“Ethnography 101″ is the title of a presentation I will be giving at the International Usability Professionals Association in Munich in May of 2010. Of course, there have been more advanced papers on this topic presented at this and other conferences, in the context of web site design. But my objective with this presentation isn’t to break new ground in science, but rather to be helpful to people who are responsible for designing or managing web sites. I’ve consulted for the largest companies and agencies in the U.S., and find that ethnography is not a research method that is even on the radar of many web site owners. Their teams use processes that are many layers of abstraction apart from the reality for which they are designing. This is perhaps efficient, but I think it limits their solution spaces to the design and domain knowledge of their teams.
Ethnography, as applied to the business of design, puts designers in direct contact with the behaviors they are trying to support, impact, or augment. Going into the field and observing their target population in action can be disorienting, particularly if their design product is only one of a cacophony of voices and offerings and options. Back in the shop, or in the usability lab, their design product stands apart in shining singularity of attention, on a pedestal, a thing of beauty in its own right, viewed in isolation from the factors that truly impact its use. Sure, there are many methods available for understanding these factors, and I use a full range of qualitative and quantitative research methods in my work. But I am hard pressed to think of a design situation where structured direct observation and interaction with the population who will use the design is not an essential ingredient for design innovation. Even where the design has evolved to a formula that is fed by quantitative data which then drives each new iteration. Because even in that situation, the best you can hope for is incremental enhancement. Someone else will come along and change the game, and the numbers won’t show it until it is too late to be an innovator.
During the UPA session in Munich, I will ask for audience for design problems that we can use as cases for discussing all the steps of planning an ethnographic study. If you plan on attending the Ethnography 101 session, and you would like the other attendees to consider a design problem you are facing, you can send me an advance notice and I will make sure that it is considered for the group exercise.
Copyright 2009, Paul Bryan, Usography Corporation (http://www.usography.com)
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