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Recap (5)
Recap (5)
Last Monday's class focused on analyzing data for your recommendation reports.
Today's class focuses on recommendation reports more broadly, and the activities relate to activity 3.4.
Recommendation Reports (25)
Recommendation Reports (25)
Markel & Selber (10)
Markel & Selber (10)
Recommendation Report
Final report, sometimes preceded by other reports, but can also be a freestanding document
Feasibility report is a popular type of recommendation report:
is an action possible?
what are the financial consequences of an action? is it financially wise?
what are the social consequences of an action? is it socially wise?
Your recommendation report is not about feasibility, but usability
What revisions should be made to this writer’s documentation, based on usability testing?
Composing Recommendation Reports
Identify the problem or opportunity:
Some parts of your peers’ documentation may be more or less usable for the user groups they specified. What parts of the documentation are more difficult or confusing to use?
Establish criteria:
Time on task
Task completion
Author-specified criteria
Determine options:
Adding, deleting, revising, editing, or retaining the current content, organization, writing, and graphics of the current documentation.
Study each option according to the criteria:
These are the observations you make based on video recordings of potential users interacting with documentation.
Possibly use a decision matrix
I am not asking for you to include this, but you can make one
Apply weights to different criteria
Quantify the quality of performance or severity of issues
Requires reasons for choosing criteria, assigning weights, and how ratings are assigned.
Draw conclusions:
Classify options
Matrix of generic recommendations you might make to peers
Example of recommendations you might make:
Keep the style of writing in the instructions section the same. Every user commented on how clear the instructions were to follow.
Keep the graphics you used in the parts and materials sections. The components are clearly and thoroughly labeled.
Add to the purpose statement of the website. Users were not sure what the tool was, or how it might be used.
Add a table of contents to help users navigate the website. Some users struggled with the organization of the website.
Add graphics to the instructions section. Even while the instructions were clear, some voiced a desire for images that demonstrated how to assemble the tool.
Substantially revise the organization of the troubleshooting page. Users were not able to understand which recommendations corresponded to the problem they had assembling the tool.
Edit the instructions for accuracy. Some of the steps were reversed, and users were not able to complete the brewing task.
Edit the safety information for Plain Language. Much of this section is written in passive voice and does not emphasize the actions users can take to remain safe.
Rank all the recommendations.
Keep the style of writing in the instructions section the same. Every user commented on how clear the instructions were to follow.
Add to the purpose statement of the website. Users were not sure what the tool was, or how it might be used.
Add graphics to the instructions section. Even while the instructions were clear, some voiced a desire for images that demonstrated how to assemble the tool.
Add a table of contents to help users navigate the website. Some users struggled with the organization of the website.
Substantially revise the organization of the troubleshooting page. Users were not able to understand which recommendations corresponded to the problem they had assembling the tool.
Edit the instructions for accuracy. Some of the steps were reversed, and users were not able to complete the brewing task.
Edit the safety information for Plain Language. Much of this section is written in passive voice and does not emphasize the actions users can take to remain safe.
Keep the graphics you used in the parts and materials sections. The components are clearly and thoroughly labeled.
Present a compound conclusion
If two recommendations are in conflict or tension with one another
Not all reports will have all of these elements. Some reports will have more or less information, depending on the scope of the underlying study.
Group Work (10)
Group Work (10)
Example 1 of Recommendation Report
Example 2 of Recommendation Report
Focus on pages 25-35 of the PDF
What sections do you see? Where do the sections begin and end?
What purposes do you see each section addressing? What sentences or passages are examples of each purpose?
What elements do you see in each section? What are some examples of each element you see?
Discussion (5)
Discussion (5)
Your Usability Recommendation Reports (25)
Your Usability Recommendation Reports (25)
First (2)
First (2)
Open your submission to Activity 3.3. Share your Activity 3.3. Set your Google Doc with general access so Santa Clara University group members are commenters
Activity 3.3 (5)
Activity 3.3 (5)
Strengths:
Many folks have good observations and insights
Many have interesting differences among participant responses and uses of documentation
Some are ahead of our current timeline, and have already started on other sections (Recommendations, Executive Summary)
Opportunities for Revision
Make sure you clarify what documentation and tool you are reporting on in the document
I left this out of the template, but have added it in; should be 1-2 sentences in the executive summary, and referenced in the methods
Some responses could include more meaningful observations and findings
Some responses could include more data from videos (ex., quotes from participants; specific observations of individual users)
Some responses could group observations based on theme rather than user
A lot of responses still have my prompting in the document
A lot of responses are written as bullet point or fragments
Recommendations:
clarify criteria studied
explain terms used in criteria (ex., timely, sufficient, successful, negligible)
add information to tables
reduce information in tables
move information from tables to paragraphs in the findings section
organize findings according to successes and issues, rather than by participant
add information about how many participants had particular successes or issues
add details from data
include quotes from participants
explain differences in how participants performed the same task
explain major issues
explain minor issues
revise fragments or bullet points into sentences
remove information or formatting (Ex., the specific prompts for the section; the highlighted elements I placed into the text)
delete brackets from the text “[ ]”
Individual Work (15)
Individual Work (15)
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