Home Discovery Research: InAct Evaluative Research: Assays Photoethnography Resume

Generative UX Research Project: InAct

Key Questions:
How can we increase engagement and enrollment into the performing arts industry? What pains and processes currently exist?
End Users:
‍Producers - High School Drama Teachers
Actors/Writers/Stage Managers/Composers - High School Students
Industries:
B2B and B2C - Education, Theater, Music
Organization:
Inscriptures®, in collaboration with the Department of Education
Product:
InAct™ - a SaaS project-coordination platform in the R&D phase
Problem Hypothesis:
‍The US Census Bureau reports poverty increases, with 20% of the nation’s children qualifying as poor. Said socioeconomic barriers limit artistic, music, sports, and scientific project exposure and exploration – each requiring skills vital in a nation with 93% organizational project-dependence. Specifically, the performing arts is an area that has become increasingly marginalized, with high turnover and reduced student enrollment.  
Market Research Opportunity:
Research behind the developed platform, InAct, first addresses the educational market (TAM = $1,328,530,000), with user research diagnosing potential growth into university, industrial, theatrical, restaurant, sports, and other global markets as a reliable platform collecting and carrying resume-documentable project experience.

Step 1: Assumption Mapping

Why?:
‍Assumption mapping invites internal stakeholders to both share their insights and hypotheses and help map the unknown: (1) What major questions need to be answered by the research? (2) What product decisions will said answers inform? (3) What are the associated business risks and timetable? (4) Who, exactly, are we targeting and how will we recruit these users? (5) What methodologies might best address this? (6) What current assumptions do we have - regardless of accuracy?
Goal:
Separate what we think we know from what we don't know to inform discovery research.
Tools:
Figjam, Miro, Lucidspark, or other whiteboard tool + Teams, Slack, Zoom on a recorded line.
Participants
‍‍The "3 legs" of a product:
Product Manager, Engineer, and the UX Designer. Sometimes a marketing representative will attend. As UX Researcher, I facilitate.
Results:
‍Exploratory research needs to address separate roles within a standard theater production: actors, directors, composers, and various crew members. Moreover, understanding the gaps between secondary education analogs of said roles and what is expected within the industry is also required.

Step 2: Discovery Interviews

John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts - Department of Education Event

The Department of Education held an opportune event at the JFK Center for Performing Arts: a venue combining educators and prospective target users from theater roles. I attended and conducted exploratory user interviews.

Arrival

JFK Center for Arts

Ed. Event Check-In

Discovery Interviews Begin

Why?:
‍Discovery interviews are the bread and butter of generative research: an invaluable one-on-one hour+ with end users mapping the motives and processes analytics and surveys fail to capture. A triangulation of interviews (at least n = 3) per user - cross referenced with larger quantitative survey data - typically produces incredibly accurate results in less than 2 weeks. To avoid replication error, a discussion guide is collaboratively produced with stakeholder feedback prior to moderated sessions. I typically share this with the participant to promote transparency. In-person sessions permit contextual inquiry: observational studies surrounding Jobs-to-be-Done and the work environment. Mixed methods approaches, including hands-on icebreakers and quantitative questions, permit multi-angled responses to similar questions: providing greater proximity to the truth.
Goal:
Accurately understand and capture the end users' processes, tools, environments, and pains.
Tools:
Figjam, Miro, Lucidspark, or other whiteboard/notetaking tool + Teams, Zoom, or in-person on a recorded line.
Methods:
Card Sorting, "Show and Tell", Jobs to Be Done, Discovery Interviews, Likert Scales, Co-Creation.
Participants
‍‍The end user. If remote, invitations are also extended to the "3 legs" of a product - kept anonymous:
the Product Manager, Engineer, and the UX Designer. As the UX Researcher, I facilitate every session.
Results:
‍Exploratory research needs to address separate roles within a standard theater production: actors, directors, composers, and various crew members. Moreover, understanding the gaps between secondary education analogs of said roles and what is expected within the industry is also required.

Step 3: Discovery Synthesis

Why?:
‍Discovery artifacts - interviews, analytics, recordings, surveys, metrics, or observations - are both shared live but also require synthesis: a means of both simplifying, abstracting, and providing all product members easily referenceable, empathetic windows into the end user.
Goal:
Succinctly, yet accurately, depict and simplify complex user processes, pain points, and insights towards invaluable product and company leadership.
Tools:
Miro, Lucidspark, Figjam, or other whiteboard software. Powerpoint - for presentations, including insights from Pendo, WalkMe, Google Analytics, or tool.
Methods:
Personas, Journey Maps, Summary Slideshows/Diagrams, Recorded Readouts, Photos, Process Diagrams, Organograms, Quotes, Video Highlights, Anecdotes, etc.
Participants
‍Product stakeholders: Product Leadership - Managers and Owners, Engineering/Dev Team, QA Lead, UX Designer, UX Manager, General Managers, Solution Consultants.
Results:
Widespread patterned pain across disparate user roles further validates a problem-solution fit beyond a product-market fit: communicative coordination within educational theater productions. Namely, a journey map reveals three lucrative starting points: directors/writers, composers, and actors. A persona for each depicts the idiosyncratic shape each role takes within secondary education - laying the foundation for an ideation session.

Step 4: Problem Scoping

Why?:
‍Discovery syntheses are further broken down into a shared action plan: translating findings and discussion points into fodder for design ideation. Without a discovery action plan to reference, too much information may overwhelm or demotivate stakeholders.
Goal:
Dilute, without misrepresenting nor concealing, all syntheses into a short document stakeholders can easily reference to commence work within the solution space.
Tools:
Miro, Lucidspark, Figjam, or other whiteboard software. Teams or Slack for sharing the plan.
Methods:
Findings/project-dependent: the KISS method, opt-in complexity, HMW ideation.
Participants
‍All product stakeholders: Product Leadership - Managers and Owners, Engineering/Dev Team, QA Lead, UX Designer, UX Manager, General Managers, Solution Consultants.
Results:
A one-page card detailing the 3-4 main personas’ current tools, pains, and expressed desires identified from the readout as core focal areas - paired with ideation-generating “How Might We?” prompts.

Step 5: Design Ideation

Why?:
Truly the “generative” portion of generative/ exploratory/ discovery/ diagnostic research, the ideation workshop exists to catalyze product or service action or design. Flaring from the problem space into the solution space - first, no ideas are too big nor bad: allowing each product stakeholder to consider a plethora of solutions before focusing. Second, a 2x2 grid allows each product member an ability to focus: sorting ideas by effort - namely engineering and design challenges - and priority - namely business and user strategies.
Goal:
Dilute, without misrepresenting nor concealing, all syntheses into a short document stakeholders can easily reference to commence work within the solution space.
Tools:
Miro, Lucidspark, Figjam, or other whiteboard software. Teams or Zoom on a recorded line.
Methods:
Gamestorming, Crazy 8s, Co-creation, Workshop Facilitation, Priority Mapping, etc.
Participants
‍3-6 key participants from product stakeholders: Product Leadership - Managers and Owners, Engineering/Dev Team, QA Lead, UX Designer, UX Manager, General Managers, Solution Consultants.
Results:
A crystal-clear roadmap for UX designers, product leadership, and the engineering team to abide by and commence work on. My ideation and prioritization sessions led to the creation of new patentable company intellectual property - protected portions shared below and awaiting further user testing.

Proceed to
Evaluative Research
Process ⇾