February/March 2006

Volume 46, Number 4

Putting Personas to Work: January Chapter Meeting Review

by Ron Arner

On January 19th, Whitney Quesenbery of Whitney Interactive Design taught STC RMC members how to make usability more human through the use of personas.

What are personas?

Personas are much more informative than the standard, generic user profile, which is little more than a list of demographic data. Personas are portraits. They make users into true individuals by telling their stories, rather than just detailing a few of their common traits like age, education, and computer experience. Telling stories about our users, gives them more "specificity and context", making it easier to design for them.

How do you create personas?

Here are some simple steps to help you create personas by writing stories about your users:

Establish a goal and context

• Why is your persona using the product?
• What will make this interaction successful?

• Stay at a high level, and
• Avoid detailed descriptions of the interface

• What happens as a result of this interaction?
• What made it a success?

Why personas?

Quesenbery's background in theater inspired her pursuit of personas for many reasons, not the least of which was the transition from a "forty foot wide stage to a fourteen inch wide screen." She was also frustrated by the simple demographic information that most user profiles provide, and wanted to know more about her audience. Thus, her practice of using personas was born in order to make better design decisions. And since personas are simply stories, they can be used even if you can't do any direct user research at all.

Quesenbery also clarified that different stories come into play during different phases of the design process. In the early stages of design, evocative stories are used to help deal with needs, goals, barriers to overcome, etc. Eventually, you get to prescriptive stories, which are full of the perceptions, decisions, and sequences of action you will consider while completing your design.

For more information on Quesenbery or personas you can visit her Website at: Whitney Interactive Design or reach her by email at: whitneyq@wqusability.com.