Blog 1. Take-home assignment when applying for jobs
As you apply for new jobs, you usually get a take home-assignment focusing on how you would approach a problem and the process of solving the actual problem. This is one way, the assignment could be approached and presented to the company.
This process is based on an assignment where you would get some basic information about what the user should do in the companies application, and you would have to create the solution with a focus on ux. Time should be within 4-8 hours.
Understand the users
After carefully reading the actual assignment, which consists of a problem and some initial information about the user, I would begin to go through the following:
Goal and outcome
The first thing would be to identify the main goal. What is the goal and what is the actual outcome we wish to obtain from the application. I would begin to identify the actual problem statement. It helps you get focused.
Usergoals & Usertask into user-stories
I would begin to define specific user goals & user tasks, to create user stories. They will help me understand what the user needs in the application and how they would actually do it. At this point, I would also rank the user goals & user task to identify what are the most important tasks. This will also help to structure the information architecture later on
Context of User
Understanding what context you create your solution in, is equally important. Are they using your product on a phone in the morning when they are stressed, or later when they are relaxing on the couch with their tablet? I would probably already have some assumptions based on the knowledge I have about the product or information from the task-description.Constraints
I would think of the constrains from a user-perspective. What kind of limitations does the user have when they use the application? Maybe it is important that they can use the solution without being signed-up. Constraints help to narrow down more specifically how the application should be created and helps you when you begin to think about the actual solution. I would also begin to reflect upon development-time against value of each solution.
Insights list
The insights list is created to put all the insights into a structured formate. It can be described as an insight-report and will be what you base your ideas and solutions for.
Idea’s and Userflows
Ideas and solution
Brainstorming is a great way to both come up with ideas of a solution but is also a way to activate your creativity. This is especially helpful for me when I need to organize the information I have before I begin the actual steps of creating the solution.
User Flow
I would now begin to create the user flow for each of the goals. This helps to define your user’s experience, where I would at each step, write down what the user actually does. At this point, I would also begin to think a bit about the technical requirements. Value x Time is the key here.
Below, you can see a user-flow diagram.
Image by Naema Baskanderi.
Wireframing and low-fidelity prototype
At this point, I would begin to create my wireframes and focus on the hierarchy of the information. Based on user stories, the context of use, user flow, and requirements, I can maintain a focus throughout the process.
In the end, I would hand in my process, a low fidelity prototype and the flow between the prototype screens. It is more important to illustrate the process to the solution then high-end UI design.
As below, the differences between low-fidelity and high-fidelity prototypes can be seen. The ideas of the solution can easily be communicated with low-fidelity prototypes.
Low-fidelity prototypes
High-fidelity prototypes
Images by Simon McCade
There are many ways to hand in a take-home assignment. Of course, in real life, we would have to conduct in-depth user-research based on ethnographic research and do multiple design-interactions with our interactive, high-fidelty prototype before we begin developing.
And maybe I should also touch on the business goals of the application? Understanding how the application will help business goals, is equally important as understanding user-needs.
Blog 2. Be creative about how you work with design
Create hypothesis and collect behavioral measurements by Incorporating a scientific research approch. Keep carrying out a/b-testing for true/false validation, and keep improveing and be innovative about the design.
Based on talk from Netflix-Product manager
Blog 3. How do we understand value
Data-driven strategies helps us understand value. We must focus on 3 important steps in data-driven strategy to understand how we measure our products.
Vision - Where are we going
Strategi - How do we get there
Metrics - Metrics that tells us, if we are getting there
Strategi - How do we get there
Metrics - Metrics that tells us, if we are getting there
The mindset
Spotify has a vision about making all music available legally. When we have our strategy, we need to break up the different kind of measurements, that impact our measure-value.
How spotify would measure value
f(measurement) = Type of users x hours we use on listing x sessions pr. week
Based on webinar from Creuna
Blog 4. Visualise ideas through video for user feedback
The problem
Products are created by advanced design-processes with an indeepth understanding of user-needs and business-needs. With the pace of technology now, there are more often casses were it would be benificial to test out an idea based on what is possible technologically, to understand if it could create any value in the right context.
The problem is to find a solution to quickly test a technological idea and help developeres to understand business and user value in the idea faster. This is based on the tremendous amount technological possibitlities which increasing at a speed, we have not seen before. The need for testing an technological idea before coding it, is equally important as the steps in a design-process.
You cannot expect users to understand machine-learning related idea’s, without them being communicated to them in the right context and in a formate they understand. What is possible, is to create an interactive visualisations and create it in a video that illusatrate the context of use and generate feedback that can help understand the technological value.
The problem is to find a solution to quickly test a technological idea and help developeres to understand business and user value in the idea faster. This is based on the tremendous amount technological possibitlities which increasing at a speed, we have not seen before. The need for testing an technological idea before coding it, is equally important as the steps in a design-process.
You cannot expect users to understand machine-learning related idea’s, without them being communicated to them in the right context and in a formate they understand. What is possible, is to create an interactive visualisations and create it in a video that illusatrate the context of use and generate feedback that can help understand the technological value.
Blog 5. The iterative Design-Process
Connecting business and design is important when you carry out projects.
