Project - What we learnt throughout the UCD process

Contributors: Femma, Richard and Sven

Initially when we started this project, we wanted to design a product for Bike Messengers. We wanted to design a fairly hi-tech gadget that would aid them with their day-to-day activities.

We wanted to include features such as:

Galilaeo/GPS tracking
Directions superimposed on glasses
Headset for communication
Route Finder and Map
Task Updates
Weather Information
Games/Karaoke

We made presumptions as to what they would have wanted in such a product, at the time we felt that these features would be very useful to couriers, however this proved not to be the case once we'd done some of our initial research.

From the first set of user feedback, we quickly discovered that bike couriers were very hesitant in investing in hi-tech gadgets as they see their job as very simple and do not wish to complicate it.

Their biggest criticisms of our initial ideas were directed at the route finding system and the superimposing of images on glasses. They felt that they could plan their own routes a lot more efficiently than the route finder as they usually used back routes that are not on maps. They informed us that their route varies with traffic light conditions, and a route finder would not be capable of taking this into account. Their final point was that they knew their town well enough not to need the route finding system, any novice messengers to the company would learn routes well enough within a fortnight.

Although they seemed to be interested in the idea of superimposing directions on glasses, many of them felt that this was too dangerous as it removed their attention away from their surroundings and covers potentially dangerous obstacles.

Generally, what we discovered throughout the UCD process was that our perception of what they wanted was very different to what they actually wanted. Throughout the course of the project we have moved from something very hi-tech, complex and very feature laden to something more simplistic and agile. We had anticipated in completely replacing their paper based system, however we quickly discovered this is not what they wanted. They preferred the paper based system because they felt it worked really well for them. The only real functionality they wanted in a digital device was one that would provide them with quick access to information about jobs. They also felt that weather information would be very useful. The size of the device was rather important to them as well as the cost. They wanted something small, robust and fairly cheap. We feel that after going through the whole process, our product meets their needs.

We found that the UCD process is a very effective one as opposed to traditional Software Engineering processes, as we have learnt a lot about designing for a particular audience. One of the key things we learnt as designers was that people like simple and intuitive products, rather than complex ones with a varied amounts of functionality. Most of our users didn't like the idea of change either, so designing a product that adds a few extra features to an existing product like a watch was sufficient enough.