UX Academy Camp 1: The Secret to being a good UX researcher!
COMPFEST 12, Jakarta — UX Academy kicked off with its first camp on Saturday, August 22nd, 2020, and was held entirely online through Zoom. UX Academy was attended by various speakers and mentors who were adept and proficient in the field of UX. Other than them, out of the 490 registrants, 20 people (or 5 teams) were picked to be participants in UX Academy. Every participant, speaker, and mentor attended UX Academy virtually, from the comforts of their own homes.
Wanna know what went on at UX academy? Read this article to know more!
Day 1 : UX Research and Usability Testing
The first day started with a warm welcome from our Academy’s manager, Faarih Ihsan, followed by greetings from the PIC of UX Academy, Nadia Adilah. After that, each participant briefly introduced themselves. Then the participants were introduced to the speakers and mentors who will guide them. The first subject was conveyed by Nanda Bagus Prakosa, a UX researcher at Tokopedia, and it was about ‘UX Research’. The speaker talked about knowing the user more deeply by determining the target user and what the user needs when using a product.
The lecture was continued by Citra Pramana, a Senior UX Researcher at Tokopedia. She talked about usability testing or product validation, which means directly testing a product to the user using the In-depth Interview method. It usually takes only 3 people for testing, a moderator, a notetaker, and a respondent.
“The most important thing in usability testing is that we have to tell our users that the thing we’re testing is the product, the screen, the design, not the users,” said Citra. So if there are problems or faults that occur when the user is testing them, then it’s the fault of the product, not the user. Furthermore, the speakers also gave the participants chances to answer questions that they asked. Next, the session continued with a Q&A between speakers and participants.
UX Academy continued with a case study session, after a short break. Before doing a case study, there was a brief introduction from Bayu Ferdian, a UX Researcher and Managing Director at Giza Lab, regarding Giza Lab. Next, the case study for the first day was explained by Evan Gilang Ramadhan, a Researcher at Giza Lab. participants were asked to practice In-depth Interviews by making a list of questions regarding people’s behavior in managing their money and to interview 2–3 people. They were also asked to download the app ‘money lover’, do some evaluation, and make a task and scenario.
The next event was a talk show! The talk show was hosted by Naning Utoyo, a UX Researcher at SP Digital. The topic she talked about was titled “Life as a UX Researcher”. The speaker separated her experience into two parts; Learning UX and working as a UX Researcher. She talked about how she preferred to be a UX Researcher over a UX Designer because she didn’t have a background in design, but that didn’t stop her from learning design anyways. She started getting to know the field of UX when she herself participated in a previous iteration of COMPFEST! She also talked about the differences in working in Indonesia and Singapore as a UX Researcher. In point of fact, the economic landscapes of Indonesia and Singapore were different and thus faced different problems and challenges. To make a career in UX, we can’t just focus on UX, because there are many things that one must learn besides UX, said Naning. Furthermore, we must also work in a domain that we truly like and are interested to learn more about.
The first day of UX Academy was closed with team presentations. Each team examined and presented the result of their case study. Group C was the first to present, while Group B was the last. Each group received and gave feedback to the other groups.
Day 2: Data Analysis and Reporting for UX Research
The second day of UX Academy was opened with a project showcase. One of the UX Academy participants was given a chance to showcase his portfolio. Ken Rangga, a member of Group A, presented an application he had made before which is related to raw-materials focused E-Commerce, which is then followed by feedback from participants, the committee staff, and the mentors.
The next session was a lecture. This time, the lecture was presented by Senior UX Researchers from Tokopedia, the first of whom is Intan Pertiwi, who is then followed by Muhammad Yusuf. The day’s lecture was about Data Analysis and Reporting for UX Research. The participants studied things like data collecting, data analyzing, procedural reporting, and giving recommendations. Other than that, they also received tips for usability testing and data analysis.
Ms. Intan Pertiwi said that “In a study, the most important thing is the research objective. Because in reality, problems are everpresent and there are many solutions, and when we don’t focus on the objective, our study could be all over the place and be ineffective.” For the first stage, which is data collecting, Tokopedia themselves prefer to use the 1 on 1 interview and usability testing methods.
Next, the lecture was continued by Muhammad Yusuf. Here, he explained how to string up a structured and correct report. Before we start making a report, we have to ask ourselves who is the audience? What are their needs? And how can we communicate with them? Then we have to make a report structure that we use as a guideline, and those are, Chapter 1 — Introduction, Chapter 2 — Main Finding (consisting of subsections that discuss different insights), and Chapter 3 — Recommendation. The lecture then ended with a Q&A session.
The second day’s case study session started at 13:00 and was hosted by Evan Ramadhan from Giza Lab again. The day’s case study was a continuation of the case study from the day before, which primarily focused on processing data obtained from In-depth Interviews. Participants were asked to transform data in the form of sticky notes in Miro, group notes that had the same context and to name said groups, and then give insight so as to form a story, and lastly to make a recommendation.
Participants were given 2 and a half hours to work on their study case. Then, each group presented their outcome. The presentations were a recap of their study case on the first day and the result of the study case data analysis. Participants also received inputs and feedback from other groups and each group’s mentors. The last day of UX Academy Camp 1 ended with delight, the participants played some games and did some introductions.
See you at the next Camp!
1 on 1 Session with A participant and a Speaker!
Arga Ilyasa, a student from the Faculty of Psychology at the University of Indonesia, was introduced about UX for the first time through a Cognitive Psychology course. When he was working on a study case in Camp 1, the toughest thing to do was brainstorming, but luckily his group’s mentor told him not to worry about making a mistake. Aside from that, the most enjoyable part for Arga was working on a case study itself, because participants were given chances to apply the knowledge that they got from the speakers when they were doing a case study. After participating in UX Academy, Arga’s desire to make a career in the field of UX grew! Arga learned many things from Camp 1, from making a research proposal to analyzing and reporting the result of said research. In Arga’s opinion, COMPFEST 12 is one of the best events he has ever taken part in during his time as a college student because it has provided him a conference with quality speakers and knowledgeable mentors. Despite being held online, this year’s UX Academy proved to be effective and successfully achieved their goals, in Arga’s opinion. However, the atmosphere felt lacking with the absence of direct (physically present) discussions and interactions between participants and mentors.
The next interviewee was Citra Pramana, a UX Researcher at Tokopedia who previously hosted a lecture and is one of the speakers attending. Citra has worked in the field of UX for 3 years and was originally introduced to the field in 2016 through a startup. Originally, Citra was only tasked to do general research but then started to get to know the field of UX when she was handling a specific area and started to look into what that particular area needs and deciding what digital products that are suitable for them.
Because she had ambitions to maximize the use of technology to make people’s lives easier, Citra’s heart was moved to work in the field of UX. “ By understanding UX research and understanding what the needs of the users are, it can actually be a form of business development, and having holistic knowledge can be a plus”, said Citra. Besides having UX skills, other soft skills that are needed are, first, empathy. Before we interview a user, we have to know what their background is and position ourselves in their shoes. Second, we can’t be a know-it-all. We have to ask and validate them so as to not obtain insight based on prejudice. Other than that, we have to be confident (not afraid to be wrong) and have our own analytic skills.
Citra was astonished by the participants of UX Academy. In her opinion, they have a strong determination to work on the case study and a great thirst for knowledge. Citra has huge respect for the participants who had spent their entire day of a weekend to participate in UX Academy. The participants weren’t afraid of making mistakes and were very open to receiving inputs from their mentors. Citra cheers on COMPFEST Academy to keep on being a place for students who are eager to learn about UX and etc.
There are more academy series coming up this week, so stay tuned to our journey on Instagram @compfest, Twitter @compfest, and our site https://compfest.id/. (Editorial Marketing/Alifah)
