How to Plan a World Usability Day Event

About a year ago, Frank Garofalo and I founded Esri’s User Experience Group — a grassroots team of people passionate about evangelizing the glory of great user experiences with the goal of sparking innovation and developing a more user-centered mindset in every employee. This year, we hosted our first World Usability Day (WUD) event and I’ll share what we did and some tips you can use for planning your own.

Our Event

Our 1-hour lunchtime event consisted of 2 activities:

Usability Brilliance & Bombs (25 min)

Description: A photo slideshow of employee-submitted examples of usability greats and quirks from work, home and out and about, with commentary from one of Esri’s User Experience professionals.

Our Preparation:

• Invite employees 2 weeks ahead of time to email us with photos & description
• Select top 20 photos
• Compose a PPT slideshow of the top 20

Special Supplies Needed: none

 

SpeedGeeking on UX (35 min)

Description:  More rewarding than SpeedDating, this is a fun, interactive way to get quick, 5-minute earfuls from 6 speakers on a variety of user experience topics. Choose the topic you want to hear first, then speedgeek your way through our speakers toward a broader understanding of user experience.

Our Preparation:

• Email a call for speakers 4 weeks or more ahead of time
• Create and send speakers guidelines for their 5-minute lightning talk
• Create a topic sign for each speedgeeking table
• Create numbered slips of papers to hand attendees as their starting table assignment

Special Supplies Needed: cowbell, timer

Considerations for Planning Your World Usability Day

1. Will you follow the WUD theme? Check worldusabilityday.org for the current theme and decide if you can work it into your event. This year's theme was "Usability of Financial Systems" — a good theme for sure, but we hadn't the slightest notion of how to work that into what our company does so we ditched it.
2. What’s the takeaway for attendees?
   What do you hope the attendees will get out of your efforts? Awareness? Education? Knowledge about your products / services? Respect for your commitment to the user's experience? Sign-ups to your group? Keep your goal in mind. Our main goals were awareness and education.
3. Will it be a public or private event?
   Is this something you want to open up to people outside of your organization? One of the obvious benefits of doing so is publicity for your company and for the fact that you care about the user experience of your products. Another benefit is the purely non-selfish one of spreading the UX gospel out to the masses. Some downsides are logistics, funding and time. We decided right away the downsides would quickly bring down our first event … so we opted for an employee-only event.
4. Will you host event on-site or off-site or neither?
   Whether public or private, are you going to host your event at your organization, another venue or virtually? This could depend on what type of event you choose to do and the reach you want. Or it can drive the type of event you do. Lack of time and budget to manage an off-site event made us go for on-site.
5. How will you pay for it?
   Speaking of budget, where will it come from? If you have a central UX team, then you probably have your own UX budget. If you’re a grassroots team from all over the company like we are, then funding could be an issue. Our Plan A: approach our Sales director. He'd said several months back that he liked the idea of our UX group and ever since we'd unofficially dubbed him as our corporate sponsor. So we'd try to go all official with it. Our Plan B: approach each director the team members reported up to (about 4 or 5 directors) and ask if they’d share the cost. Our Plan C: reach into our own pockets. Plan A worked really well. Some costs you may need to consider:
   
   
   • site or room rental (don't forget to book a rehearsal day, too)
   • speaker fees
   • promotion (signage, fliers, newspapers)
   • food or snacks (a great time to get rid of previous week's Halloween candy!)
   • equipment
   • support staff (event coordinator, A/V, network)
   • materials (handouts)
   • giveaway swag
   
   
6. Will you have attendee participation?
   Instead of just having a speaker present to the audience, you might be considering an event where the attendees can have active participation either before the event (submitting photos, treasure hunt), during the event (quiz show, "hallway testing") or after the event (follow-up surveys). Those are fun ideas but they may require more planning and prep time than you have available.
7. How far ahead should you start planning?
   Do things get done quickly or slowly in your organization? Do the coveted conference rooms or nearby venues get booked months in advance? Do internal announcements and company-wide emails take a long time for approval? Is this a volunteer effort where planning team still has their normal work to do that takes priority? Is anyone in the planning group well-connected with key people who will get things done quickly just for them? Consider your answers to those questions as you plan your timeline.
8. Is your audience UX-savvy?
   Are you preaching to the UX choir? If so, you can raise the level of your presentation and pack it full of UX jargon, abstraction and inside humor. But if you’re trying to indoctrinate UX newbies, keep it light and stay out of the weeds. Everyone can relate to a bad user experience, use that as a starting point.
9. Finally…
   
   
• Designate a main coordinator or two
• Check current and past WUD events for ideas
• Brainstorm and refine ideas based on your goal, audience, venue, time and budget
• Make backup plans in case of speaker no-shows, equipment failure, venue/room hijacking, hurricanes, etc.
• Make a task list and an asset list with names, dates and times
• Rehearse
• Arrive early
• Remember the goal
• Have fun
• Take pictures
• Thank your sponsors

An Introvert's 7 Prep Steps for Grace Hopper

Solitude recharges me. In meetings, I listen and observe more than I speak. Those are traits of an introvert. There are more traits but suffice it to say that if introverts exist, I am one. But being an introvert doesn’t stop me from being bold, being a skilled collaborator, being adept at multi-tasking. It doesn’t stop me from leading a department, a business, or a culture shift (I’ve done a pretty good job at all three!) In fact, introverts sometimes make the best leaders (see why in this Forbes article).

And it doesn’t stop me from me being thrilled to join over 2,000 women at the annual Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing in 2 days. The GHC is a unique event – hundreds of women of all ages, cultures and academic disciplines gathering in one spot to inspire and be inspired, to learn and to teach. So how do I make the most of every minute? How do I make sure I resist any urges to over-indulge in solitary recharging?

1. I volunteered to work as a Hopper. True, I just love the idea of helping an event like this be a success. And I like the free conference registration. But the bonus: for at least 8 hours, I am now required to be somewhere doing something. And because I don't pick my exact assignment, I may get to meet some women I may have otherwise missed.


2. I booked a room with an extra bed. At my first GHC last year, I shared a room with 2 women I’d never met before. It turned out to be one of the best parts of my trip and I still keep in touch with them. So this year, I wanted to make sure that option was still open for me. Good thing, too: at the last minute I was able to offer my extra space to someone inquiring about rooms on Twitter. Turns out she's an HCI professor at a university in Ghana and is also a presenter at this year's GHC - pretty good luck for a recent HCI grad who's looking forward to presenting someday. (If you get a roommate be sure to read @lexyholloway's Do-Over #4 in her blog post Five do-overs since my first Grace Hopper Celebration for Women in Computing.)


3. I used Twitter to do some pre-conference networking. I followed other attendees whose GHC comments peaked my interest so now I have some faces to look out for.


4. I'm using the GHC mobile app to connect with anyone I remembered from the last conference, anyone I've been communicating with on Twitter and any company reps that have contacted me. So if you see my name in your GHC mobile app's Contact list, it means I would love the chance to say hi in person!


5. I'm reviewing this great presentation by Whitney Hess. She presented this on the last day of the recent UPA conference and I remembered thinking it should have been presented on the first day. It's useful for any field, not just UX. If you don't have 48 minutes to listen to it - take 3 minutes to click through the slides - they're very digestible:
   
   Evangelizing Yourself
   
   
   


6. I'm reviewing this must-read for introverts by Sacha Chua. Great networking advice for introverts and for shy people. Also very digestible - takes just 3 or 4 minutes to go through the slides:
   
   The Shy Connector


7. I'm letting my music move me. I'm spending today with piano solos by Philip Wesley and George Winston so I can relax, center myself and think about my goals for this trip. Over the next couple of days I'll progress through motivational songs like Katy Perry's Firework to inspirational tunes like Michael Jackson's Man in the Mirror to chill-icious, bold beats like Run-DMC's Sucker MCs to gutsy ballads like Melissa Etheridge's Brave & Crazy. By Tuesday morning I'll be ready to Raise My Glass (of iced tea!) with Pink in the ultimate too-school-for-cool, underdog anthem. Look out, Portland.

How's the User Experience at Your Bank?

I loathe my Bank of America user experience and I'll recount a recent, laughable yet typical encounter with them to illustrate why. You probably don't need my anecdote, though. Were you already identifying with me just reading "I loathe my Bank...", not even needing specifics of which one or why? I wouldn't be surprised if there are millions who feel the same way, either about Bank of America or some other bank. Was it always this way? Did so many of us hate the service from our banks in the days before ATMs, online banking, and mobile banking? While technology has made access to financial facts and transactions more convenient, it has both created and neglected the most important aspect of my new, 24/7, pervasive banking experience: an insistent need to know the why behind those facts and transactions.

Usability vs User Experience
I know the financial industry didn't sleep through the UX movement. I'm guessing most of their UX efforts are focused on designing the usability of their banking sites and apps. In addition, it seems all the "personal service" touted by the larger banks really just refers to the extent to which you can personalize their banking apps. But, all the UX "rockstars" in the world won't deliver a top-notch user experience if they, and the majority of the UX budget, are all focused on external product development with nothing left over for internal systems and processes. You might get a hot product, but I doubt I need to remind anyone of how fleeting and undependable product hotness can be.

All We Know are the Facts, Ma'am
My problem with online and mobile banking and all their instant notification capabilities is that they can't tell me why something happened - only that it did, indeed, just happen.

My problem with banking personnel, particularly at Bank of America, is that they usually can't tell me why something has happened, either. At least not accurately. Nor quickly. And by quickly, I mean "2011" quickly. I mean "my-phone-alerts-me-of-a-transaction-before-I've-even-left-the-ATM" quickly.

Ridiculous Hold Times, Musical Departments, and General Cluelessness
These conditions still reigned when I called Bank of America a couple of weeks ago to find out why my overdraft protection had not kicked in on a particular business checking transaction. I was transferred from checking to credit cards and back to checking - each team insisting the other was the one I needed. After 25 minutes, I finally hung up. The next day, I tried again. This time, I didn't even want an answer to why. I just wanted to resolve it - to transfer money from my B of A credit card to cover the overdraft and then re-activate the overdraft protection which seemed to have been quietly de-activated at some point. Apparently those were challenging requests for B of A, not at all everyday and common requests - this "transferring of funds" and "activating overdraft protection" - as I might have stupidly thought prior to calling. After another 25 minutes on the phone and being transferred between departments I finally spoke with a woman who contradicted all the information I'd been given thus far plus told me it would take several days plus the mailing of a paper form to get things straightened out. O_o .... wow, could you please transfer me to one of your speedy apps? Better yet, I'm done with you.

When Your Own Technology Mocks You
My point in relaying this is not to bash B of A but to point out a major flaw in my user experience with them that I feel is partly caused by the technology they put out there to "improve my user experience." It seems internally their customer service capabilities can't keep up with the speed and gratification standards set by their external-facing systems thereby making their reps look inept and their processes look outdated and inadequate. If you text me about a problem at 9:00 pm, then I want to talk to you about it at 9:01 pm and have it resolved by 9:06 pm. Your apps have "trained" me to wanna roll that way! In addition, online banking systems have made us privy to all sorts of nuances on our financial accounts that we didn't have access to before. Informative yes, but have you noticed it stops just short of being transparent? That prompts questions and instigates a quest for clarity, context and, sometimes, troubleshooting. (Could this be what led ordinary people to discover their banks were processing items in the order that profited the banks most, not the order they came in?) And that's where it all falls down.

Closing the Loop on the Banking User Experience
Make acting on the information as easy as getting the information. Get a UX team to work on that in parallel with website and product usability so that the user's experience is consistent, rather than frustrating. Realize that as you push more info at us, we can become more curious about what we see. And the more your capacity to present information surpasses your capacity to clarify that information, the more leery and intolerant I become.

And About those Phone Systems...

• B of A: you already asked me to key in my account number at the beginning of the call so I expect you to actually use that information to route me to the correct team rather than have an agent tell me 10 minutes into the call that he can't help me because I'm calling about a business checking account in California and that's a whole different team. Gah!
• Arrowhead Credit Union in Redlands: I wanted to give you a shot at my business but when 4-1-1 transferred me to your phone number, I was immediately subjected to 4+ minutes of music and "we appreciate your business" before I finally hung up. Anyone who has spent precious lunch breaks in B of A's holding queue is far too trodden upon to tolerate that.
• Chase Bank in Redlands: thank you for having a real person answer the phone after the 2nd ring (on a 4-1-1 transfer, as well) and for offering me a personal banker who won't shuffle me around endlessly. You're on the right track, I think.

And, lastly...Affordances 101!
Make getting out of your bank as easy as getting in. Note to Chase Bank in Redlands: I have watched people struggle with exiting your bank. Certain kinds of door handles afford pulling, no matter what you print next to them. (Especially if on the way in the bank, they worked by pulling!)

Where to Study HCI

Three years ago, when I decided on an advanced degree in Human-Computer Interaction, I couldn't find local schools. Good grief - I live in Southern California, not...Iowa! Yet, there seemed to be many HCI programs on the other side of the country. And yes, even in Iowa. When nearing completion of my degree (from Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, thanks to options allowing us humans to join class via a computer - a rarity in Human-Computer Interaction apparently), I joined the Usability Professionals Association (UPA) but found only two local UPA chapters. So, when I got the opportunity to try ArcGIS Online, a system that allows anyone to build and share intelligent maps, I tried this small project. The map confirmed what I suspected...West Coast crickets for HCI.


View Larger Map

As of this writing, the map is for the United States only and includes the following layers which can be turned on or off (bring up the larger map to control layers, view the legend, see nicer pop-ups, etc.):

• schools offering degrees in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) or Human-Centered Computing (HCC)


• schools offering degrees with an HCI track/concentration
  
• schools offering HCI-related degrees


• UPA chapters


• SIGCHI chapters

I'd also like to build a slicker map and overlay some other interesting things...perhaps companies with full-fledged User Experience divisions. If you notice something missing or incorrect, let me know.

UPA 2011 Takeaways Part II: Tutorials, Workshops & Speakers

This is Part 2 of my UPA 2011 takeaways where I discuss the tutorials and workshops I attended as well as the keynote speakers.

An In-Depth Introduction to Fieldwork – Susan Dray (Dray & Associates), @susandra
As this full-day tutorial cost as much as the entire conference, my expectations were high. I had read up on Dr. Dray ahead of time and was impressed with her credentials. Although the class moved a little slowly at times I was not disappointed in the content nor the instructor. The tutorial content was well-organized and well-thought-out. I found the instructor not only to be quite knowledgeable regarding fieldwork but very warm and accessible with quite a sense of humor (when you meet her, you must ask her to do her usability "rap" - she is, after all, Dr. Dray). There were only a handful of attendees but Dr. Dray led us into some good discussions about our own fieldwork experience and the videos and case studies she interjected throughout really highlighted some of the challenges of fieldwork. I won't attempt to sum up everything, there was way too much good info. Just a few notes:

• Field research helps you determine if your value proposition is correct about what you’re building. Just because it works in the lab doesn’t mean it will work in the field.
• With tightly clustered group of people, you can get a persona that’s very accurate. With more heterogeneous population, the data is everywhere, it doesn’t get represented well with a single persona.
• Cognitive dissonance – users want to be consistent, want to provide reasonable answers
• Cognitive distortion – people don’t even realize they have problems (example of senior woman who claimed she had no problems brushing her teeth - observation proved the opposite!)
• Reactive effects – people change because you’re watching
• Allow yourself to be in the muck at first, allow ambiguity until it comes together
• Don’t debrief on client’s front steps!
• Sustaining attention while observing is difficult
• Explain to any people with you that the path to the answers can vary
• Remote field evaluation – oxymoron
• Telephone ethnographies - oxymoron

Post-its and Affinities: low tech tools for high-impact results – Amy Kidd & Mary Beth Rettger (MathWorks) @amy_liz
I almost missed this but thanks to some tweets that alerted me to the session and a nice little discount from UPA, I was able to add this to my schedule at the last minute. This was a great hands-on workshop that had me wishing I could go back and use it the very next day at work. This was all about getting your developers to participate in observing users, taking notes with Post-its and guiding them through building affinity diagrams with the Post-its. We didn't just talk about it...we did it. Here we are, deep in affinitizing.


Toward Usable Usability Research: Building bridges between research and practice – Kath Straub (Usability.org), Elizabeth Buie (Luminanze Consulting), Susan Dray (Dray & Associates) @kas, @ebuie, @susandra
This workshop was about brainstorming ways to make research more usable so it can be delivered to the practitioners who need it and how to get practitioners more interested in research. This was a panel/forum discussion where the goal was not just to discuss how the gap between research and practice came to be but to come away with solutions. Alas, we spent the majority of the time discussing problems (we had a list of over 25 causes) and ran out of time discussing solutions. At times the discussion seemed to focus too much on CHI and its relation to UPA - I haven't been to a CHI conference yet so I felt like an outsider in that regard, like I was missing something. And yet, this session REALLY opened my eyes to how practitioners view researchers - important for me because I want to continue into research. The point was made that currently researchers have no incentive to create practitioner takeaways. This is something I want to keep in mind as I go forward. And by the way, the Twitter hashtag for research & practice in ux is #uxrpi if you want to follow related tweets.

Designing for Social Change, Starting with You – Bertice Berry @berticeberry
If you heard anything about the UPA 2011 conference, surely you heard about Dr. Berry. She knocked it out of the park. She clearly took the time to research the UX field and had us feeling like we had one of the most important jobs in the world. Very inspiring. A few notes:

• We are the social workers of technology
• We are the ambassadors of the users
• Remove the frame, clean the lint filter
• How do you want to be known when you leave the room, not when you die. I’m glad she’s gone or I’m so glad she was here?
• Ask: why me here now?
• Diversity is not what you give them but what they give you
• Diversity of thought
• Go from networking to quiltworking
• Work –life balance: things bad at home but good at work or vice versa. That IS the balance. Cant have everything right all the time – won’t grow
• And my favorite: Give people back their sh*t - you can't take on everything
  

Designing for Social Change Keynote – Paul Adams (Facebook) @padday
All hail anyone from Facebook, right? But really, he was down-to-earth and made a lot of interesting points. Just a few of them here:

• Apps and sites should be social by design, with social as a core tenet
• Facebook photos became largest photo gallery due to social components
• TripAdvisor adds social – see reviews by your friends
  
• News sites will have news edited by your friends
• Esty can reveal what your friends like to make gift buying easier
• Airbnb allows you to rent from people who are known by your friends
• Government is getting social ... will be the next industry disrupted by social
• Average # of strong ties for Americans is 4
• 130-150 is average # of weak ties, also happens to be average # of FB friends…find that social groups with over 150 people start to breakdown
• People group around: life stage, shared experience, hobby
• He’s doing research on temporary ties and building trust
• You –> 130 friends –> 8,000 friends of friends –> 1,000,000 friends of friends of friends
• It’s possible you are only person in the world connecting 2 groups
• Example of wedding where all of a sudden your “worlds collide” (your different groups of friends meet)
• People that connect groups are not special (i.e., famous)
• Instead of turning to experts, we turn to friends for advice on car buying or relationships
• Disproportionately influenced by people close to us (eat more sitting next to heavy eater)
• Celebrities actually don’t influence us all that much
• Change will be driven by people with social science – not technology – background
• Audience question: But aren’t we influenced by large numbers…for example, on Amazon when we see that 1,000 people liked something, wouldn’t that influence us more than just 2 people? Adams says not if those 2 people are your friends. Adams says Amazon ratings are self-perpetuating because we’ll often change our opinion slightly based on what others have said

So that's a wrap on UPA 2011. I'm looking forward to next year - hoping to review submissions again, submit a poster perhaps and help with some of the organization logistics if possible.

UPA 2011 Takeaways Part I: Books & Sessions

I attended my first UPA conference in Atlanta, June 21-24, 2011. I had to jump through a few hoops to make it there:

• paying for the travel and conference out of my own pocket (thank goodness for student discounts or else it just wouldn't have happened!)


• had only 1 vacation day so I had to squeeze in an extra 32 hours of work in the evenings and weekends to make up the time off


• had just returned from a week in New York - my family and wallet weren't thrilled (supportive, but not thrilled!)

But I'm happy to say this conference is a keeper for the reasons I expected - learning and meeting people in my field. And a reason I didn't expect - learning how much I already know. I'm looking forward to next year's which is much closer to home and hope to participate more. It's a great complement to the Grace Hopper conference which I also am beginning to attend annually.

Books:

A few interesting books I heard about. I already have an autographed copy of A Year to Wellness (thanks, Bertice!) - need to put the rest on my wish list.

• Gamestorming


• Remote Research


• 100 Things Every Designer Should Know About People


• Neuro Web Design: What Makes Them Click?


• Proofiness: The Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception


• Lies, Damn Lies & Statistics: The Manipulation of Public Opinion in America


• A Year to Wellness

Some Favorite Sessions:

Evangelizing Yourself – Whitney Hess @whitneyhess
This was excellent for us introverts. Some of it may have seemed common sense but Whitney put it all in a new light, plus reminding us that common sense isn't always common practice. Peppered with appropriate and humorous selections from ThisIsIndexed.com (a new fave site of mine), her down-to-earth delivery, open manner and bold presentation slides made this session refreshing and motivating and had me wanting to start the conference over - I wouldn't have hid in my room so much!

• Social networking is not about a number by your name but being a resource to others


• Have you been setting up your own obstacles?


• Everyone can teach…you can get a gig at the local college teaching a weekend class


• Don’t protect your Twitter & LinkedIn accounts - you want them to be found
  


• Don’t feed the trolls


• Commons sense is not common practice


• Be open to feedback


• 6-month job review cycle is silly – you should know week by week how you are doing


• See her SlideShare presentation for more

Usability Fundamentals Program Orientation – Eva Gaumond (Oracle), Thyra Rauch, Ronnie Battista
This session was intended to kick off a series of pre-selected sessions, workshops & tutorials that, once completed, would earn us a letter of completion from the UPA. It provided good advice for those of us coming out of school and trying to decide where and how to get our foot in the door. Unfortunately, I gave in to the temptation of other interesting sessions and ended up going off the track of selected ones so I won't get a letter - boo. And there were more speakers than I have listed above - sorry if I've missed someone.

• Technology changes so fast – don't worry about having to know every UX app out there. Jjust learn one application really well and demonstrate willingness to learn another.


• Most important thing is to bring the user experience to the table, technology is just how you deliver it


• Move from being an order-taker to the strategic decision-making level by getting executive sponsorship – find an executive with human-centered mindset and feed them info


• Do posters, do lunch & learns – communicate change and share findings


• Person on your left is not going to do it – be the person on the right


• Don’t tell everyone everything, edit out / filter to get point out that will make a difference, especially at executive level

The Psychology Behind Usability – Susan Weinschenk (Human Factors International) @thebrainlady
This started off with the "which is the REAL the U.S. penny" test. I've seen this several times, and STILL can never guess the right penny. Weinschenk followed up with more interesting facts and findings about the human memory, vision, and decision-making process. This is the fascinating part of HCI that I love. I like that her book 100 Things Every Designer Should Know About People appears to be a concise, easy-to-read collection of such things.

• Just because you look at something doesn’t mean you see it


• People use peripheral vision to get gist


• 7 +/- 2 is an urban legend, real number is 4


• People reconstruct memories each time they remember (movie: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind)


• Memories of interviewee can be affected by wording of interviewer’s question


• People make most decisions unconsciously which means need multiple methods and longer studies to figure out what’s really going on


• Interface is a conversation we’re having. People don’t realize it but they want the conversation to follow social rules.


• See her Slideshare presentation for more.
  

Recruiting Better User Research Participants – James B. “Jim” Ross (Electronic Ink)
I thought this was a good "gem" session, meaning that although I learned about recruiting participants in school - I don't remember getting all these little practical nuggets. I could see learning much of this the hard way, after trial and error, or from books and web articles but what a time saver this was to get it in an hour session where you could ask questions. And there was much more than listed below.

• Don’t use people who’ve participated in a research study in last 6 months


• Eliminate people who have an industry conflict


• Don’t read multiple choice answers


• Don’t make elimination answers obvious


• Eliminate people choosing 5 or more items on multiple choice


• Ask questions only qualified participants can answer


• Require proof – example, ask them to bring a particular item in


• Eliminate those with an obvious negative attitude toward product


• Avoid questions that are hard to answer…for instance, asking them to be very specific about a piece of information


• Only use screener to screen, not to collect participant info that should be done with a pre-study questionnaire


• Ask behavior online – don’t rely on self-reported level of ability – ask what they've done online recently


• Screen for eloquence – people who are comfortable talking about what they think, not giving one-word answers


• Screen for physical ability to participate – do they wear glasses, etc.

Tool Time: Remote Testing Tools You Should Know About – Michael Rawlins (Cigna) @michaelrawlins
I didn't realize there were so many remote testing tools out there. I like that he repeatedly pointed out that these are not to replace traditional testing tools and provided both pros and cons for their usage. I do feel there's a strong need - budgets are tight in this economy and user testing can easily get squeezed out (if it was ever squeezed in). These tools allow orgs to cut back on travel and get low-cost, initial directional guidance before moving on to traditional methods. There was much more than listed below, see his SlideShare.

• Try and buy tools help you apply correct tool to task rather than making a more expensive tool fit


• Concept Feedback - collaborative peer review – quick feedback from peers


• Verify App – upload jpegs and get quick feedback from whomever you send URL to


• Intuition HQ - allows user testing by iPad


• See his SlideShare presentation for more

In my next post, I'll give my thoughts and feedback on the tutorials and workshops I attended, as well as the conference speakers.

How I Ended Up Registering for the 2010 Grace Hopper Conference

(Well, here's how I think it happened...with all the pre-conference excitement and buzz, the beginning of all this is becoming a little fuzzy!)

In 2009, I was fortunate to receive a Career Development grant from AAUW (apps currently being accepted for next year - go for it!) So, a few months ago as I was finishing up my grant year studying Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), I began looking for ways to become more involved in the advancement of women in STEM fields. I came across the Anita Borg site which led me to the Grace Hopper site and the 2010 conference. Looked interesting, but it would be held in Atlanta and I'm in Cali. With a full-time job, very little vacation time, 2 elementary-age boys, a recessed pocketbook, a tendency toward shyness, and a good 13 years since I'd been on an airplane, I thought I'd be skipping this event.

The Pull of Grace Hopper
But I kept going back to the Grace Hopper site...again and again. Nice artwork. Oh, now look...they've added more details on the speakers. Interesting. I looked at the scholarship option but didn't apply for it - after all, I wasn't really going to this thing. But wait, was that an HCI track they added to the schedule? And then the conference organizers really turned up the social heat...Facebooking, tweeting, blogging..made the whole thing look not just educational but fun and plain crazy to miss out on. And that's what finally got me.

Tired of Being an HCI Loner
Due to family commitments, I chose to get my Master's in HCI at Rochester Institute of Technology in New York because they have a great online HCI program. Well, that first year of study changed my life for the better in so many ways...I'll blog about that later. But an obvious downside is that, being a long-distance student, I don't get the in-person interaction with the instructors and other students and I miss all the on-campus events like the graduate teas, speakers, clubs, study groups, the annual fair, etc. And then when my summer break from classes came and I really felt isolated, I realized... hey, I need to get my intellect socialized!

Lemme look at that Grace Hopper gig again...
GCH10 looked like an excellent way to get face-to-face dialogue, advice, mentoring, coaching etc. from other tech students, researchers, professors and career professionals - and especially this year with regards to HCI. The scholarship deadline had passed, but that student rate didn't look too bad. And that free Hopper rate looked even better. I figured if I commit to working the conference, I won't be able to chicken out (plane ride?!) at the last minute. So I applied for a Hopper position and was accepted. To defray the hotel costs, I found a couple of roommates (not bad for a shy person, eh?) and sealed the deal with a plane ticket. I...am...so....THERE!

What's your story? Why did you register for the Grace Hopper conference?