What Doodlers and <coders> can teach Business about

Experience Design

Who is this?

Candy (with a ‘WHY?’)

Bernhardt, known for questioning business about strategy and goals

currently Sr UX Architect@ Nokia

Candy as a <web> Designer…CAR RENTALS @ travelocity.com

Current Car Rental Detail Page on travelocity.com

Capacity icons

Vendor-specific

Photos & Upsell

Current Car Rental List Page on travelocity.com

Icons for Airport

Location & Hassle

See both counter prices &

rates

Basic car type illustrations & standard names

Concept and test UI that is equal or better than competition. Differentiate the UI so it may be service marked.

UX goal: Highlight better upsell offers, based on needs

Candy as a <web> Designer…CAR RENTALS @ travelocity.com

Current Car Rental Detail Page on travelocity.com

Vendor-specific

Photos & Upsell

Current Car Rental List Page on travelocity.com

Icons for Airport

Location & Hassle

See both counter prices &

rates

Concept and test UI that is equal or better than competition. Differentiate the UI so it may be service marked.

UX goal: Highlight better upsell offers, based on needs

Candy as an Information </Architect>…FLIGHTS @ travelocity.com

Current TotalFlights SM displayon travelocity.comCurrent Fare Note popup on travelocity.com

Ability to highlight unique contextual features with popup

details

Travel Time does vary by plane type, route and stops.

Seat price availability window

Concept and test UI that is equal or better than competition. Differentiate the UI so it may be service marked.

UX goal: Highlight differentiators beyond price commodity

Note: Information Designers are Doodlers, too!

Candy as an Information </Architect>…FLIGHTS @ travelocity.com

Current TotalFlights SM displayon travelocity.com

Current Fare Note popup on travelocity.com

Ability to highlight unique contextual

features with popup details

Travel Time does vary by plane type, route and

stops. Seat messag

e

Concept and test UI that is equal or better than competition. Differentiate the UI so it may be service marked.

UX goal: Highlight differentiators beyond price commodity

Candy as a Product Marketer…

Candy’s UX Goal: Let the Powerhouse Talent Do Their ThingAgree on the vision and basic direction. Prepare to review amazing prototypes created when you stay out of the way!

$teve Brewer “Coding Powerhouse & Technical Business Czar”

Travis Isaacs “Awesome Dude-ler”

radiotime.com/mobile

radiotime.com/partners/yahoo

radiotime.com/partners

Concerned with product categories, channels, advertising, partners, competitors, consumer

readiness…

LISTEN & RECORD WORLDWIDE AM/FM RADIO @ radiotime.com

Candy as a Product Marketer…

Candy’s UX Goal: Let the Powerhouse Talent Do Their ThingAgree on the vision and basic direction. Prepare to review amazing prototypes created when you stay out of the way!

$teve Brewer “Coding Powerhouse & Technical Business Czar”

Travis Isaacs “Awesome Dude-ler”

radiotime.com/mobile

radiotime.com/partners/yahoo

radiotime.com/partners

Concerned with product categories, channels, advertising, partners, competitors, consumer

readiness…

LISTEN & RECORD WORLDWIDE AM/FM RADIO @ radiotime.com

- What’s “Experience Design” really?- Common misunderstandings in Business and ‘UI’ people- How ‘Personality’ can help define solutions- Other helpful resources to bridge the gap

What this talk is about:

Why talk about it?Business may underestimate the differentiation from ‘wild’ Designer and Developer ideas because they have limited their own scope and competitiveness.

What’s Experience Design?

In commercial use, it means defining or creating positive and memorable

interactions – whether online or offline -- between people and a brand, product, or service.

Experience designers identify existing touchpoints, create new ones, and craft ways to produce a focused, desired outcome.

Adapted slightly from wikipedia

cre a tive ⋅ ⋅  –adjective 1.Having the quality or power of creating. 2.Resulting from originality of thought,

expression, etc.; imaginative: creative writing.

3.Originative; productive4.Using or creating exaggerated or skewed

data, information, etc.: creative bookkeeping.

How can Doodlers & Coders have the same mindset?

“At best, it’s a common awareness, a thread that ties

together people from different disciplines who care about good design, and who realize today’s increasingly complex design challenges require the synthesis of different varieties of design expertise.”

Louis Rosenfeld on the practice of Designing Experiences

- publisher at Rosenfeld Media and author of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web

12 Traits of a Great Interaction Designer

1. Explain, present and create interactions and ideas that are conceptual.2. Broadly shape how people use products and services, but get compulsive over the

little details that make them great.3. Work furiously and productively without ever touching a computer.4. Create sparks that can't be visualized in a static mock-up or screen.5. Have the ability to implement ideas, not just tell people how to do them.6. Understand computers and digital interactions, but spend just as much time

uncovering other interesting things in life.7. ‘Do' more than 'observe’, and even more than 'say'.8. Care more about how people feel using a product or service than the 'right' way to use

them.9. Are light blue collar- craftsman and salesman merged into one.10. Speak geek (work with engineers), tell stories (gab about marketing) and help

businesses make money (sit in the big-kids meetings). 11. Love challenges, thrive in unknowns and win teams over with results.12. Get excited about the smell of new sharpies (or new product and service challenges).

Bryan Zmijewski - zurb.com blog

- What’s “Experience Design” really?- Common misunderstandings in Business and ‘UI’ people

-See the Business Perspective-See the Creative Perspective-A Typical Conversation-Some Advice-Getting Common Ground

- How ‘Personality’ can help define solutions- Other helpful resources to bridge the gap

What this talk is about:

Meet the Business MindsetPossible Roles• Owner• Product….• …Marketing …

What they look like• Dressed Sharply• May be in a lot of

meetings• Typically worried

Terms used• Fixed/ Variable costs• Opportunity cost• Maintenance fees• Competition• Speed to market• Deals & Contracts

Measures• ROI : Return on

Investment• Proven Performance

Business Challenges

• Feeling useful and smart in creating solutions• Staying in budget• Meeting projected targets• Getting an edge on competitors• Find it difficult to measure and blindly trust

what is heard from Tech & Design• They have other people to convince, too!

HARSH </truth>

Experience Design can make or break the relevancy of your

Marketing. Consumer opinion (trust) depends on your business being transparent, coherent, and

genuine.

Meet the Creative MindsetPossible Roles• Artist• Designer• Developer• Engineer• …UX…What they look like• Jeans• Clever shirt designs• Unique sneakers

Their terms• Users• Scenarios and Tasks • ‘best practice’• Design & Flow

Their measures• Code standards• Accessibility• User testing• Coolness• Aesthetics

Creative Challenges

• Getting credibility with Business• Flexibility and budget to do a job really well• The unfulfilled promise of ‘Phase 2’

Harsh </Truths>

There’s no Holy Grail of Experience Design without some level of relationship building or Business understanding.– Change takes time in most organizations and people– You must have a business advocate to get it done at all– Even startups can get in their own way and shelve great ideas– You may be wrong! Get whatever user feedback you can to

make sure your hypothesis can be proven or disproven.

A familiar scenario….

We’re really excited to work on this project!

Okay, well let’s start a list of features and go from there

I just want it like… copy.com

When UI Questions & Presents Ideas…What Biz people hear:– “What are you trying to achieve?” when they feel they have been clear– “Check out this cool, new…” which probably costs more– “There are several ways we can address that…” meaning there is flexibility– Buzz terms like convergence, web services, software as a service, cloud

computing, and various technical acronyms. Sounds smart, but no context.

What Business should keep in mind:– Be specific about your budget and desired outcome– The features you have imagined may not be the best way to address

your real goals– Don’t be afraid to collaborate on a vision and inspire with a few

examples and walk away– Expect to get questions about your goals, likes, dislikes and why.– Talented creatives will not support blindly copying another site’s

features. You get what you pay for.

General Advice for Business

• Stay a bit open-minded. Design thinking is different from Finance and Marketing.

• Ask broader questions to walk through the creative mindset’s thinking process. It may lead to a surprise innovation.

• A creative genius is bound to be passionate and argumentative from time-to-time. It actually means they are good at what they do.

• Allow the flexibility to test new ideas that go against your own to ensure you are on track.

When Business Speaks…What Creatives hear:– “There’s no time or budget for that”– “That’s a ‘Nice-to-have’ or enhancement-- not

business critical”– “Do it like…[some other company]”

What Creatives should keep in mind:– Business usually doesn’t understand what is ‘easy’, ‘hard’, or ‘new’ for

you to build, but do care about $MONEY$– They assume that NEW or different means more money and more risk– Business thinks they will ‘know it when they see it’, even though they

may not (because they are usually not the target consumer). Gently help them understand that by teaching through examples

– Feedback is not a personal attack or lack of respect, but an opportunity to gather requirements which you can use to educate them later.

When Business Speaks…

What to do:– Expect to research links and/or prototypes to demonstrate live action– Try to keep some excitement contained. It can scare them off.– Create visuals that compare features side-by-side or before & after– Explain your supportive reasoning as best you can without being

argumentative or showing much agitation– Beware of blank smiling and nodding, you could be using jargon they

don’t understand– Write down exact quotes from business to deconstruct and address

again later

What to say :– Use general terms of high, low, and medium for level of effort and

impact (usually different things) to help manage scope.– Reframe requirements (yours and theirs) in terms of how they

support project goals. Validity of how to do it can be tested later.– Make up your own vision statement as you gather their goals.

General Advice for Creatives• Stay a bit (respectfully) stubborn, but don’t address

your difference in belief the same way every time. If you are right, there is bound to be more than one way to prove it or point it out.

• Really listen, and make sure you understand the business issues behind the objective.

• Find ways to illustrate why an approach may be better

• Pick your battles and make them small. Winning a series of small battles can make all the difference in building credibility.

- What’s “Experience Design” really?- Common misunderstandings in Business and ‘UI’ people

-See the Business Perspective-See the Creative Perspective-A Typical Conversation-Some Advice-Getting Common Ground

- How ‘Personality’ can help define solutions- Other helpful resources to bridge the gap

What this talk is about:

DECODE: Some Basic Translation…

• Make it available to everyone= easy, <Accessible>, <CrossBrowser> maybe social … and I don’t really know who our target users are.

• Make it Pretty = Attractive to target users and justify the personality by helping me figure out who that is!

• Make it like… = I can’t verbalize my real goals or measures of success, so help me figure it out!

Get a Common Understanding

• What kind of site are you building?(The obvious questions… for whom? What’s the purpose? What’s your budget?)

• But HOW and to what level will the site communicate? What’s the personality? (Often overlooked and critical to a relationship with consumers)

Identify an Intended Level of Use

- What’s “Experience Design” really?- Common misunderstandings in Business and ‘UI’ people-How ‘Personality’ can help define solutions

-What’s personality have to do with business?-If you are going to be ‘like’ someone…-Take a trip to the real world!

- Other helpful resources to bridge the gap

What this talk is about:

‘… most typical and deeply characteristic … [behavior]… about an individual that is distinctive and [which] sets apart from other[s]’

‘The reaction of other individuals to a person is what defines … personality’

Adapted from Theories of Personality (Wiley & Sons, 1970)

Result for jamin.org blog

http://jamin.org/archives/2008/analyze-the-personality-of-your-blog/

Known techniques• Personas to represent users• Scenarios to represent tasks to accomplish• Features to prioritize what to build

Interesting conversation-starters• Personas that represent business stakeholders• Persona to represent the site personality

But what makes up personality!?

• What are your service ‘values’?• How do you maintain service ‘authenticity’ in a way

it remains useful and relevant?• What is your company’s background or history?• What attitude does your service convey?• What age group and persuasion style best

communicates your message?

Sites as High School Personalities?

37

Smart Kid/Nerd – Know-it-All, “definitely smarter than me about what I should do”, A whiz, Go-to person for a specific answer

Features:• Think “Amazon” or “Google”• Requires logic, but makes it look easy

Note: Not easy or cheap to achieve!

Sites as High School Personalities?

Class Favorite – Sociable, open, conversational, smart, but accepting and authentic, inclusive

People tend to look forward to communication and typically are in awe but in a comfortable way .

Possible site features:• RSS• OpenID, Facebook Connect• Forums and comments• blogs

Other High School Personalities?– Average Joe – Know a lot of people, but not extremely well. Blends

in with the crowd

– ‘What’s their name’? – Emo or Goth. A Drab crowd blender . Really doesn’t want to stand out, but does stand out in a bad way.

– Class clowns – whether Cheeky or Campy, good for entertainment, like YouTube

– Bullies – porn pop-ups

– Fake people – Ads that pretend to be real sites

– Drop outs – Had a lot of potential, but left the game :: Pownce

- What’s “Experience Design” really?- Common misunderstandings in Business and ‘UI’ people-How ‘Personality’ can help define solutions

-What’s personality have to do with business?-If you are going to be ‘like’ someone…-Take a trip to the real world!

- Other helpful resources to bridge the gap

What this talk is about:

Rethink ‘Best’ Practices as Common

What is common is not differentiation. Take the time to get to know the business context and represent it authentically – not just technically or from the current business position.

As an example… DONUT storefronts

The Krispy Difference

A real world example of attention to detail and authenticity… Where a doughnut becomes craftsmanship.

Bring out what’s unique

Appeal to special audiences

- What’s “Experience Design” really?- Common misunderstandings in Business and ‘UI’ people- How ‘Personality’ can help define solutions- Other helpful resources to bridge the gap

What this talk is about:

Books I’m reading

Fascinating techniques for compromise and negotiation across cultural gaps.

Great book for anyone wanting to build support for selling ideas

Conferences & Associations

I’m the 2009 Local IxDA Coordinator. Look for a website soon-ish!

March in Austin, TX!

1 day local event in Dallas, TX

Sat, May 30th more details to come!

Thanks

twitter / flickr / slideshare / facebook : digitalcandy

That’s All Folks!