Ethnography in Design

Ethnography in Design

This is part of a series demystifying design and creating design awareness for non-designers. Catch up on Affordance, Branding, Chunking, Dark Patterns, or read on for E for Ethnography...

Ethnography is a research method involving observing people in their natural environment.

This qualitative research method has its roots in anthropology – anthropologists immerse themselves in another culture to understand what people do, think, feel and say that might seem strange to others but is normal for those people.

In design, a key tenet is: “You are not the user”. One way to understand our users is to visit and observe users in their own environment, be it their offices or homes. This ethnographic research helps the design team learn about users’ pain points, needs and goals, some of which may never come up in other research methods like interviews or surveys.

For one of my ethnographic studies, I observed insurance agents at their desks across the country create quotes and write new insurance policies. I remember them constantly referring to cheat sheets or sneaking a peek at one of the many Post-it notes bordering their computer screens to complete these tasks, neither of which came up in other research methods. These observations and follow-up interviews turned into design insights and features (guided process, contextual help among others) during the redesign of an improved and more user-friendly application.

Ethnographic studies are an effective way to create empathy for users, leading to designs that make their lives easier.  

First Rule of Usability? Don't Listen to Users. To design the best UX, pay attention to what users do, not what they say. Self-reported claims are unreliable, as are user speculations about future behavior. Users do not know what they want. – Jakob Nielsen


Takeaways

  • You are not the user – but you can get direct experience by walking the proverbial mile in their shoes.
  • Don’t just ask people what they want, observe what they do.
  • User observation combined with an interview gives rich insight into not only what people do, but also why they do it a particular way.

Resources

Are there any design terms you'd like to have discussed? Please let me know in the comments or in a message.

Nice, Lyndon, just shared it.  Thanks.

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