{"id":321,"date":"2016-08-09T18:52:19","date_gmt":"2016-08-09T18:52:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/?post_type=portfolio&#038;p=321"},"modified":"2017-02-11T15:29:26","modified_gmt":"2017-02-11T15:29:26","slug":"usability-testing-centre-for-social-innovation-ischool-project","status":"publish","type":"portfolio","link":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/portfolio\/usability-testing-centre-for-social-innovation-ischool-project\/","title":{"rendered":"Usability testing: Centre for Social Innovation"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Context<\/h2>\n<p>This project was part of an assignment for a workshop in Usability Testing in my first year at the iSchool.\u00a0<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I worked with a team of four other students to build, pilot, and run a small-scale usability test of the website for Toronto&#8217;s Centre for Social Innovation, which was then passed on to the organization.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2>Problem<\/h2>\n<p>Our test did not specify a problem with the CSI site so as not to bias results. Rather, we aimed to evaluate the effectiveness, efficiency, and ease of use of the site, by observing\u00a0users&#8217; actions in attempting to gain a basic understanding of\u00a0what the CSI is.\u00a0Our central questions in this test were as follows:<\/p>\n<p>[list style=&#8221;list1&#8243; bullet_color=&#8221;#1e90ff&#8221;]<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Is the user able to find relevant membership options?<\/li>\n<li>Is the user able to find community events and workshops?<\/li>\n<li>Is the user able to find possible job postings?<\/li>\n<li>Is the user able to understand associated costs of involvement with the CSI?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>[\/list]<\/p>\n<h2>Process<\/h2>\n<p>We first developed a detailed usability test plan\u00a0outlining our test goals and objectives, methodology, and logistical details for testing. <strong>We then piloted the test with several users and iterated on our plan based on the results<\/strong>, making changes where users made mistakes as a result of issues with the test rather than with the site.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_322\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-322\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/IMG_20160201_134646-e1470768726462.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-322 size-medium\" src=\"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/IMG_20160201_134646-e1470768726462-300x225.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/IMG_20160201_134646-e1470768726462-300x225.jpg 300w, http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/IMG_20160201_134646-e1470768726462-768x576.jpg 768w, http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/IMG_20160201_134646-e1470768726462-1024x768.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-322\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An image from our card sort activity.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>We next conducted the usability test with a small group of five users. Our test included a background questionnaire, five tasks, a card sorting activity, a post-test questionnaire, and a product reaction form.<\/p>\n<p>We aggregated our test results and found themes in our findings through a number of methods including small-scale statistical analysis using the System Usability Scale and creating affinity diagrams to generate data from qualitative statements, card sorting, and product reaction forms.<\/p>\n<h2>Solution<\/h2>\n<p>We put our findings into a detailed report which was delivered to the CSI and outlined\u00a0several usability issues with the site, as well as our recommendations\u00a0to resolve those issues.<\/p>\n<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-321 gallery-columns-4 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Screen-Shot-2017-02-11-at-10.20.39-AM.png'><img width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Screen-Shot-2017-02-11-at-10.20.39-AM-150x150.png\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-633\" style=\"width:100%;height:55.37%;max-width:1127px;\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-633'>\n\t\t\t\tUsability issues: users were unable to find contact information\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Screen-Shot-2017-02-11-at-10.20.47-AM.png'><img width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Screen-Shot-2017-02-11-at-10.20.47-AM-150x150.png\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-634\" style=\"width:100%;height:56.36%;max-width:1125px;\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-634'>\n\t\t\t\tUsability issues: users found terminology on the site unclear\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Screen-Shot-2017-02-11-at-10.20.55-AM.png'><img width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Screen-Shot-2017-02-11-at-10.20.55-AM-150x150.png\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-635\" style=\"width:100%;height:50.27%;max-width:1114px;\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-635'>\n\t\t\t\tUsability issues: users were confused by the global navigation\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Screen-Shot-2017-02-11-at-10.21.03-AM.png'><img width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Screen-Shot-2017-02-11-at-10.21.03-AM-150x150.png\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-636\" style=\"width:100%;height:55.24%;max-width:1117px;\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-636'>\n\t\t\t\tUsability issues: large amounts of text on the site led to high cognitive burden\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<h2>Key Learnings<\/h2>\n<p><strong>This experience made me a big fan of card sorting.\u00a0<\/strong>It&#8217;s a cheap, easy way to generate a lot of highly useful data and evaluate the effectiveness of a navigation scheme.<\/p>\n<p><strong>I also learned the importance of not bloating tests.\u00a0<\/strong>We wanted to include several different methods in our test to strengthen our findings, but as a result, several of our tests went over the allotted time. In piloting, it&#8217;s important to watch out for timing to make sure you can get all your activities done with all your users.<\/p>\n<p>I learned about the difficulty of forming mental models on sites that deal in\u00a0unfamiliar concepts.\u00a0A lot of the questions we heard from users during our testing were about the heart of the CSI&#8217;s work, such as: &#8220;What is social innovation?&#8221;\u00a0It&#8217;s critical to\u00a0help users fill in those knowledge gaps when designing\u00a0IA, <strong>and to<\/strong> <strong>test sites to ensure that your conceptual model as a designer aligns with users&#8217; mental models<\/strong>, or their actual experience of the product.<\/p>\n<h2>Artefacts<\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/Usability-test-plan-CSI.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">See our Usability Test Plan here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Building, piloting and running a usability test of the website for Toronto&#8217;s Centre for Social Innovation <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":322,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"portfolio_category":[],"portfolio_tag":[52,53,54,55,26],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio\/321"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/portfolio"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio\/321\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":639,"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio\/321\/revisions\/639"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"portfolio_category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio_category?post=321"},{"taxonomy":"portfolio_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danielleklein.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio_tag?post=321"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}