I’m currently ‘recovering’ from an intense project – interviewing corrections clients for a week.
…A project during which a relative I was staying with questioned whether I was cut out for my job…
Category Archives: Empathy
83 seconds, 14 actors and one question.
Given the choice, I’ll use video to share customer stories with my clients.
…so when I refreshed my bowmast.com home page last week, I made a short video to put the customer’s voice to the front, asking implicitly…
How well do you know your customer?
Design thinking – One size doesn’t fit all
“It’s not about going from left to right and some magic happens on the other side, it’s about understanding the intention”.
…Said Director of Design Innovation at Intuit, a stop on the Bettter by Design Study Tour I was part of in 2012.
During our visit, Intuit shared how design thinking changed the culture, and profit of the company (eventually).
Their story: How they tried and failed to install ‘design as a process’ into their teams, arriving at a more engaging and successful model of ‘principles’.
A couple of key points I took away:
Design thinking – to the rescue?
With a history of incremental usability improvements but no real innovation, Intuit took a big swig from the design thinking cup. Their aim was to integrate design thinking into the business, to be more user-focused – exceeding customer expectations, rather than just meeting them.
Things didn’t go as planned…
“We made a mistake in that we started with design thinking as a process, when we brought a process back to Intuit, they puked all over it. Because in a culture where; product development has an agile process, marketing have a go-to-market process and legal have a compliance process, they couldn’t reconcile the design thinking process on top of theirs, so they did nothing”.
So, the conventional design thinking process wasn’t flexible enough for the realities of their culture and practice, and it simply wasn’t engaging teams.
Principles, not process.
To replace the rigid ‘process’ approach, Intuit arrived at three principles to underline all development work- teams could use whatever methods they liked, so long as they adhered to those principles.
So, how did that go?
“A seminal moment in our journey was when we took the process of design thinking and made it into principles. It’s not about going from left to right and some magic happens on the other side, it’s about understanding the intention behind these principles, then you can make it your own”.
“We have watched teams come up with their own methods and tools at any time in the process and it totally works. Thats when we saw uptake in the culture, when we started to see behaviours change, when we gave them permission to make it their own”.
Here are their principles:
- Deep Customer Empathy (Know your customers better than they know themselves)
- Go Broad to go Narrow (Quantity of solutions, then focus)
- Rapid Experimentation with Customers (Prototype, test, iterate)
Sounds like a win to me, especially if this has taken hold in an organisation of thousands.
So, how do Intuit involve customers in their design process?
To deliver on their first principle, (apart from their dedicated UX team) Intuit has committed to getting their teams out of the office and into the context of their customers using their products. Unsurprisingly, this has proven to build empathy for the customer, and as a positive bi-product, engagement with the ongoing design process.
Two big wins.
“We went from listening and fixing problems, to watching to find what they really need but can’t tell us.
This changed the way the organisation makes decisions by watching people’s behaviours versus listening to what they say”.
If you’re wanting to institutionalise design thinking, there’s a video on the Adaptive Path website which tells this story from another Intuit insider’s viewpoint http://youtu.be/HrxD_BaZlcU
Design Thinking – The road-trip of a lifetime.
A couple of years ago I visited the Eames’ ‘case study house’ and thought I had entered design nirvana.
…Well, it did have a great swing:
Next week I’m heading back to California, this time on a journey into the home of ‘design thinking’
Check out the highlights of the schedule…
I’m heading there with 25 CEOs of Kiwi export companies in the Government-backed Better By Design programme.
Along with a dozen others, I’m playing the role of ‘design integration coach’, helping promising NZ companies to integrate design into their business.
The principles behind the programme borrow a lot from the ‘design thinking’ school of thought popularised by IDEO, and more recently Stanford D.School. Both of which we’ll be visiting.
I’ve always been dubious of ‘design with a capital D’…
In fact, I tweeted not long ago:
“Is design thinking to design what cookbooks are to celebrity chefs?”
I’d love design thinking to be more than just a tarted-up version of taking a user-centred approach to design, beginning with end user insights.
This trip will either fully convert me, or leave me wondering whether it’s another wardrobe for the emperor.
I’ll let you know how it goes…
Life or death usability
Over the last couple of years I’ve been lucky enough to be involved in the R&D programme for a ground-breaking medical device to help diabetics manage their insulin treatment.
Part of the project was to reach a regulatory milestone, which has now been achieved.
To reach this milestone we tested the usability of the device to prove it was intuitive and the design prevented people from giving themselves a mis-dose or even fatal dose of insulin.
It was amazing to work in this ‘high-stakes’ context with so many facets to the user experience:
- an ‘out of box’ experience with crucial set-up to match the device to the user’s insulin sensitivity
- a physical product which is injected with insulin and attached to the body
- a touch screen device presents a learning curve for diabetics in their 70’s
- online monitoring and visualisation of blood glucose levels – data presented in new ways
- …and the big one… people’s health and lifestyle literally in their hands and plugged into their bellies.
Aside from having my eyes opened to the world of diabetes and being humbled by the courage of the people I met during the research, …it’s been so satisfying to see design research deliver such a tangible impact.
I worked in conjunction with London User Research Centre and with Design Science in Philadelphia.
Motivations. Delivered fresh to your door
I’m in London this month and just received a boxful of fresh produce from Abel&Cole.
Two things become very clear upon opening the veggie box;
They know who their customers are,
…and that each customer has a different set of motivations to use the service.
A great example of this is in the friendly Spring magazine inside the box.
From a quick flick through, I’ve split out the content and some potential motivations Abel&Cole might be targeting in their customers.
- Spring issue. To know I’m eating what’s in season
- Recipes. To feel inspired
- Large close up photos. To feel close to the goodness
- Place of origin. To know where the food comes from
- Names of growers. To feel a connection to the source
- Foodie person profile. To feel I’m in good company
- Tone of voice. To know I’m dealing with down to earth people
- Food facts. To feel informed about what I eat
- Animal welfare article. To know that Abel and Cole cares
- Green credentials. To know I’m having lower impact on the planet
- Eco focussed articles. To feel part of a movement for good
- Fitness related article. To know I’m eating what’s right
- Recipes on a budget. To feel like I’m getting value
- Photos of the staff. To know who I’m dealing with
Only some of these are relevant to me, but I do see a pattern of :
‘To know’ and ‘To feel’
At first glance… about half of these appeal to the customer knowing they’ve made a good choice, the rest speak to their emotional motivations.
Abel&Cole have clearly done their research and spent a lot of time to deeply understand their customers. It shows in the way they’ve appealed to their motivations, peppering emotional hooks and affirmations throughout the magazine.
I wonder though…
Does anyone actually read the magazine?
Does the usefulness of the content matter or is the message and motivational triggers behind it more important?
After thirty years in the vege business does this level of customer understanding come by default?
Perhaps Abel&Cole is a business which is by its ethical nature brimming with empathy for it’s customers?
How much of their intelligence and feedback comes through their social media channels?
To what extent do they use their delivery drivers to capture customer feedback?
Have I read too much into this?
As for the contents of the box …The veggies are all great, but as I discovered in a recent project,
It’s a lot more than just the fruit and veggies which can add goodness to the customer experience.
Swipe this way
You know you’ve overlooked basic design research when your customer can improve your product in a few seconds using a pen and some tape.
This is the case with these three payment terminals.
The design usually includes a discreet symbol to indicate which way the card should go through the slot, an interaction that occurs millions of times per day.
The symbol alone doesn’t get the message across, especially when customers have a queue of people behind them and don’t want to look like a goof.
To save time explaining, and customers feeling like idiots, these shopkeepers have removed all ambiguity with a simple message explaining how to insert your card.
It took observation of customer behaviour to improve this interaction, something the designer should have done, not the shopkeeper (who pays for the service).
Last week, for the first time, I saw this.
I like to think that a designer out there took notice of these shopkeeper hacks, then integrated them into the new design.
If your customers could hack the design of your product or service what would they change? and how will you respond?
Skype takes the hassle out of remote usability
Remote research brings cultural relevance to usability findings, providing the kinds of insights which can only be gained by being there…virtually at least.
I recently ran some remote website usability sessions for a Kiwi startup whose main customer is in the U.S.A. … sure, ‘isolation breeds innovation’ and all that, but when your customers are on the other side of the world, it’s vital that your product connects with them.
A fun project, but choosing which software to run during the sessions was a headache… There’s a boggling number of services to choose from (25 on this link) and there’s no clear winner.
After some experimenting, I went with Skype and it did the job nicely.
Here are some benefits over paid and more sophisticated software I’ve used previously:
- It’s easy to recruit participants who already use Skype
- Familiarity means no learning curve for you or participants
- No install means no wasting valuable session time setting-up
- Sending links and files is instant with built-in messaging
- It’s possible to make contact with participants prior to the session
- It’s free, so that’s hard to argue with
During the sessions, I was able to video chat with the participant for a while, then fire up Skype’s screen-sharing tool, so I could observe their movements on the website while hearing their thoughts and reactions etc.
Skype’s screen-sharing only works between two computers so if you have clients observing, this will have to be through an external monitor (Make sure they are sitting out of view of your webcam and preferably out of earshot).
The project generated rich insights and shaped the design process moving forward.
I’d definitely use Skype for this again, but would love to hear from anyone who’s used anything else with success.
I also had Adobe Connect recommended …anyone tried that?
Equal opportunities in User Centred Design?
IDEO, The worlds greatest proponent of User Centered Design have released a ‘toolkit’ to promote a human centred approach to social development projects.
It’s full of top tips… one of which seems worryingly chauvinistic…
If you can’t read the image, it kindly reminds us; “To ensure there is a balanced gender perspective involve female staff in all aspects of this process” … (eek!)
I’m sure IDEO had the best intentions, but with half of the world’s humans being female, do we really need to be told to include women in a Human Centred Design process ?
The oldest trick in the customer experience book
Every Tuesday NZ business strategist Lance Wiggs issues ‘Three ways to improve your business’, Last week at number two is ‘Meet your customers’.
This simple advice represents the grass roots of a customer-centric approach to building a great experience for your customers, and competitive advantage for your business.
So, if this approach is simple yet crucial to design and business, why do we have to be reminded?
In the world of retail, gaining customer insight is; there for the taking, known best practice and as old as shops themselves.
In traditional retail, understanding customer behaviour is a matter of key staff keeping eyes and ears open. At base level, switched-on store managers can track and respond to demand and popularity of products simply by watching them fly off the shelf (or not). Front of house employees with their ears ‘on’ can gauge reaction to new product lines and track customer requests to inform potential new products or services.
Online, without face to face contact with your customer, you’re blinded to these insights and opportunities.
…of course web analytics can paint some of the picture, and tracking keywords in your site search can take you closer to the mind-set of your customer…
…but ultimately these aren’t stats or keywords, they are people and it’s about meeting them, understanding the attitudes that drive behaviours in and around the context of your product or service, and their wider goals relating to what you offer.
This means qualitative research at an individual level. By building empathy with your customers, you can gain valuable insights into their motivations, monitor changing attitudes and expectations to inform vital changes to your proposition. …just like shopkeepers have been doing for thousands of years.
Lance’s timing is good however, as too many online businesses have failed to keep eyes and ears on their customers. It’s an old and proven approach, and it ain’t going anywhere soon.