OpenRegistry User Personas

Personas are actual archetypes of users, with personal details and even pictures of composite characters that serve as intimate examples of distinct "types" of users that the system will encounter. (for more information on the persona process see http://www.deyalexander.com.au/resources/uxd/personas.html)

Developing Personas

Identifying and developing the personas to build for starts with researching the users of similar or legacy systems. The following are some practical steps to take to develop OpenRegistry user personas:

Survey users of legacy registry system
- Focus on activities performed and issues encountered
- At SFU this means several main help desks as well as departmental users that interact with the self serve sponsored account creation system
Shadow a subset of identified users
- Selecting a cross section of survey respondents, a business analyst will sit and observe users interacting with the legacy system
Merge survey and shadow data to build identifiable groups
- Users should be grouped by requirements and task flows
Use the identified groups to build unique personas each representing a larger group of users

At SFU we have the legacy users and a Business Analyst willing to help perform the research and development. We welcome discussion of the proposed steps and would love to get input from users at other institutions.

Potential Survey Questions

Please help brainstorm questions in this space that will help build a survey to be distributed to system users. Any given survey will need to be tailored to the school's specific legacy system, but there are generic questions that can appear on all surveys to help build unified persona profiles.

How many hours per week to you spend logged in to X?
How many times a day do you log in to X?
How percentage of your interactions with X are "read only"?
What do you find the most frustrating about your interaction with X?
What is the most common task you perform a right after you log in to X?
What is your primary job function?