This is the presentation I gave at the Boston UXPA 2013 conference, with Steve Krug and Diana DeMarco Brown. UXPABOS13

1. User Research + Agile
Jen McGinn
Steve Krug
Diana DeMarco Brown

2. Nobody is talking about it
When I started looking for answers 18+ months ago:
• Lots and lots on Agile UX + design
• Not so much on Agile UX + user feedback
• RITE (described in general terms, but few
specifics)
• Co-design
• Customer/user “proxies”
However, when I asked in December, at the Boston
UXPA monthly meeting, a LOT of people were
doing it

3. Everybody is doing it
๏ Show of hands
- How many of you are working with Agile
development teams?
- How many of you are conducting user
research (feedback sessions) with those
Agile teams?
- How many of you are feeling really
AWESOME about how the dev team is
involved in that research and that they
make changes as a result?

4. Hello, my name is Jen, and I‟m a
user researcher for an Agile team …
• UX team started with traditional testing
• Outside the Agile cadence
• The dev team didn‟t observe the sessions
• The data came too late
• The team didn‟t agree with the findings
• The designers were frustrated
• The developers were frustrated
• It was not a happy situation

5. Now you
๏ First names only
๏ Agile User Research only
๏ In less than a minute, tell me:
- What user research you are conducting now
(method, frequency, # of participants)
- One thing that is AWESOME about that
OR
- One thing that‟s not working, that you wish
you could fix

6. Enough about you – let‟s talk about me
• Conducted another full UT (baseline test)
• My designer suggested we try RITE testing
• Rapid Iterative Test Environment (RITE)
– Can change the system between participants
– Developers must attend
– Keep testing until show-stoppers are fixed
– Number of ppts and time to conduct undefined
• A few months before, I‟d been really
impressed by some things that Steve Krug
was doing

7. Enough about me – let‟s talk
about Steve

8. The Krug Method
“A morning a sprint, that‟s all we ask.”
๏ Test 3 users in a morning
๏ Invite everyone to attend: product owners,
developers, designers, writers, marketing …
๏ Debrief over lunch: 1 hour
- Only people who observed can attend/vote (sort of)
- Focus ruthlessly on most serious problems
๏ Report takes less than 30 minutes to write
- Just an email
- 2 page max., mostly bullet lists

9. Our RITE + Krug Combination
• Elements from both RITE and KRUG
– Require that a stakeholder from dev,
design and PM attend each session
– Can change the prototype between
participants
– 3 or 4 participants
– Findings discussed in 1-hour debrief
– Minimal “report” (bullets on a wiki page)
• Sessions went viral: 12+ observers
• Could test every as often as every 2
weeks
http://www.upassoc.org/upa_publications/jus/2013may/JUS_McGinn_May_2013.pdf

10. RITE+Krug Tips & Tricks
๏ Before: Hold a kickoff meeting with
stakeholders to get buy-in into the process
and time required
๏ During: Keep a running list of observations
and email them to the stakeholders within
30 minutes of the last participant
๏ After: Ask attendees of the stakeholder
meeting to review your list of observations
prior to the meeting
๏ Document the observations and list of changes
agreed immediately after the debrief meeting

11. Let‟s talk about Diana
The conversation
has changed from
„what is it?‟ to
„how can we
master it and
make it our own?‟
- Diana DeMarco Brown
(over lunch one day)

12. Agile Research Recommendations
๏ Conduct research before the development
cycle if possible
- But if you can‟t, fit it in anyway
๏ Predictable and repeatable user feedback
sessions during the cycle
๏ Complement user feedback sessions with fast,
low-cost data collection methods:
- Surveys
- Customer phone calls
- Web analytics
- Card sorts
- Un-moderated usability tests

13. What else have people written on
User Research Methods + Agile?
• Agile + RITE testing, finally described in detail (2013):
• “The RITE Way to Prototype”, Shirey, Charng, & Nguyen
• http://uxmag.com/articles/the-rite-way-to-prototype
• Agile + Cognitive walkthroughs (2013):
• “Informal cognitive walkthroughs (ICW): paring down
and pairing up for an agile world”, Grigoreanu &
Mohanna
• http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2470654.2466421
• Agile + Wizard of Oz testing (2006):
• “Adding Usability Testing to an Agile Project”, Meszaros
& Aston
• http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/AGILE.2006.5

14. Agile UX resources that include
discussions on user research
๏ “Adapting Usability Investigations for Agile User-
centered Design”, Sy (2007)
http://www.upassoc.org/upa_publications/jus/
2007may/agile-ucd.pdf
๏ “Successful User Experience in an Agile Enterprise
Environment”, Federoff & Courage (2009)
http://link.springer.com/chapter/
10.1007%2F978-3-642-02556-3_27
๏ Lean UX, Gothelf & Seiden (2013)

15. Now back to you …
๏ Questions?
๏ Comments?