Just Enough Research

A Book Apart #9

by Erika Hall

Design research is a hard slog that takes years to learn and time away from the real work of design, right? Wrong.

Good research is about asking more and better questions, and thinking critically about the answers. It’s something every member of your team can and should do, and which everyone can learn, quickly. And done well, it will save you time by reducing unknowns and making sure you're building the right thing, in the best possible way.

In Just Enough Research, co-founder of Mule Design Erika Hall distills her experience into a brief cookbook of research methods. Learn how to discover your competitive advantages, spot your own blind spots and biases, identify small changes with huge potential impact, and why you should never, ever hold a focus group. You'll be on the path to good research in less time than you can plan your next pitch.

Genres: Design, Nonfiction, Business, Research, Website Design, Science, Professional Development

186 pages, Paperback

First published September 10, 2013

Reviews

[Erika]

Actually, I never want to read this again. But I totally think you should!

[Tim Kadlec · Rating 5 out of 5]

In typical A Book Apart fashion, Just Enough Research is one you'll want to keep nearby so that you can go back to it frequently. Erika manages to pack a ton of information into a small package (154 pages!) without making it a chore to read.

This book should be on the shelf of anyone involved in building websites.

[Toon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clearly written by someone with a lot of experience in doing (user) research.
For some people, it might be too basic or not in-depth enough.
I would recommend this book to anyone who doesn't have any user experience, but wants to make a good start. It's a fairly short book, so you can just read it before you start a project, make some notes and get started.
All the advice given by Erika Hall is very pragmatic and applicable to most real-world situations. Coupled with some more in-depth specific information on the kind of research you need to do, this is an excellent primer and hands-on guide.

[Youssef Eid · Rating 2 out of 5]

Extremely basic concepts. No detail on specific research strategies or techniques.

Although this is a good intro to research and its value if you've never explored before.

[Michael Scott · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sketch of a review:
+ Publisher A Book Apart specializes in accessible (read: reasonably short) topics on emerging tech. Overall, better read colleague Mike Monteiro's Design is a Job (and even that with a pinch of salt).
--- Just Enough Research has a confusing title, because it's a book about the study of organizations, users, market, and own products, using mainky qualitative research methods. So, "just enough" means by and large ignoring quantitative methods (the book spends a few dismissive sentences to tell us what good is quantitative research, and a few ungainly pages on linking a verbal overview of quantitative research to a quote from the [Author:Yevgeny Zamyatin]'s excellent but grim We). Even more disappointingly, "research" means largely intuition, introduced as a universal panaceum only to be diamissed by encouragements to cover "all" aspects.
- The author breaks own definition of research - "Research is simply systematic inquiry", but there is nothing really systematic about this work. The systematic parts (e.g., in the chapters on user and competitive research), are insufficient to claim systematic process for the entire work. There is nothing on surveys; the author (and this reader) may not like them, but they cannot be merely wished away.
+ Ignoring the title, the book has a useful introduction to the topic, albeit on-par with Wikipedia for style, and below Wikipedia in quality. This book is also much shorter, so... a reasonable primer.
++ Useful examples for interviews conducted in organizations, for user research including personas and scenarios, a primer on ethnographic field work including face-to-face interviews/contextual inquiry.
+/- Ok but shallow work on competitive research, including SWOT analysis and competitive/brand audit (shallow).
+/-- Weak evaluative research, only plus is usability testing. Underwhelming understanding of requirements, with little detail about non-functional requirements. Same for complex systems, workflows, the bread and butter of design beyond industrial design of individual objects.
- Weak analysis and quantitative research chapters.
--- Dismissive about design research, and misunderstanding the gap between pure and applied research.
- Statements meant to be playful often feel merely disrespectful, e.g., "put an MBA out of work".
+/- Some good references, but (1) nothing new for this reader, and (2) very few references overall, giving few options to explore to the reader.

[Oriana Urquiola · Rating 4 out of 5]

Me hubiese encantado haber leído este libro hace unos 7 años atrás, cuando estaba empezando mi camino en el diseño de experiencias. Me encantó. Está lleno de mucha sabiduría práctica, pequeños aprendizajes y consejos que pueden ser consultados incluso hoy día, no solo desde la perspectiva del diseño de investigación sino también desde la conversación y negociación con stakeholders y de la fortaleza de poder respaldarnos con datos y métricas al tomar decisiones.

Súper recomendado 🙌🏼✨

[Meghan Arnold · Rating 5 out of 5]

NOTE: the UX design folks at Goodreads should probably read this book and then ask their users about how to properly record which edition they read (I read the Second Edition...but now I think Goodreads has me reading this about 5 times).

I am not a "business book person", but Erika Hall writes for people who aren't. People like me that just want to do their jobs better and maybe bang their head against the wall a little less each day. As someone who works in more of a marketing role, but as a consumer appreciates nothing more than a functioning app or website, this book was an excellent read about how the sausage gets made and gives me some tools/language to understand what research is and isn't and how to support my colleagues trying be successful with the "is". Also, let me just say that if my stats class in college used centaur analogies, I would be a much different person today.

[Sashko Valyus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Прекрасна книга для тих хто вже почав займатися UX дизайном, і хоче розширити свої знання в сфері дослідженнь. Це не cookbook, але в книзі намічаються поля в яких треба копати і речі які бажано покрити, що важливо для подальшого професійного росту.
Особливо хочу відмітити, глави про Organizational Research i Competitor research – теми про які рідко розказують, але вони також важливі.

Обов’язково куплю собі в друкованому варіанті, ця книга посібник, який має лежати на столі дизайнера і до якого потрібно час від часу звертатися.

[Kylie Upton · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are looking to start understanding customer research or just looking for a quick refresh on research then pick up Just Enough Research. With great insights from cover to cover you will get an overview of subjects such as user research, competitive research, and analysis and models. This book was a great help to me when I was running my first research project and I definitely recommend it to anyone who is interested in knowing a little more about research.

"Design research both inspires imagination and informs intuition."

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

give it to students, your UX team, your Development team, your Product Management team.
Research is a practiced art that most folks can pick up the basics. We all benefit when the entire team (UX/Development/Product Management) is involved in research.

[Anastasiia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would say, this is a book about common sense and balance in user research, written by someone (Erika Hall) who has a huge experience in the field. Although I'm far from a beginner in UX, this book helped me to fill some gaps and draw a more holistic picture of research classification, methods, process, common pitfalls and advocating for UX in an organization.
The chapter that I will surely revisit in future is chapter 4 "Organizational Research", which touches on stakeholder interview multi-faceted process and gives references for further reading.
Beware chapters about user, competitive an evaluative research, as they are quite shallow and cover basic concepts and principles. Although they might serve as a good introduction for a beginner.
I would pay a special attention to chapter 8 "Analysis and Models", as data analysis and modeling is a crucial stage of any research project.
I won't spoil the rest.
Long story sort, written in a witty and engaging manner, "Just Enough Research" will not be a revelation for experienced designers. For me it was more of a conversational and fun reading that filled some gaps and opened a different perspective on common concepts.

[Max Tieland · Rating 3 out of 5]

I actually liked reading this more than I thought I would! I can definitely tell this is the partner of Mike Monteiro and I like that! Although I think Erika is a little more conservative especially towards big companies like Google and Twitter haha.

I learned a lot from this during my Interactions beyond screens semester. I think I will pick up this book again when I’m researching again. It gives some legitimate handles to help you out doing it right!

[anna b · Rating 4 out of 5]

Concise resource for anyone who is on a digital or usability project. Research is always expensive and can be long drawn, this book gives nifty tips on how to go about getting enough information and research so that projects don't drag or stall. It's a great handbook to have.

[Cat · Rating 4 out of 5]

I pulled this off the shelf to prep for a ux design Focused class I was teaching and found it to be so insightful to the types of situations I was being asked to do research in. Thorough and complete ideas of how to do research when you’re not in the most “traditionally ideal” situations. It became a book for my class and students said they got a lot out of it.

[Adam Amran · Rating 5 out of 5]

While it's written as a primer on research for designers and I already have some experience with it, it still gave me some new knowledge as well as ammunition for advocating for research. Very easy to read, concise book and I can only recommend to all designers out there.

[Isabella Whitfield · Rating 5 out of 5]

So useful, thanks Kelsey!

[kaitlin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book and resource for those just starting out

[mrs rhys · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent, concise, little bible on UX Research 101. Loved it! Notes to self:

1. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH
What research is
-Basic research is carried out to create new human knowledge, whether to uncover new facts or fundamental principle
-Applied research borrows ideas and techniques from pure research to serve a specific real-world goal
-Design research is integral to the design work itself—inquiries that are part of designing, not about design
What research is not
-Research is not asking people what they like
-Research is not a political tool
-Applied research is not science

2. THE BASICS
Who should do research? Everyone!
-Find your purpose
-Generative or exploratory research: "What's up with...?"
-Descriptive & explanatory: "What & how?"
-Evaluative research: "Are we getting closer?"
-Casual research: "Why is this happening?"
Roles
-Author
-Recruiter
-Coordinator/Scheduler
-Interviewer/Moderator
-Observer
-Notetaker/Recorder
-Analyst
-Documenter
The research process
-Everyone working together should have a shared understanding of how the work will proceed. This can be as simple as a checklist.
Overcoming objections
-Research 'proves' nothing - in order to influence decisions with evidence, you have to work WITH existing beliefs, not against them.
Objections you will hear
-We don't have the time
-We don't have the money
-We don't have the expertise
-We need to be scientists
-The CEO is going to dictate what we do anyway
-One research methodology is superior (e.g. qualitative vs. quantitative)
-We don't have the infrastructure
-We can find out everything in beta
-We already know the issue/users/app/problem inside & out
-Research will change the scope of the project
-Research will get in the way of innovation
Actual reasons behind the objections
-I don’t want to be bothered
-I am afraid of being wrong
-I am very uncomfortable talking to people
Research requires collaboration
-The virtues of collaboration: Clarity & definition, accountability & ownership, awareness & respect, openness & honesty
-Embrace conflict
-Better products, faster
-Working with an Agile development team
Just enough rigor
-Cover your bias: Design, Sampling, Interviewer, Sponsor, Social desirability, Hawthorne effect, Curse of knowledge, Seeking validation
The ethics of research
-The project as a whole
-The goals or methods of the research
-Consent, transparency & privacy
-Basic safety
-Staying out of judgment
-A handy checklist
-Be a skeptic
Best practices
1. Phrase questions clearly
2. Set realistic expectations
3. Be prepared
4. Allow sufficient time for analysis
5. Make it memorable & motivating
How much research is enough?
That satisfying click

3. THE PROCESS
1. Define the problem
-A good research question is specific, actionable & practical
2. Select the approach
3. Plan & prepare for the research
Recruiting
Screeners
-What are all of the specific behaviours you’re looking for?
-What level of tool knowledge & access do participants need?
-What level of knowledge about the topic (domain knowledge) do they need?
4. Collect the data
Materials & tools
Interviewing
-The keys to success are preparation, structure & conduct
Usability testing
No labs, no masters
Literature review
5. Analyse the data
Get everyone involved
Structuring an analysis session
1. Summarise the goals & process of the research. (What did you want to find out? Who from your side participated & in which roles?)
2. Review the participants & how you interacted with them (number of people, voice, video, in-person, etc.)
3. Describe how you gathered & saved the data
4. Describe the types of analysis you will be doing
5. Pull out quotes & observations: what participants said, what you saw, etc.
6. Group quotes & observations that typify a repeated pattern or idea into themes
7. Summarise findings, including the patterns you noticed, the insights you gleaned from these patterns, & their implications for the design
8. Document the analysis in a shareable format
What is the data?
You are looking for quotes & observations that illuminate:
-Goals (what the participant wants to accomplish that your product or service is intended to help them with or otherwise relates to)
-Priorities (what is most important to the participant)
-Tasks (actions the participant takes to meet their goal)
-Motivators (the situation or event that starts the participant down the task path)
-Barriers (the person, situation, or thing that prevents the participant from doing the task or accomplishing the goal)
-Habits (things the participant does on a regular basis)
-Relationships (the people the participant interacts with when doing the tasks)
-Tools (the objects the participant interacts with while fulfilling the goals)
-Environment (contextual factors influencing the participant’s motivations & abilities)
6. Report the results
-The type of reporting you need to do depends on who will be making what decisions based on your findings
-Always write up a brief, well-organised summary that includes goals, methods, insights & recommendations
& repeat!

4. ORGANISATIONAL RESEARCH
Who are stakeholders?
-Leaders, managers, subject matter experts
-Make sure you balance out the executive perspective with people who do the day-to-day work. In particular, find anyone who has knowledge of the end users. Customer service representatives & salespeople can offer valuable insight
Interviewing stakeholders - what are they for?
-Neutralising politics
-Better requirements gathering
-Understanding organisational priorities
-Tailoring the design process
-Getting buy-in from stakeholders
-Understanding how your work affects the organisation
-Sharpen your tact
-Types of interviews: Individual, group, email
Stakeholder analysis
-Key points
-Problem statement & assumptions
-Goals
-Success metrics
-Completion criteria
-Scope
-Risks, concerns & contingency plans
-Verbatim quotes
-Workflow diagrams

5. USER & CUSTOMER RESEARCH
Everything in context
-Physical environment
-Mental model
-Habits
-Relationships
-Assumptions are insults
Getting good data from imperfect sources
-First rule of user research: Never ask anyone what they want
-Your challenge as a researcher is to figure out how to get the information you need by asking the right questions & observing the right details
-You won’t be breaking into anyone’s house. You need to figure out how to break into their brain - only after being invited, of course, like a vampire of the mind. If you go in through the front door, asking direct questions, you’ll run into defenses & come up with pat, & potentially useless, answers
What is ethnography?
-"What do people do & why they do it?"
-The 4 Ds of design ethnography: Deep dive, Daily life, Data analysis, Drama!
Interviewing humans
Preparation
The interview guide should contain:
-The goal & description of the study
-Basic demographic questions
-Icebreaker or warm-up questions
-The actual questions or topics
Interview structure (3 boxes, loosely joined): Introduction, Body, Conclusion
Conducting the interview
-Breathe
-Practice active listening
-Keep an ear out for vague answers
-Avoid talking about yourself
-Handy checklist
What to do with the data you collect
-Once you’ve completed your interviews, analyse them all together to find themes, including user needs & priorities, behaviour patterns & mental models
-Note the specific language & terms you heard so you can better reflect the way users think & talk in the actual interface
Contextual inquiry: Travel, Get situated, Interview, Observe, Summarise
Focus groups: Just say no

6. COMPETITIVE RESEARCH
-Your target customers have to love you more than they hate change
-You need to convert attention into habit
SWOT analysis
Competitive audit
Brand audit: Attributes, Value prop, Customer perspective
Usability-testing the competition
A niche in time

7. EVALUATIVE RESEARCH
Heuristic analysis
Usability testing
-Don't make me drink
-Cheap tests first, expensive tests later
-Preparing for usability testing: UT plans, Recruitment, Facilitation, Observation & Documentation, Analysis & Presentation (How bad & how often, It'll end in tiers), Now get to work, Put the competition to the test

8. ANALYSIS & MODELS
Affinity diagrams
Write down observations, Create groups, Identify next steps
1. Closely review your transcript & notes
2. Look for interesting behaviours, emotions, actions & verbatim quotes
3. Write your observation on a note
4. Group the notes
5. Watch the patterns emerge
6. Rearrange the notes as you continue to assess & refine the patterns
Personas
Capturing the character: Name, Photo, Demographics, Role, Quote, Goals, Behaviours & habits, Skills & capabilities, Environment, Relationships, Scenarios
Jobs To Be Done (JTBD)
-A technique to consider customer motivations & value props through the customer's perspective & avoid getting hung up on feature sets & market segmentation. Think of the requirements of the "job" rather than merely the attributes of the customer.
Mental models
-Internal representations of things in the real world
-How to create a mental model: Do user research, Make an affinity diagram, Place affinity clusters in stacks representing the user's cognitive space to create the model - these groups will include actions, beliefs & feelings, Group the stacks around the tasks or goals they relate to
-Building on the towers: Conceptual modeling/site mapping, Gap analysis
Task analysis/workflow
-From simple to complex & back again
-Break it down: Initial state, event prompting user to begin the task, info/tools user needs at each step, any steps at which the task is likely to be interrupted or resumed - put all of these steps back together as a workflow
-Make it flow

9. SURVEYS
Math first
-The larger your sample size, the lower the margin of error. The greater a proportion of the total population you survey, the more representative the results will be.
-Survey response rate - you have to put your survey in front of far more people than you need responses from
Planning a survey: Who, What context, To what extent will people be able to be truthful, What do we think will motivate them to respond, Is there another/better way to get this info?
Writing a survey: How many questions, Open or closed, For closed - options or scale question order?
-Ask more general questions first
-Write simple, succinct questions using specific language familiar to your audience
-Only ask one question at a time; don't combine 2 or more questions into one
-Avoid loaded or leading questions that contain embedded assumptions or preferred answers
-Don't ask people to recall the distant past, or to predict the future
-Offer the right number of response options - enough to cover all likely answers, but not so many that they overwhelm
Using scales
Interval scale
Satisfaction-packed
Likert scale: Select your topic, Pick your poles, Decide on the number of anchors & their labels, Write your statements or questions

10. ANALYTICS
-You always need to answer "Why?" before asking "How?" & you need good answers for both

[Kyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wish I had found this book 5 years ago. Instead, I have spent 1/2 a decade learning to convert academic research experience into product/ux research. This is one of those books I will keep handy for the rest of my career as I mentor others in conducting product research. It is a short, to-the-point, pragmatic guide for anyone looking to bring the benefits of research into real-world contexts.

[Erik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved the humor in this book. A great guide for doing user research!

[Rebecca Karasik · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was my second time reading this book, as I had first read it a few years ago. But it's a great overview of user research. It breaks down in easy to understand and usable terms what different types of user research are, how to set up a research study, and why research is important. Highly recommended to anyone who is interested in conducting user research.

[Ian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really good breakdown of research techniques, targets, and basic analysis. It hits the middle ground --it might be too little for the diehards and too much for a newbie. Either way, good to keep around as a reference.
My main issue: it was so boring! Incorporating real-life/personal examples would have helped (maybe interviews with leading professionals working on known products). The textbook-like structure of 'this is what this is and why/why not to do it' provided the gateway to some epic naps.

[Graham Herrli · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am not the target audience for this book. (The book is aimed at people who aren't sure whether they should do user research. Hall writes "You may have a vague idea that research is a good thing, but the benefits are fuzzy while the costs are all too clear. This book is for you" (p. 3).) That would have been nice to know before buying the book. Usually A Book Apart publishes things aimed toward practicing designers. This book seems to be aimed more toward upper management. It may also be useful to a novice.

Nevertheless, the book is a reasonable overview of research. It gives some suggestions on how to introduce usability research into a hostile company culture. It serves as a good primer of most major types of design research, including organizational research, contextual inquiry, competitive evaluation, usability testing, and split testing. Hall advocates for blending qualitative and quantitative information to make decisions supported by both statistics and empathy.

Here are a few ideas I found interesting:

*In addition to talking to customer service people, getting direct access to incoming service requests can provide insight into customers' needs and language (p. 24).
*Quantitative data helps to explain what is happening, while qualitative data helps explain why it's happening (p. 103).
*It can be useful to run the same test across both your and several competitors' software and determine which site or application does best on each task. (Then redesign to improve your software on each task, then rerun the test.) (p. 114)

[roundface · Rating 3 out of 5]

[fast browsed] A general book covering types of research a business might need. no in-depth or very practical content.

[Madhur Bhargava · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book itself contains & covers a lot of formal ground on UX research and it is not meant to be the user’s first introductory book to the topic. Also, it is NOT the book that you want to pick up just wanting to learn just a bit about UX research and maybe want to carry out some minor experiments(relatively quickly and inexpensively). Most of the learnings are provided in the context of large organizations, big budgets, and bigger teams and are of little relevance to startups(Nothing lean, all fat and juicy)! However, if you are looking for a textbook coverage on research & its types then this can definitely be the book to go to. Oh, and btw, some of the links provided in the book are now dead/outdated and do not work.

[Arnold Saputra · Rating 5 out of 5]

if You are at the business of understanding your user or an UX designer, BUY THIS BOOK!

Erica hall will gave you the honest statement what is UX research and how to do it fast,cheap and the right way. This book will guide you to understanding UX reseach without dictating the reader.

There's also lot of references to having deeper knowledge about UX research. This book are one of a kind .

[Jason]

Excellent. True to the A Book Apart formula - gives you just enough understanding of the underpinnings of design research. Gets your wheels spinning and enthusiasm cranked. Can't wait to put what I've learned I to practice. Highly recommended.

[Gedi௨]

+ Erika is knows her stuff and presents it in a very witty & engaging manner.
- In some cases the author was too methodical and I lacked more real life examples to get the grasp how different methods & tools can be used

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd call this book the "UX research 101" it's an introduction to all kinds of design research, from stakeholder interviews, through usability tests till brand research. Really nice additional chapter on surveys in the 2nd edition.

Easy to read so it's suitable to most beginners.

[Julio César · Rating 3 out of 5]

A great introduction to UX research. She gives a broad perspective on how to undertake a research workflow that makes sense both from the business and from the design sides of a company. A great sense of self-deprecating humour, too. The part on usability testing rocks.