Human-centred approaches

Linknote — 20 January 2020 — 16 words

Moves to modern research: A new maturity model for user-centric organisations — Michael Winnick and Mac Hasley — dscout

A useful guide for those of us trying to push user research forward in our organisations.

Linknote — 14 January 2020 — 56 words

Accessibility — Business — Human-centred approaches

Accessible polling cards: Keeping it low-tech — Lizzie Cass-Maran — Website and Communications Blog

How do you make participation in workshops and training sessions as accessible as possible? My colleague Lizzie Cass-Maran has created these low-tech voting cards (using letters, colours and shapes to include as many people as possible) that are easy to make yourself — and a lot less fiddly than some of the technology solutions out there.

Linknote — 11 January 2020 — 34 words

Human-centred approaches — Web

Dark mode favicons — Chris Coyier — CSS-Tricks

This is pretty cool. Google Chrome will begin supporting SVG favicons. And because you can embed CSS within SVG, you can use media queries to create dark mode favicons. Smart!

Via Stéphanie Walter

Article — 23 December 2019 — 1,503 words

Pedestrian ways

Accessibility — Architecture — Human-centred approaches — Society

Town planners in the mid-20th century faced a big problem. The advent of the motor car brought increased congestion and safety risks. Planners wrongly thought that separating pedestrians and vehicles on different levels was the solution. If you know where to look, you can still see remnants of this thinking.

Linknote — 19 December 2019 — 101 words

Business — Content design — Human-centred approaches — Technology

The complex task of simplicity — Paul Taylor

Sainsbury's Basics food packaging - washing powder, flower, canned tomatoes

It is human nature to add things, making them more complex. This feels like you’re doing something, but actually you’re probably making the situation worse.

We see this in web design. People like adding pages to their websites because it feels productive. But actually, the most effective websites are the ones with fewer, simpler pages.

The same can be true for any design, including the way we structure our work.

We often anchor around the wrong thing. That’s why some big institutions have no chance — they are hit by random plans and transformations rather than anchoring around purpose and iteration.

Article — 8 December 2019 — 178 words

I’ll be speaking at UX Scotland 2020

Service design — User experience — User research

Work: Learn Foundations

The session will outline the comprehensive programme of user research the University of Edinburgh’s User Experience Service conducted on behalf of the Learn Foundations project. It will show how, as the project went along, we adopted a service design approach in order to better meet the needs of both students and staff.

Article — 28 November 2019 — 520 words

The false paradox — accessibility and aesthetics

Accessibility — User experience

Accessibility and aesthetics are not in conflict, despite the claims of some.

Linknote — 25 November 2019 — 85 words

Human-centred approaches — User experience

Types of design focus — Ben Holliday

Useful definitions outlining the differences between user-centred design, person-centred design and human-centred design.

If user-centred design is more functional in terms of understanding and meeting needs. Person-centred design is more holistic. This means that it’s more focussed on emotional needs and goals. Human-centred design is then about thinking beyond individual needs and more towards the collective needs of a system, place, or community.

Note — 22 November 2019 — 55 words

User experience — Web

Work: The University of Edinburgh

[We’re looking for a University of Edinburgh PhD student intern to work with us next year](https://edin.ac/3301QFy). This is an exciting time to join the Website and Communications team, and an opportunity to help us improve high-profile web services like MyEd and the University website. [Take a look](https://edin.ac/3301QFy)!

Linknote — 21 November 2019 — 122 words

Economics — Service design

In storytelling and service design, easy is boring — Daniele Catalanotto — Enigma

Why it may not always be right to design as smooth a journey as possible.

This idea seems counter-intuitive at first, but makes perfect sense on further reflection.

…people who had an issue with a service that was later resolved gave a better rating to it than people who didn’t have any.

It reminds me of a story (which I now cannot find) about someone who annually camped out for nights on end to get tickets for a particular event. One year, this person’s dedication was rewarded with free tickets. This gift offended the person. They derived their utility from the effort they were putting in (or perhaps in showing that effort to other people). The value was in the struggle.

Note — 14 November 2019 — 106 words

User experience — User research

Work: Learn Foundations

I’ll be speaking at the next IxDA Scotland community meetup about our user research with the [Learn Foundations project](https://duncanstephen.net/tag/learn-foundations/).

> Duncan’s talk will take us through how [the University of Edinburgh’s User Experience Service](https://www.ed.ac.uk/information-services/user-experience) has undertaken a comprehensive programme of user research supporting a project aimed at improving students’ experience accessing course materials digitally. Find out how they developed a programme of multiple user research methods to understand what students really need.

Time: Wednesday 4 December
Venue: Amazon Development Centre, 2–4 Waterloo Place, Edinburgh

Full details about the IxDA community meetup event

Maybe see you there?

Article — 12 November 2019 — 430 words

Get out of your comfort zone and talk with people

Business — User experience — User research

To do good stuff, you have to get out of your comfort zone. 10 years ago, just before I got my first job after graduating, I was a scared person. I still am.