The sociologist’s questions always remain essentially the same: “What are people doing with each other here?” “What are their relationships to each other?” “How are these relationships organized in institutions?” “What are the collective ideas that move men and institutions?”
– Peter L. Berger，《Invitation to Sociology: A Humanistic Perspective》
發文作者：asker | 一月 23, 2012
The sociologist’s questions
發文作者：asker | 十二月 21, 2011
Opportunity & Solution
The opportunity assessment should just discuss the problem to be solved, not the particular solution you may have in mind.
All too often what happens is that a product manager combines the problem to be solved with the solution and, when they run into difficulties with the particular solution they are pursuing, they abandon the opportunity. It’s a classic example of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
– Marty Cagan，《Inspired: How To Create Products Customers Love》
張貼於閱讀::Reading, 話語::Quote
發文作者：asker | 十二月 8, 2011
求婚大作戰、connecting the dots、使用者研究
《求婚大作戰》是一部我非常喜歡的日劇。
今天一個老同事捎來訊息，說終於看了我多年前強力推薦的《求婚大作戰》，覺得頗有感觸，很想提筆寫下心得。
在還沒看到老同事的心得前，我想先寫寫自己的，雜亂的想法。
在《求婚大作戰》的劇情推展中，男主角一次又一次的改變過去的某個片段，彌補生命中一個又一個的小小遺憾，但到頭來女主角卻仍是別人的新娘。這些努力改變過去的嘗試是沒有價值的嗎？不，每一個小小的改變都確實的彌補了男女主角生命中的某些缺憾。
當一家企業剛開始嘗試研究使用者的生活脈絡，並希望藉此改善產品與服務的設計時，其實也很可能會碰到一樣的狀況。當企業花費心力瞭解使用者的生活脈絡，透過設計幫助他把生命中的某個缺口或遺憾填滿後，未必就會看到一飛沖天的銷售量或營收。
為什麼？因為商業上的成敗背後其實有很複雜的因果，一個產品是否會大賣，並不完全取決於這個產品的設計是否能幫使用者化解生活中的某「一個」遺憾。
咖啡牛奶、鈕釦，或者把握一生中最後一次和爺爺相處的機會都很重要，都讓女主角的生命更加圓滿。但女主角會和誰結婚背後也有很複雜的因果關係，「個別」來看不論是咖啡牛奶、鈕釦還是爺爺，都無法保證女主角會成為自己的新娘。
怎麼辦？還能怎麼辦，當然是繼續堅持，一集一集的彌補過去的缺憾，直到最後一集…
當最後退無可退，已經沒有照片可以讓他回到過去的時候，就在現在，就在當下，男主角做了最後一次的嘗試…
這裡就是我最喜歡《求婚大作戰》的地方，男主角最後一次的努力其實並不比之前的任何一次高明，但最後的這一次，把之前所有的努力串連在一起了。
如果用Steve Jobs的話來說，《求婚大作戰》最令我著迷的地方，就在於這其實是一個「connecting the dots」的故事。
None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me.
…(中略)…
If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.
– Steve Jobs
而更重要的是，要完成一齣「connecting the dots」的故事，我們都必須擁有足夠的信念，才能撐過黎明前的黑夜。
Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.
– Steve Jobs
不論是戀愛也好，人生也好，在企業中導入使用者研究也好，願我們都能在最終回中仍勇敢的不斷努力，直到親眼見到所有的點都連接起來的神奇時刻。
發文作者：asker | 十一月 21, 2011
Transformation is nothing more than a shift in perception
Einstein says, 『We cannot solve a problem at the same level of consciousness that created the problem.』
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At the heart of the apparent problem is a dilemma. Problems can be solved, while dilemmas can only be resolved through a shift in perception.
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Transformation is nothing more than a shift in perception. A shift in perception does not necessarily mean a happy ending. Freedom from the bondage of an idea does not necessarily mean that the boy gets the girl. Sometimes we only see the light as darkness descends.
– Alan Watt ，《The 90-Day Novel: Unlock the story within》
張貼於閱讀::Reading, 話語::Quote
發文作者：asker | 十一月 8, 2011
無題
It doesn’t help that we live in a left-brain society. We have been trained to second-guess ourselves, to be more interested in the result than the process. We are not encouraged to be curious, so it’s difficult to really get quiet and inquire.
– Alan Watt ，《The 90-Day Novel: Unlock the story within》
雖然作者是在講「寫小說」這件事，但這段文字卻讓我不禁聯想到使用者研究。
張貼於閱讀::Reading, 話語::Quote
發文作者：asker | 九月 6, 2011
成本是使用者田野研究的致命傷嗎？
The biggest downside to field studies is the cost to the organization. Scheduling the visits, taking team members out of the office for several days, and finishing the analysis can have a huge impact on a project’s resources.
The most successful organizations look beyond the current project, realizing that the value from the information learned will feed into future projects for years to come. Using this perspective, they amortize the costs across many development projects and it becomes an extremely cost effective method for gathering critical information. (這段其實和之前Norman爺的那句『Then when a project starts, hey guess what, the research has already been done.』有異曲同工之妙)
When we look at teams that are struggling to produce quality designs, almost always it is the result of spending time guessing and estimating user needs instead of working with actual data. Field studies can eliminate ‘opinion wars’ by replacing the strongly-held hunches of the team members with real information that describes what is happening. This is probably the biggest benefit that teams see.
– Jared Spool，《Field Studies: The Best Tool to Discover User Needs》
張貼於閱讀::Reading, 話語::Quote
近期迴響