Information

1
Information Interaction Design

• Fall 2005
• Bill Hart-Davidson

Session 6 analyzing work practices rationale
and challenges the 5 Contextual Design work
models Exercise 2 CD interviews, flow
sequence models
2
Today in Class

• Introduction to Contextual Design
• Overview of your work in phase 2
• Challenges in analyzing designing work (Bill
  H-D talks about the most obvious ones for each
  project team)
• CDs 5 work models explained
• Exercise 2 Conducting CD interviews to build
  flow and sequence models

3
Contextual Design, what is it?

• An approach to system design that
• uses qualitative research techniques to directly
  observe actual, ongoing work
• ties design decisions to the results of research,
  using work models in 5 visual formats in order to
  facilitate shared understanding

4
What does CD do?

1. It reveals hidden patterns of work
2. It makes work structures visible and intelligible
   so that they can become the basis for system
   design
3. It meshes nicely with Activity Theory and
   Embodied Interaction, allowing designers to focus
   on implementation without ignoring user centered
   goals while still

5
CD Philosophy
Design processes work when they build on natural
behavior

• go to where the work is, and watch it happen
• learn by paying attention to what matters to the
  people who do the work
• see the details!

6
CD Methodology
Seeing the work reveals structure

• people learn to do work and become expert by
  observing othersyou can do the same
• commit to watching multiple instances and
  multiple users
• current activity recalls past instancesask
  about them!

7
CD 4 Principles Context
Context Lessons gather evidence of ongoing vs.
summary experience concrete vs. abstract data

• avoid surveys, general interview questions such
  as what do you think of the current systemthis
  is summary data
• gather actual artifacts, observe and talk about
  real events, explore ongoing work

8
CD 4 Principles Partnership
Partnership Lessons build a reciprocal
relationship with participants to ensure good data

• avoid relationships that position you as the
  expert, the guest or the typical interviewer
• help users to explain work by reflecting back
  what you think you see, verifying, asking them to
  show you, etc.

9
CD 4 Principles Interpretation
Interpretation Lessons build your interpretation
over time, with the help of the whole team and
users

• gather facts and make interpretations of those
  that you can share with your team and with users
  for verification
• consider design decisions the end of a chain of
  reasoning that begins with interpretation of your
  data

10
CD 4 Principles Focus
Focus Lessons commit to challenging your
assumptions about the activity, not confirming
them

• your focus is a powerful tool that can help
  you to see detail, but also to miss important
  aspects of the big picture
• take time, as a team, to talk about the focus
  for each data gathering session so you can
  understand what you may see and what you may miss

11
Doing Contextual Design

• In phase 2, Youll observe and interview people
  in the various user roles you identified in Phase
  1, gathering data to build interpretations of the
  work that your system must support. Youll share
  your interpretations using the 5 work models, and
  then build prototypes of the user environment for
  the system that allow you to test the design
  ideas that come from your interpretations.

12
3 Priorities of the Conceptual Design Phase
Understand the work
Represent the context
Model the system
Gather interpret concrete data about ongoing
experiences for each user role
Use visual models to achieve shared understanding
and see possibilities
Design the functionality of the system with few
or no specific implementation choices
13
How it breaks down in class
Session 6 intro to CD, work models teams plan
CD activities and begin building flow and
sequence models Session 7 the big picture
cultural models teams share their CD research
plans Session 8 consolidating the data w/
affinity diagrams teams present examples of work
models (flow, sequence, cultural) in class
14
How it breaks down in class, cont.
Session 9 modeling the user environment OO
modeling concepts (objects, views,
relationships) Exercise 3 artifact and physical
models Session 12 prototyping testing design
concepts, not system features Session 13
conceptual design presentation guidelines
15
Phase 2 homework CD Interviews

• Your homework for phase 2 is to conduct 1-3
  contextual design interviews as described on pp.
  64-66.
• Youll use the data to create and share two
  sequence models (see ch. 6). Post these for
  sharing in class session 7.

16
Challenges of Work Analysis Design
Seeing work that is

1. Normal
2. Intermittent
3. Uninterruptable
4. Extremely long
5. Extremely focused
6. Internal

17
Where do your challenges lie?
Seeing work that is

1. Normal
2. Intermittent
3. Uninterruptable
4. Extremely long
5. Extremely focused
6. Internal

For each user role, lets consider which of these
complicating factors come into playand how they
can be dealt with
18
Team Student Body Politic participants
Seeing work that is

1. Normal
2. Intermittent
3. Uninterruptable
4. Extremely long
5. Extremely focused
6. Internal

You may need to ask participants to keep a record
of activity over some period of time that can be
the basis for a retrospective interview
19
Team mmFood menu planners
Seeing work that is

1. Normal
2. Intermittent
3. Uninterruptable
4. Extremely long
5. Extremely focused
6. Internal

Normal actions planning meals may not be
enoughyou may need to ask about critical
incidents probe to discover complicating issues
20
Team 9SoV Schedulers
Seeing work that is

1. Normal
2. Intermittent
3. Uninterruptable
4. Extremely long
5. Extremely focused
6. Internal

The scheduling portion of meeting planning is a
heavily mediated activty, involving the
coordination of information from potentially many
sources
21
Team Fitting Room Frequent Clothing Shoppers
Seeing work that is

1. Normal
2. Intermittent
3. Uninterruptable
4. Extremely long
5. Extremely focused
6. Internal

Frequent shoppers may, in some sense, always be
shopping reconciling what they have with whats
available to buy, etc.
22
5 work models

• Flow what patterns of communication/
  coordination exist?
• Sequence what are the detailed steps necessary
  to perform actions?
• Cultural what are the influences on the work
  that come from organizational social sources?
• Artifact what do the resources used to perform
  work look like? How are they employed in real
  work situations?
• Physical what does the workspace look like? How
  does it influence the work? What patterns of
  activity shape it?

23
Building a flow model

• Gather data about
• Roles
• Responsibilities
• Groups
• Flow patterns
• Artifacts
• Topics
• Actions
• Places
• Breakdowns

See coordination by noting when people interact,
what they use, why and where they do it.
24
Simple flow model scheduling a consultation
calendar
Please arrange a time
Students
TA
schedule
Request to coordinate schedule
Instructor
website
25
Building a sequence model

• Gather data about
• Goals
• Triggers
• Actions
• - steps
• Artifacts
• Outcomes
• Errors

Start with a user role, and trace the work
practice from that users point of view.
26
Simple sequence model Instructor
Intent Delegate Task
Trigger upcoming presentations Request TA
coordinate schedule Send e-mail to students
asking them to coordinate with TA Receive e-mails
with schedule requests Post schedule on
website Receive revised schedule Re-post schedule
on website
Forward to TA
27
For Next Week

• Be ready to share
• A sequence model based on your already collected
  data
• As before, It is best if you can post some
  representation of it for us to look at as well
• - the main purpose to discover what you still
  need to learn more about
• Set up and conduct your initial CD
  interviews/observations start working on flow
  and sequence models
• Well talk about the big picture cultural models

28
Whats a Research Plan?

• The research focus - what does your team need to
  know?
• The interviews/observations you will do broken
  down by roles
• The approach you will take in each of these
• How you will deal with the challenges your
  project poses

29
Something to think about

• Culture is as invisible as water is to fish
• The cultural model speaks the words people think
  and believe but dont say