mallinckrodt – Facilitator – From Wall Street to MarCom Way, Clodine Mallinckrodt’s varied background spans the early days of interactive multimedia and distance learning to data security and strategy consulting. Currently, Clodine is Manager of Ambulatory Reporting & Analytics for Providence Health & Services, where she enjoys enabling analyst teams to deliver data visualization and exploration tools to healthcare executives throughout the west. She helped develop new Providence Consumer Segments, is a GE-certified Change Facilitator, and trained in Lean. Based in Portland, OR, Clodine Mallinckrodt is Program Co-Chair for CHIFOO.

Register Online Be an Early Bird! Get the best price by registering before August 20.