Versions Compared

Key

  • This line was added.
  • This line was removed.
  • Formatting was changed.
Panel
panelIconIdatlassian-note
panelIcon:note:
panelIconText:note:
bgColor#DEEBFF

On this page:

  1. What is User Experience (UX), anyway?

    1. how does it intersect with Service Design?

1️⃣
What is User Experience, anyway?

If Service Design supports the operations necessary to deliver a good customer experience, how can we break down what makes a good experience?

Enter: the UX Honeycomb, developed by Peter Morville.

honeycomb w think feel use.webp
staircase of UX.png

*Disclaimer: in practice the work isn’t quite as neat-and-tidy as the tables below might suggest, e.g. practices that make an experience usable also make it credible. The distinctions below are rigid for clarity, in practice the work is much more fluid and intersectional.

**This table is full of resources (and this is the tip of the iceberg). Why so many links? This work is broad and deep, and you need to consider different things, and take different approaches, depending on the context. “It depends”.

THINK · What do users think about the product? Is it useful? Is it valuable? Do they find it credible?

USEFUL

VALUABLE

For an experience to be useful and valuable, we need to understand why we’re offering the experience (business) and why someone is interacting with it (user).

The experience needs to solve real, whole problems and have measurable impact.

  • If it doesn’t serve a clear purpose or isn’t adopted, it isn’t useful.

  • If it doesn’t deliver clear value (solve problems, facilitate successful task completionhave measurable impact) for the business and the customer/user, it isn’t valuable.

What it entails:

FEEL · How do people feel about the product? Do they find it desirable? Also, do they feel it’s credible?

DESIRABLE

CREDIBLE

Often framed in terms of ‘visual aesthetics’, but can be so much more:

For someone to want, enjoy using, return to a product/service, and hopefully recommend it to others: we can layer in an understanding of how emotions impact the brain (e.g. stress and decision making, emotions and memory). The emotional ‘tone’ of our experience needs to match the context.

What it entails:

‘Desirable’ experiences involve almost everything in this table

Broadly, trust in government is a hot topic these days. For the Academy, we’ll be building trust with IM/IT folks looking for us to provide credible support for the very difficult work they’re often asked to do.

What it entails:

DO or USE · When it comes to actually using the product, is it findable, accessible and usable?

FINDABLE

ACCESSIBLE

USABLE

Can a user find our service/product AND easily navigate within it?

Ultimately, when people interact with an experience they’re looking for content (words, images, videos, etc.) that meets their need. I like to say that content is the experience.

Information architecture connects people to the content they’re looking for. It includes searching, filtering, browsing and wayfinding, labels, tags, metadata, and more.

What it entails:

Inclusive design describes methodologies to create products that understand and enable people of all backgrounds and abilities. It may address accessibility, age, economic situation, geographic location, language, race, and more. (NN/g)

What it entails:

Ease of use of the experience: clear, intuitive, can effectively and efficiently complete a goal (NOT the same thing as useful).

Note: generally we want to avoid friction in our experiences, but sometimes we introduce it intentionally. For example, if you were designing a banking feature, you might want to introduce an extra ‘review’ step before moving money around to double-check the transaction and avoid stressful mistakes. If designing a simple form, it could really annoy people and be unnecessary to have a ‘review before submitting’ function. “It depends” and context is everything.

What it entails: