Context

Whether we are designing a jet plane or a learning activity, we are ultimately designing it for people. In order to fit the needs and constraints of these people, we need to have a model of the actors playing a role in our innovation. One popular way of representing such models, adapted from software development, is called ‘personas’. Wikipedia defines personas as:

‘Fictional characters created to represent the different user types within a targeted demographic, attitude and/or behavior set that might use a site, brand or product in a similar way.’

(Wikipedia, 2012)

‘Personas are the single most powerful design tool that we use. They are the foundation for all subsequent Goal-Directed design. Personas allow us to see the scope and nature of the design problem. They make it clear exactly what the user’s goals are, so we can see what the product must do – and can get away with not doing.’

(Cooper, 1999)