Understanding Client Dynamics for UX Designers - Girl Geeks Toronto presentation

Editor's Notes

• #15: How is this project going to operationalized? Are there dependencies on other projects also on the books this year? What’s the company trying to achieve – look at the annual report
• #16: To get to that meeting, there were a number of steps – RFIs, RFPs, - but essentially, you bid on the contract…
• #17: There was a trigger for every step in that process. Your Sales people, Account Managers, Project Managers, Product managers will be a fount of knowledge here.
• #18: We like to assume that our clients are interested in changing the world and doing whatever it takes to create a world class customer experience – because that’s what we promised in the proposal. I had one project where we put tons of effort in a short time frame into an app for a low use OS, whose sole purpose was to get another higher use OS to provide us with funding to develop an app for their platform. “hey – look what we’re doing for your competitor.” e.g. LG television app
• #19: Reputation gets you on the short list only. I tried to match the vendor with my team and the internal client team. Was the client wowed by your pitch team, and now you have to come in and execute? Design Process – many won’t understand it, don’t understand the value, and worried that you’re going to spend too much time on research or navel gazing.
• #20: If you’re not getting the A-Team – why not? These are all valid reasons. This will not become apparent until you’re into the project a bit.
• #22: As always, be present in the moment, and observe. Titles – how do they introduce themselves? Do they “run”, “lead”, “support”, not clear? – window into corporate culture Where do people sit? If you sit beside the decision maker, you’re more likely to get them on side than if you sit across the table/in opposition. Note words. What are they doing – are they on their phone? Are they taking notes? Who does most of the talking, and how are their colleagues reacting to that person?
• #23: Let’s get into the meat of it. NEED AT LEAST 20 minutes for the rest.
• #24: All persona development has to start with a theory, or hypothesis. This is mine. What are they willing to do to make this a success Can they make the business that this project is contributing to a success? Design contribution – icing on the cake, really What’s needed next is observable, discoverable traits that map to these 3 groupings. clients are people too start of the project we tend to think of them as an amorphous mass with a spokesperson CLIENT PERSONAS Hypothesize defining characteristics Research – interview, survey, test Cluster analysis Create personas based on clusters and show differentiation
• #25: Personal Investment Weigh personal versus corporate objectives. There’s always a personal component, but what’s the balance? Good things happen when someone’s compensation is tied to corporate objectives. “Closed” means that the person is afraid of looking stupid, and so doesn’t contribute as much as they could. what are their individual motivations – what are they looking to get out of this result: what is personally driving the clients who are at the table money, prestige, reputation, title, career advancement, getting home to see their family Frustrated designer Motivations: Corporate objectives versus personal objectives Vulnerability: Willing to collaborate/say what they don’t know vs. fearful of looking stupid
• #26: Paul English – 10 years ago. Kayak.com & pinpoint travel. Trusted our team to design. As founder, he was highly incented to make things work. Incidentally, we later found out that aol was on the block, so suspected that beyond generating revenue, our project was part of a concerted effort for aoL to present itself as a more forward looking company in the marketplace Help by rephrasing Personal and open – rare in clients, and awkward Get a good rapport behind the scenes to explain, or work around. WHERE ARE YOU? Risks of perfectionism to the project, arm crossing.
• #27: Worst case, they don’t get digital and don’t care. Found more often when you’re working in cross-platform teams, or with people whose work is affected by the digital project.
• #28: Top right – AND you’ll learn lots from them Educate – draw from their offline realm for parallels Allies – they may be on the team because they’re the most digitally savvy person they have. win-win. Help them find a way in with their colleagues. BUT don’t ally with them at the expense of higher priority stakeholders If they’re a key member – dig. Worst case replace or work around. News radio example – knew radio but stuck on the idea that site visits had to be long to generate the ad revenue they wanted. We spent a full meeting explaining how we were going to drive multiple visits per day – like their radio station. Basis of the project was supposed to be a straight lift and drop from one CMS to another, but everyone kept trying to sneak their favourite features in there. Where are you – I interviewed people who knew UX but came into the interview saying that they were reluctant to put ads in front of users.
• #29: Design experience: Understands design methodology – waterfall, iterative, agile, whatever, and language/experience in design process vs. not
• #30: Learn from their experience in that corporate environment Invested in past project successes as a way to minimize risk – listen and explore Threatened – attitude will show through. Learn… Strong – NO Surprises – likely to be CRs, major changes in direction throughout the project NO Surprises. SPORTSNET EXAMPLE – push on budget, unknowable scope, little trust in our estimating abilities, start of responsive, other things going on