The Moderator's Survival Guide: Handling Common, Tricky, and Sticky Situations in User Research

by Donna Tedesco, Fiona Tranquada

The Moderator's Survival Guide is your indispensable resource for navigating the rocky shoals of your one-on-one user research sessions. Inside, you’ll find guidance for nearly 100 diverse situations (ranging from business-as-usual to tricky and sticky) that might occur during usability studies, contextual inquiries, or user interviews. As a moderator, you are responsible for the well-being of the participant, your study, and your organization. You must be prepared for anything that may happen, from your technology failing to the participant quailing. Use this guide to identify your best next steps, react appropriately, and survive any challenges that comes your way.

Genres: Design, Nonfiction

364 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2013

Reviews

[Graham Herrli · Rating 4 out of 5]

I look forward to using this book in practice.

The first part of the book establishes a framework of how to deal with the wide variety of situations that might arise, including suggestions for adapting your moderation style using common patterns.

The second part contains practical advice on how to deal with a wide variety of specific problems that arise when performing user research...from drunk participants to interruptive observers and from earthquakes to technical issues. This section of the book might be better used as a reference text than read normally. I read through it, but after a while it got to be a bit repetitive; each possible situation has similarities with others.

Scattered throughout the second section are one-page first-person case studies written by other user researchers, which add a pleasant change of pace and a degree of levity to what is otherwise a list of reference topics.

The end of the book pulls everything together into precise and useful checklists that can be used to lessen the likelihood of the unpleasant situations arising in the first place. These checklists are succinct, with just the right amount of information to be usable in practical situations. I fully intend to use them when preparing studies in the future.

The authors state that they've written this book with the intention of it being useful both to novice and expert user researchers, and in this I think they've succeeded. The presentation was basic enough to make sense to a relative novice yet detailed enough that even a long-time practitioner can likely find some information of use in the checklists and the advice for rare situations.

[Marcela · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book covers many different things that could go wrong while moderating a study with tips on how to handle them, from drunk participants to earthquakes. It assumes you already know what usability is and how to conduct a study. It had many anecdotes from UX people on how they handled unexpected situations. It was a fun read and it shed light on the fact that studies don't always go smoothly.

[Carnegie Mellon University Alumni Association]

Fiona Tranquada (DC 2000), Co-Author

From the author:
The Moderator's Survival Guide is your indispensable resource for navigating the rocky shoals of your one-on-one user research sessions. Inside, you’ll find guidance for nearly 100 diverse situations (ranging from business-as-usual to tricky and sticky) that might occur during usability studies, contextual inquiries, or user interviews. As a moderator, you are responsible for the well-being of the participant, your study, and your organization. You must be prepared for anything that may happen, from your technology failing to the participant quailing. Use this guide to identify your best next steps, react appropriately, and survive any challenges that comes your way. Practical, field-tested, and actionable tips for what to do and say―and what NOT to do or say―in each situation. Key patterns and extensive examples to sharpen your approach to the commonplace and prepare you for the unlikely. Illustrative "survival stories" contributed by numerous professionals on the front lines of user research.