Being user researchers, our strength lies in planning research and interviewing real users of our product.
The entire research structure is an elaborate process.
But, is observation the only critical responsibility while conducting the research?
Observation is just one half of the puzzle we are trying to solve.
The other half and often neglected one isnote-taking.
It’s free, every week, in your inbox.
Note-taking is a basic User Research skill
Is note-taking really important?
We are already observing this right, we can just write down only the interesting points?
The report is not the only artefact of a research insight.
Notes are the legos that build the analysis and synthesis.
What we capture molds the way we understand the user, their experiences, and problems.
Every insight should have a genesis and needs to trackback to raw data i.e notes.
Accountability
How does having such detailed notes help in the analysis?
While the sessions may be recorded with informed consent, notes are used to accelerate the analysis process.
Makes follow up easy
The user mentioned something really interesting and I had wanted to know more about it.
I really cant recall it right now.
Bynote-taking, you might have opportunities to deep dive into the research by asking follow up questions.
These questions can be easily noted down and asked at the end of the session.
you could note down the body language, behavior, and personality as well.
So its always good to have documented notes as a backup.
How to plan for note-taking?
You guys have been doing this since a long time.
But these avenues can push you to get into the habit of writing anything and everything.
A spectrum showing hownote-takingvaries from a small usability study to an ethnographic study.
The extreme range of Notes depending on the kind of study.
The notes can be added to each section when covered during the interview.
Discuss with the folks you will be working with to check that you have covered everything important.
There is no single framework for this.
Experiment with different layouts to see what is most suitable for the study you have at hand.
I came across one such interesting layout which may work for contextual interviews.
By doing this, maybe you are adding your own biases which are unrelatable to the user.
There is an entire next phase for synthesis and sense-making where the skills of interpreting will come in handy.
Do not filter
Record ALL notes and not just the one related to your product or feature.
By doing so, you might be capturing user needs and behaviors that shape your products future action.
Do a favor by adding time stamps
It is fine to miss a few things while taking notes.
Keeping a time display for every session helps you to highlight the times of the section you couldnt capture.
In this way, you might get back to that precise part of the recording and complete it.
So, whats next?
This raw data needs to be broken down and individually coded by the researchers.
it’s possible for you to read the original piecehere.
