1. iPersonas | Inclusive requirements for your Personas
Inclusive Design (Guest Lecture)
February 2012
Caleb Tang @calebtang
UX Consultant | Foolproof
Accessibility | UK Usability Professionals’ Association

2. Contents
1. What are Personas?
2. Why Inclusive Personas?
3. Extending the persona development process
4. References
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 2

3. “
“A persona is a user archetype you can use to help guide
decisions about product features, navigation, interactions,
and even visual design”
– Kim Goodwin

4. What are Personas?
A typical Persona may include:
§ Profile (name, age, job etc)
§ Goals (life goals, experience goals and end
goals)
§ Motivations (triggers, rewards etc)
§ Frustrations (barrier, things to avoid etc)
§ Context of use (desk, mobile, on-the-go etc)
§ Skills (domain knowledge, use of technology
etc)
§ Decision making process (behaviours,
preference etc)
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 4

6. Contents
1. What are Personas?
2. Why inclusive Personas?
3. Extending the persona development process
4. References
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 6

7. There
are
One
Billion
people
in
the
world
currently
currently
living
with
a
disability

8. Why Inclusive Persona?
Many people do not consider their
condition as a disability
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 8

9. Why Inclusive Persona?
Disabilities can be invisible,
temporary or acquired
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 9

10. Why Inclusive Persona?
I’m sorry but we are all going to
experience disability at some point!
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 10

11. Contents
1. What are Personas?
2. Why Inclusive Personas?
3. Extending the persona development process
4. References
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 11

12. “
Inclusive
Thinking
+
UCD
Personas
=
Inclusive
Personas
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 12

13. Extending UCD Personas process
ObservaCons
Hypothesis
and
findings
Desk-­‐based
Contextual
Analysis
research
research
Behavioural
segments
Skeleton
Write
up
personas
Workshop
personas
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 13

14. 1. Desk-based research
Where to find data?
§ Customer service/support logs
§ Previous research
§ Available analytics and statistics
§ Disability related organisations
§ Standards and guidelines
§ Good old Web
Involve an
Accessibility
Expert early in
the process
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 14

15. 2. Contextual research
Research tools you could use
§ Home or workplace visits
§ Coffee shop interviews
§ One-to-one lab interviews
§ Focus groups
§ Co-design
How many people and who to include?
Involve users
§ It depends….
§ 6-8 from each disability group
with disabilities
§ Rule of third (e.g. 12 users + 6 with disabilities) as much as you
§ Different disability groups through iterations can
§ Include those with invisible disabilities,
temporary disabilities and older people
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 15

16. 2. Contextual research
Where to find them?
§ Employees or customers panel
§ Disability organisations
§ Specialised recruitments
§ Friends of friends or social media
§ They have already responded to your
recruitment
What to gather?
Involve users
§ Stories of themselves and friends with disabilities
§ Adaptive/Assistive technologies and tools used as much as you
as well as their level of expertise
can
§ Condition related frustrations, barriers,
motivations and preferences
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 16

17. 3. Analysis
How to analyse
§ Map data to behavioural axis
§ Identify patterns of user groups
§ Prioritise disability conditions
§ Consider personal vs. condition specific
preference
Inclusive
requirements are
just better design
requirements
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 17

18. 4. Workshop
What to discuss?
§ Identify overlapping and conflicting behaviours
§ Stretch personas to a manageable number
(normally between three and seven)
§ Identify primary, secondary and negative
personas
Find the sweet
spot between the
requirements
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 18

19. 5. Write up personas
Inclusive requirements can be in form of
§ Previous experiences
§ Future needs
§ Friends or family of persona
§ Secondary personas
§ Age related needs
§ Context specific needs
§ Behavioural characteristics
Personas don’t
§ Preferred touch points
§ Preferred interaction styles
design, designers
do
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 19

20. Contents
1. What are Personas?
2. Why inclusive Personas?
3. Extending the persona development process
4. References
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 20

21. References
Personas
§ AEGIS
http://www.aegis-project.eu/index.php?
option=com_content&view=article&id=63&Itemid=53
§ W3C
http://www.w3.org/WAI/redesign/personas
§ Just Ask
http://www.uiaccess.com/accessucd/personas_eg.html
Inclusive Design
§ Inclusive Design Toolkit
http://www.inclusivedesigntoolkit.com/
Standards
§ BS 8878 Web Accessibility code of practice
§ Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG2)
© 2012 Foolproof Limited 21

22. Thank you