UX Research — A conversation with focus
We all know that being able to conduct good Qualitative user research sessions is vital to successful UX and Product Design. However, I’m noticing that many juniors and graduates (along with more experienced people in roles such as development or engineering) struggle to know how to get started with it.
People entering the industry from HCI or other design courses seem to have been taught about its importance, but their portfolios are way more focused on the execution aspect of design rather than identifying the problem or user needs. This is great, they come out as far sharper interaction or visual designers than I could ever hope to be, but they still seem to be missing that initial step in how to conduct the right type of research sessions in order to make that awesome shiny thing.
For more experienced folks in related but different fields, being asked to talk to customers can be a serious leap out of the comfort zone. It’s not for everyone and we all have our domains in which we’re more comfortable.
However, if you’re one of those people that your perspectives are invaluable as understanding deeper technical and feasibility issues that a UXer might have missed or misunderstood can really help shape the future of the product in positive and impactful (most importantly actually achievable) ways.
But where do you start when thrown in the deep end, or if you’re new to the field, or perhaps an introvert? After all, RESEARCH sounds technical (it is), it sounds like it needs a special skill set (it does), it just sounds HARD (it is).
HOWEVER, with practice, those skills will come, but to develop those skills, you need to start, and the first and most important thing to remember is:
Research is simply conversation with another human being, with some added focus, to achieve a goal.
And below are some ideas about how you can get yourself in the right mindset to make this focused conversation run smoother.
It’s nothing to be scared of!
At its core, Qualitative research is simply an opportunity to talk to someone about what they do. People like talking about what they do, their problems and achievements. It’s natural human behaviour to talk about ourselves, and it’s just our job to channel that natural behaviour in a fashion that helps us learn what we need to to help them.
I believe one concern is a pressure (especially when starting out) that there’s a requirement to understand everything in advance or be a domain expert in order to extract useful info… nothing could be further from the truth, you don’t need to go in knowing the answers, that’s the point of doing the research!
Of course any advance knowledge of the area or industry is useful to help connect the dots, but even then, and in the short time you might be involved in a particular research project you’ll never know as much about the subject as your participant, so don’t feel pressure to get it 100% ‘right’ any new learning is valuable.
Your first, and most important job, however, is to get that other human being to open up to you. To do that, you need to leverage your soft skills to build rapport, show empathy, and get them onside. Without this engagement with your participant, the research call won’t flow as smoothly as it could, it might be a stilted question and answer back and forth, or filled with awkward pauses (on your side to be clear)…while this might supply some answers to what you’re looking for, it will never be as valuable as a true, and natural (as can be) conversation.
It’s a conversation between human beings.
You talk to people all the time — at work, at home, conducting an interview, buying a coffee. Perhaps you’re a bit nervous due to the nature of the job titles of the people you’re going to be conducting research, but once you boil it down, these aren’t conversations with Software Engineers, Data Architects, or IT directors, they’re all conversations with human beings, and luckily, you’re a human being, right? MOST people aren’t defined by their job; they have lives, families and outside interests, so taking an interest in them early helps break the ice, get them on and helps the conversation flow.
Ask them how they are, and relate to them as people early. They mention they’ve had a busy commute? So have you, they live in a cool city you’ve visited? Mention it. It sounds simple but small touches like this go a long way to putting both them and you at ease early and makes the rest of the session loads easier. It’s also fine to tell a couple of little white lies to build this rapport, they might be in New York and you had a terrible experience there, but pretending just for a seconds you loved it won’t hurt anyone.
Also, and this might just be me, but I believe humour, even in a professional setting goes a long way to put people at ease, don’t be afraid to make (appropriate) jokes, or throw in a bit of self deprecation to make them understand you’re a person, and this is all about two people connecting.
Have you spoken to them before? Mention the last session, reflect on the notes you made last time and ask how things are going since you last spoke about xyz. This will show them that you do care about their situation and you did listen and remember previous interactions. Again this helps build empathy, respect and connections, meaning that they’ll open to you more in this session and you might find out things you wouldn’t have otherwise.
The best way to avoid this is to remember the Golden Rule of Qualitative Research, say after me three times…
THE CALL PLAN IS NOT A SCRIPT.
THE CALL PLAN IS NOT A SCRIPT.
THE CALL PLAN IS NOT A SCRIPT.
This is the first, and biggest mistake people who are new to research make. They rely too heavily on the call plan they’ve created to guide the research session on rails and it invariably causes problems. Of course, it’s useful to have noted down the questions you want to ask, but relying on it as an absolute approach to talking to someone else is destined for failure.
You’ll focus on reading it word for word, and if you stumble that will knock you completely off stride. If the participant says something you hadn’t accounted for, you’ll have nowhere to go to explore in more depth, potentially missing valuable insights. It restricts your options to connect ideas and gain insights from multiple threads of what people are saying, and you’ll run a huge risk of sounding bored.
If you sound bored then the participant will become bored, their responses will start to dry up and the session will rapidly go downhill.
Sometimes it’s better to create a ‘Topic Guide’ of the key themes you wish to discuss, rather the granularity of individual questions. As long as you have the topics there as a guideline and know the key questions you need answers to, you have a lot more flexibility and the conversation will be far more natural as a result.
It’s important to give yourself permission to follow the threads in what a participant is saying, even if that wasn’t in the original scope of what your research project wasn’t about. Following the threads can lead to some of the most valuable insight gems, as that’s often where the participant is talking about the things that really matter to them, not simply responding to the questions you and your team thought were important.
I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard beginner researchers say “Oh that’s very interesting” in response to an answer, and then….simply move onto to the next question on their ‘script’.
If indeed it IS really interesting, then follow that thread to see where it leads! If in fact it ISN’T interesting, and you’re just saying it to be polite, then use a different phrase. Telling a participant that what they’ve just told you is really interesting, and then moving on regardless, is far worse than not saying it at all. What you’re projecting in that instance is:
“Oh that’s really interesting to you, but not as important as the next question I’ve got written down here…”
How would you feel in that situation? How much effort would you put into answering the rest of the questions?
But, a structure is important.
Whilst following threads will unlock insights you never knew were there for the taking obviously you entered into the research session with clear objectives about what you were trying to learn. Therefore, some control and structure is important. I like to visualise/plan a research call like this:
As you see I’ve used a lot of triangles, this is because I take the approach of starting wide in any topic before drilling down to the details. If you start too narrow you’ll learn a lot about very specific things, but once down in the weeds it’s difficult to relate that back upwards to what that means to them more widely.
Intro
I open up with an intro (obviously), asking how they are, reminding them of the purpose, of the call, building rapport etc as I mentioned further up in this article. I also find it really useful to remind them they’re the expert, people like to share their knowledge, so framing them as an expert early primes them that I want to learn from them.
Context
I then also ask whats going on in their world, trying to understand how their working life fits together, where they’re both succeeding and struggling and where there’s workarounds, problems, or pains that either my current project or potential future projects can fill the gaps. I ask questions and their organisation, their team structure, their workload etc. As designers our software, apps or projects fit into a much wider ecosystem that stretches way beyond the screen or the individual workflows we’re building, whilst it could be our sole focus, it’s simply just a tiny jigsaw piece in the rest of their working lives and it’s essential to understand where that jigsaw piece fits into the larger puzzle to ensure you’re always working to improve them as a professional, or their business, rather than just an element of a particular task they have to do.
Core research topics
From there I delve down into the main reasons and questions we’re holding the research session to find out. I try not to include any more than 3 different aspects or themes (around the main objective) to research to ensure there’s enough time to delve deep into each one, whilst allowing to time to follow threads and diversions in they crop up.
Again start wide and narrow down to specifics as you go.
Anything else…
After we’ve covered the context and specific topics we’re interested in, I always allow time to go wider again by asking the participant what's important to them that we haven’t covered. Again this allows opportunity for them to express the things that are on their mind, and again may provide insights and opportunities for you that you had never expected going in, it also shows that this is a partnership and you’re not simply tried to harvest the answers you want out of it.
If they don’t have any burning issues, it’s a further chance to go deeper on either the context or your research topics if there’s anything left to discuss or talk about any other ideas you have that aren’t directly related to this research cycle.
All of this is a lot to keep track of, so another practice I can highly recommend is to…
Make handwritten notes
I don’t think it will come as any surprise than I’m a fan of handwritten (or drawn) notes… If you’ve read any of my other articles or follow me on social you’ll know I love sketchnotes, I also find just scribbling handwritten notes during research sessions really helps the information sink in, enables me to make connections between different things the participant says and find the insights between the answers.
I’m very lucky in my workplace that design is very much a team sport, my whole product team gets involved and listens in on the research calls. Not only does this mean we’re all on the same wavelength when making decisions, all contributing our perspectives and experiences to what we’ve heard from the participants, it also means that we back each other up during the research sessions and as a result we have a designated note-taker. This means that because I’m confident that someone else is already capturing the verbatim notes for analysis later, this frees me up to focus on the conversation, listening and making notes about these different threads.
Always have a scrap of paper next to you to be making your own notes for this purpose, I quite often draw it out like a mindmap, to capture the different themes the participant is mentioning and then using elements such as arrows , dividers and containers to group & connect them together. This helps with follow up questions and diving deeper into different elements, resulting in a better conversation and research session.
There are lots of articles out there on the benefits of making analogue notes (in particular Sketchnotes) to retain information better and a research call is a perfect opportunity to start your sketchnotes habit.
Lastly…
Remember you’re in control
Another key blocker or nerve-causer could be the feeling that letting the participant lead the convo means you’ll lose control and won’t get the findings you need. In all research calls the participant should always be talking more than you, you’re there to find out from them, not the other way around of course, but, don’t be afraid to refocus the conversation toward your objective when needed, that is the purpose of the session, and your time is as valuable as theirs. If they go too far down a rabbit hole, always feel comfortable in saying “Thanks — we’ll note that down for later”, if you’ve structured your call plan well enough you’ll always have time in the section at the end to return to.
Another aspect comes back to being worried about having to have all the answers, if they ask you a question you can’t answer, reflect back to them as “What does that mean to you?” this will mean they have to rethink and rephrase and this is often a good way of gaining better understanding of their understanding which you can follow up on with more questions of your own.
If you get 15–20 mins in and it’s obvious the person isn’t engaged, is giving simple one-word responses, or is distracted and working on something else, for example, end the call! You’re there to learn, and that’s the unspoken contract of a research session, if you’re not learning, or progressing toward learning you’re wasting your time, and your time is as valid and important as anyone else's, thank them for their time so far, tell them it’s been really useful and your appreciate their input and end it so you can spend your time in a more worthwhile fashion.
Don’t let this dishearten you though, in your career as a researcher you’ve going to be holding thousands of sessions and speaking to thousands of people, the law of averages dictates that some of those sessions and some of these people will just be of no use to you. Put that behind you and dial the next person with the same amount of excitement and enthusiasm you had at the start of the first call, a new person to connect with and new things to learn await!
Conclusion
I hope some of what I’ve covered here helps you embark on taking part in UX or Product Research, particularly if you have any nerves about jumping in. Whilst it’s not a perfect science, like everything, skills will come with time. People are messy, and research is hard, but the very first step you need to take is to talk too, connect with, and understand other human beings. It’s the most valuable and important learning tool we have in both our personal and professional lives.
I’d love to hear any of your top tips about conducting successful research sessions, please get in touch with any you may have.
You can find more of my writing here on medium, or connect with me on Twitter.
