July 2007

Chapter Business

  • In October we will have a series of 10 minute talks for our meeting. Chauncey is expected to be the official timekeeper. Anyone interested in presenting a 10 minute talk should email Jen Hocko.
  • November is World Usability Day. We will be announcing brainstorming sessions around the topics of health care and/or accessibility.
  • We still have some material from mini-UPA if anyone is interested.
  • The UPA Boston web site is posting articles, book reviews, etc. Anyone who wants to contribute should contact Jen Hocko.

Several tours of the Oracle lab were given throughout the evening.

Presentation

Kazuyo Masuda, of Brookside Consulting, has been doing ethnography for 10 years. The word "ethnography" is changing; 5 years ago no one had heard of it, but now it's something that people are starting to understand. This talk was about what it is and how to do it in a different way.

Ethnography is an approach to understanding how people do things and what their values are. It is based in anthropology and sociology. You would watch people to see how they live their lives for long periods of tiime. Now it's more of a methodology about how people live from the business world perspective.

There are two approaches:

  • Deductive is hypothesis-driven and works toward truth. (Looking top down.)
  • Inductive is when we don't know what we want when we search. (Looking bottom up.)

For example, Kazuyo recently looked at culture and how culture impacts habits like shaving. In Japan, the cultural context impacts how people behave. In Japan it's more customary for people to take baths so this changes people's shaving and grooming habits.

Behavior is based on past, present and future. Ethnography helps us understand this context.

Techniques:

  • Observation
  • Interview - formal and informal
  • Participant observation (doing it with them) - trying someone else's shoes, let participant's drive interactions

When participants are videotaped, this allows clients to hear the voice of the customer instead of the ethnographer.

Q: Do people get defensive about questions and studies?
A: We try to avoid asking questions and getting deep into why until later, we start with "how do you do it?", without judgment. People tend to like to talk about themselves.

Number of samples - We're not looking for statistical significance; the goal is not meant to be statistical testing. A typical group is 9-20 people per study. The study is for depth not for statistical significance. Kazuyo will study a range of people and types of people as well as a few outliers. It's similar to recruiting participants for usability.

Q: How do you recruit?
A: Recruiting companies, the Internet, referrals from past studies.

What is it good for?

  • Daily life of a specific group / product usage
  • Understanding unmet needs from observation (you can't say what is unmet, you have to see it)
  • Modifying existing products/services

Approach of understanding is part of the whole process of other techniques.
Field research, IDIs (in-depth interviews), dyad interview (two people at a time), focus groups and prototypes.

Case study:

  • Cell phone application study to see how people use applications on the cell phone.
  • Used a hybrid approach, ethnographic approach to see how the device is used.
  • Received feedback on early stage of application as people interacted with them.
  • Used a series of one-on-one and dyad interviews with phones loaded with new applications.
  • Client was able to make immediate changes to navigation, visual elements and content.
  • The study brought imaginary customers to life. This made personas real.
  • Unexpected learning occurred
  • The study showed that the application offered emotional benefits, empowerment, control, self-expression, self-definition, network and social opportunities.
  • The client found that ethnographic studies have a good shelf life and can be used further in product development.

Kazuyo usually works with a videographer.

Q: In usability we try to separate the testing from the user. Doesn't ethnography change the study since you impact the user?
A: Yes...us being there does impact the study but since the studies are longer people tend to be more real after a while. Users may not be 100% natural but it's the job of the ethnographer to try to identify these cases and take away the core findings.

Q: What is the business justification?
A: Try to justify larger concepts and how the business fits in with people's lives. Ethnography tries to help you find exploratory and long term research. By understanding how people live it's a longer term study that can help you figure out how your product fits in the longer context. Provides exploratory research that is long term business value.