|
"Fly-on-the-Wall" Observations |
Perspectives |
|
Seeing Your Product in Action Provides Vital Design Context |
Designing Usable Devices |
|
Many of our clients do not own usability labs where controlled, formal tests of their product can take place with the user community. Even with a functional usability lab, we encourage designers to take advantage of every opportunity to get close to the context of use for their products. One of the best ways is to accompany field reps or technical service personnel on trips to the clinic or hospital where the device is being used in daily procedures. These opportunities are great observational laboratories for collecting usability information. During clinical procedures, direct interaction with the user of your device may not be possible, but you can take detailed notes (time stamped with good description of activity) which you can discuss with the users after the procedure. During these observations, you should be looking for how the product fits the overall procedure, how it's used in combination with other devices, who uses the device and when, instances of user hesitation or confusion, error corrections, or direct comments about the device. Information you collect can be invaluable to the design team, especially in guiding other contextual interviewing situations. You may get a chance to interview users when they are not engaged in actual clinical tasks, and instances of observed usability problems are a great way to set the context for eliciting users' stories about their own problems with the device.
Home | The Process | Products | Team Background | Experience | Resources | Contact Information © 2006 Human Centered Strategies, LLC |
How much Human Factors is necessary or required by the FDA? The Users are Here! What Do I Test? Can I talk to the FDA about my usability issues during design? |
