User research is imperative for the product/service development. It provides an insight into the needs and requirements of the user or the customer. Excellent user experience can be achieved, if one conducts surveys, interviews, and use other methods to learn and inquire about what the user really wants.
However, during the class I was surprised to learn that Government agencies would create user products without even asking the user about the products.
The presentation by Xiaopu Fung, was interesting as it taught me how user can be sidelined, and a product can be created for them.
While, she highlighted the 3 main aspects of user research which are recruitment, consent and compensation. She also informed us about the usability testing which can be done using 5 respondents only. We need to consider that different approaches lead to different results for a target primary user, however, the cost of impact when solving problem is more crucial. Once, user research is complete product development is followed by prototyping and testing. All these are intriguing enough for me to learn more about how we can evolve the user experience and provide apt services by using better usability testing and verifications.
The presentation, along with my prior experience as a Software Support Specialist, help me understand how the government and the private sector products differ in their user experience; it also explains the wide gap between the services provided by the two type of sectors because of how important user acknowledgement is for each sector.
I feel I can use my past experience in the IT sector and knowledge of how user research is backbone for the product or service, in the public sector to create products and services effectively designed for the user themselves.
To sum up, the presentation was a learning curve to understand how user research is part of the exceptional user experience. Also, I am more eager to learn and see how user research will be adopted in the public sector for product development.
Gaurav's blog 