Persona: User-Centered Design from User Data
User-centered design (UCD) is an iterative design process in which designers and other stakeholders focus on the users and their needs in each phase of the design process. UCD calls for involving users throughout the design process via a variety of research and design techniques so as to create highly usable and accessible products for them.
— Definition of user-centered design (UCD) by the Interaction Design Foundation
User-Centered Design
User-Centered Design (UCD) is a part of SDLC (System Development Life Cycle), therefore the design of the application developed with UCD will be optimized and focused based on end-user requirements. UCD process focuses on the user as the center of product design and development. UCD is an iterative process which expected to fulfill user’s needs so that it won’t change user behavior on using an application.
UCD involves users throughout the design process to create usable and accessible products for them. It starts with requirements and ends up with a customizable application. UCD takes user’s information such as description, pain point, etc to make sure that the application will fit in targeted user.
User-Centered Design Process
Process in UCD demand designer to do research and brainstorming in term of defining user’s requirement. UCD is in the form of iteration, which is repetition and evaluation carried out in each process before proceeding to the next process. Generally, there are 4 steps on UCD process:
- Understand Context of use
The system designer should understand the context of use from system usage such as who will use the application, the purpose of using it, and the situation they are using the application
2. Specify User Requirements
After the designer understands the context of use, they continue to the next process, determining user requirements. In this process, the designer should determine user requirements in business and goals to be achieved.
3. Design Solutions
The next step is designing the solution of the user requirement which has been explained in the last process. This design process will go through some stages start from a rough concept, prototype until a high fidelity design.
4. Evaluation Against Requirements
The evaluation will involve users that will use the application. The valuation will be started from a process to the other.
As said before, all these steps will be done iteratively until the application fits user requirements and implemented.
User group profiles cover a range of characteristics; personas use specifics. The more specific we make our personas, the more effective they are as a design tool.
— Cooper, A. The Inmates Are Running the Asylum. Indianapolis, Indiana: SAMS, Division of MacMillan Computer Publishing, 1999.
Persona
Persona is a fictional character that represents the real application user. It is used to visualize the target that the system designer going to target. In the making of persona, we collect data and analyze it from the market. This would help the designer to design UI/UX of the application.
Persona will help to identify the general description, motivation, frustration, and goals of a user. It also contains the age, gender, address, and occupation of the user. The designer will make as many personas as they needed to fit all the user requirements. The more detail, the better.
Here are some examples of the personas that my team has made:
Bank Jelantah’s Persona
Here are some other example of persona I’ve made:
All the persona above represents each user role that will use our product. Those persona has been through collecting data and analyzing process, and have been approved by the stakeholder. Our team has had done the design and is implementing it right now.
