Professional UX Diploma with the UX Design Institute
During the Course in the UX Design Institute, the course covered the entire UX process in stages and as a student you would work on one stage at a time, delving into the best practise and applying it in a real world project. In this way you built up your skills and could see how this was integral to the overall Project. The research was ongoing and had an important part to play in developing the product from the ground up. This shows the tasks involved in producing the application with the user experience at the forefront of the development.
The early stages allowed me to research sites that would already be available within my chosen area, and in my case I picked an airline booking web application as my Project. The first couple of exercises were optional but were important in figuring out good practise and gave a solid understanding of the type of site that could be developed, helped me to recognise good features and whenever possible offer unique features that could further enhance the user experience.
Task 1: Competitive benchmark
The focus of the exercise was to allow you to identify what your competitors are doing right, or what they are doing wrong. You needed to review four websites/Apps to gain some insight on how best to design your own website or app.
Objectives
• Learn how best-in-class websites and apps solve the problems we are trying to solve.
• Understand the conventions
• Highlight best practice that could be emulated in the ongoing Project.
Benchmarking and analysis of existing sites already on the market
Task 2: Survey
I used a Survey tool to gather information that was used to inform my choices when I was deciding on features that should be made available within my site. What type of features would be expected, what annoys users and what should be included to improve their user experience.
Task 3: Usability Testing and Note Taking
The next exercise centred around note taking and I had to review a couple of Usability Tests and used note taking to find the details in regard to user experiences of 2 users as they experienced two desktop airline websites. This was important as when running usability tests it is key to listen and observe in order to clarify the user experiences as they are integral to designing a product that will cater to the needs of the user in the long run. It was also important to observe good practise as I would have to run our own Usability Test.
Project 4: Usability Test
This exercise required that I would run my own Usability Test and In-Depth Interview. Within the Test I did a general introduction and explained the methodology to be followed by the subject. There was an initial introduction interview on the background of the user. Then there was the tasks that had to be completed on a couple of websites and there was subsequently ending questions to evaluate the experiences of the user. Due to the pandemic restrictions this interview was done over Zoom. After the Interview I used Camtasia to edit the video before submission. The Submitted version of the Interview can be found below.
Usability Test and In-Depth Interview
Task 5: Affinity Diagram
Using all the research undertaken so far the aim is to create an affinity diagram that incorporates everything that has been learned so far. This will help to conceptualise the work done so far and will be utilized to make design decisions for the ongoing project. It is useful to put structure on the qualitative research data. Initially I used a cork board and notes to allow me to devise associations and when this was successfully completed I used Miro to create a digital version of the affinity Diagram. I started with a manual version with a board and post it notes, then I arranged them according to whether there were good, neutral or bad points, and then I produced a physical copy in Miro, for presentation purposes.
Digital Version of the Affinity Diagram in Miro
Task 6: Customer Journey Map
The aim is to create a Customer Journey map, using the information up to now to create the journey of a user. It is capturing their goals, behaviours, their pain points and their good points and their mood throughout the processes. It it a good way to capture the customer journey in a methodical and easily digestible manner .
Task 7: Work Flow Diagram
In this project, the goal was to define a high-level flow for the new desktop website. The focus is on one primary use case. and allows you to understand the optimal user flow for the new site.
Objectives
• Define the high-level booking flow for the new website.
• Address all the issues highlighted in the customer journey map.
• Lay the groundwork on which to build the design work in the upcoming project.
Task 8: Interaction Design for Desktop
In this project the goal is to create wireframes for the screens in the new website, following on from previous work, I can start solving the problems that have been highlighted by the users.
Objectives
• Build on the flow diagram and sketch the screens and screen states for users flowing through your desktop app.
• Address all the issues and user goals identified in the research and analysis phase.
• Learn how to use sketching as a tool for problem solving.
• Learn how sketching is a vital step before prototyping or digital wireframing.
Task 9: Prototype
In this project the goal is to create a medium fidelity Prototype for the Desktop Application, and the tool I used to create it was Figma.
Objectives
• Building on from the wireframes, create a Prototype for the main flow within the Application.
• Show the interactions that will be possible for the end user.
• Be able to to do usability tests with users to ensure the application meets the key needs of the user and where necessary find ways to improve on the model.
The Prototype was created in Figma and can be found here:
Task 10: Wireframes
In this project the goal is to create a set of annotated notes for Developers who will develop the application.
Objectives
• To provide Developers with enough information to be able to develop the application, with details relating to how the application will behave, providing enough details to make it easy for Development
• Be able to explain your rationale and detailing the type of information that will enhance the experience for the user.
