Personas & Interviewing Steve Chenoweth & Chandan Rupakheti RHIT Chapter 10 - Requirements Text Links to Personas ref’s on the web Quiz 3a, Question 10 Dorte is 53 years old and works as a secretary in her husband’s plumbing business in the suburbs of Copenhagen. There are 5-6 assistants and apprentices in the company.

Outline  Mistakes to avoid  Before the interview  Questions

Most Common Mistake  Lack of preparation  Bias

Context Free Questions  Who is the user?  Who is the customer?  Are their needs different?  Where else can a solution to this problem be found? Quiz 3a, Question 1

Outline  Mistakes to avoid  Before the interview  Questions

Where Should You Hold an Interview?  Non-threatening environment Customer's turf? Room large enough for group  Free from distractions

Interview Preparation  Do some research  Prepare questions  Prepare agenda  Select roles: Note taker Questioners  Don’t stop the user when they are trying to answer a question, don’t just follow the script, try and establish a rapport. Question 2

Interview Phases 1.Establish user profile 2.Assess the problem 3.Understand the environment 4.Recap for understanding 5.Analyst's inputs 6.Assess solution 7.Assess opportunity 8.Assess reliability, performance 9.Other requirements 10.Wrap-up

Outline  Mistakes to avoid  Before the interview  Questions See Fig 10-1 in the Requirements book Requirements engineers should all know standard questions like these, which are good things to ask in many interviews. E.g.,  “How will the software be distributed?”  “Is this the real problem?”  “How do you solve it now?”

1. Establish User Profile  Do some research first  Determine background of interviewee  Find out what will constitute success or failure

Personas – in software engineering  Personas or personae are fictitious characters that are created to represent the different user types within a targeted demographic that might use a site or product.  Used in HCI, Will they be useful for us? Why, If yes How? Right – Examples of personas used by IBM in development of mobile apps by an IT organization. Identifying roles is not good enough. You have to feel like you know a user personally as you develop their software. Ethnographic studies are now common.

2. Assess the Problem  Find out what the problems are  How are problems addressed now?

3. Understand the Environment  Find out about the users  Find out about the computing environment  How much help will users need?

4. Recap for Understanding  Paraphrase what you have heard so far  Is anything missing?

5. Analyst's Inputs  Ask about problems that you would expect to be present  Rank these problems relative to others

6. Assess Solution  What if...  How important would it be?

7. Assess Opportunity  Determine the market for the solution  Determine the value of the solution

8. Assess Reliability and Performance  Determine nonfunctional needs: reliability performance support

9. Other Requirements  Any external requirements?  Any other requirements not already mentioned?

10. Wrap-up  What should we have asked?  How can we follow up?

Why Not A Questionnaire Instead?...  …After all, they can be done so much more efficiently! But  Difficult to follow-up on responses  Relevant questions cannot always be designed in advance.  Advantages of interviews: Personal Contact Interaction/Follow-ups Questions 3-5