Site Visits

by Sylvia Barnard, SAP AG, Usability Engineering Center – Last changed on 06.05.2002

This paper is outdated.

Site visits are visits to customers with the goal of gathering data on the work practices of users. As soon as possible after the visit, the interview and observation data is collated into simple models of the working practices in interpretation sessions, and then consolidated into comprehensive models. The models form the foundation of the interaction design.

Overview

This document is intended to help training preparation and support site visits.

 

What Is the Purpose of Site Visits?

Site visits to end users allow you discover first hand - from the end users themselves - what they most urgently need to carry out their daily work and where they have had problems in the past. Subsequent analysis and processing of end user data creates a product that has integrated the user requirements, closed existing gaps, and solved any problems.

 

How Do I Conduct Site Visits?

Prerequisites

If possible, all participants on a site visit should have done a site visit training course. This training accelerates the process considerably and guarantees that the site visits deliver useful and reusable results.

Overview of the Individual Process Steps

  1. Brainstorming Session
  2. Setting the focus
  3. Expert interviews
  4. Planning site visits
  5. Finding the right company with the right end users
  6. Contacting the selected companies
  7. Conducting site visits
  8. Evaluating and consolidating the extracted data
  9. Follow-up activities: The next steps

1. Brainstorming Session

This allows the team members to see the "big picture" and develop a common understanding of the new project. The goal of the brainstorming session is for all participants to get a uniform view of the new project. The following points are clarified:

  • Defining the most important questions to be settled in the interviews.
  • Uncovering any knowledge gaps in the team so that the areas that will be the particular focus of the end user interviews can be defined.
  • Fixing all the end user roles to be covered by the interviews, and listing them according to responsibilities, tasks, personal goals, and motives.
  • Establishing the characteristics that are important for the later interviews:
    • Who is the main user group?
    • Who or what still has to be included?
    • What is the relationship between the participating people and objects?
    • What are their goals and responsibilities?

A description on carrying out a brainstorming session is given in "Brainstorming Sessions."

2. Setting the Focus for the Site Visit

What Does the Team Want to Achieve?

  • Which end users should be interviewed?
  • Which end user activities should be examined?
  • What are the knowledge gaps of the team members that need to be resolved during the interviews?

3. Expert Interviews

Interviews with experts in the target area can supplement site visits. They allow questions to be resolved in advance of a site visit when time is limited. You can ask the experts in advance about:

  • The role and background of the potential end user to be interviewed
  • Specific industry sectors where the tools could be used
  • The work processes connected with the use of the tools
  • The biggest challenges facing potential users
  • The problems that can crop up within the work processes
  • How information is gathered, followed up, disseminated, and processed
  • The advantages and disadvantages of the existing system
  • The most important characteristics of an ideal system
  • Articles, books, and Web sites that are useful for work

4. Planning Site Visits

The most important criteria for planning site visits are:

  • Do not plan too many interviews per day. (One to two interviews is enough for an interview team of two people.)
  • Dress for the conditions (for example, factory, bank).
  • Take a notebook, pen, and business cards.
  • Organize small gifts for the end users and the contact person at the customer.
  • If you are taking a camera, ask for permission before you take pictures!
  • 2:1 interviews are the most effective (two interviewers to one interviewee).
  • Keep to the time scheduled for the interview.
  • Ask at the beginning where you can meet up with your interview team again at the end of the interviews.
  • Make sure you are never critical of the customer or end user during the entire time you are there!

5. Finding the Right Company with the Right End Users

  • SAP internally there are a number of services avaliable:
    • You can use the iViews Customer Service Center and Customer Tracking to find customers. You can create both iViews on your personalized mySAPNet site.
    • Contact the contact person for the customer at SAP (key account manager) first.
    • The SAP contact person can either establish contact with the customer or give you the go-ahead to contact the contact person at the customer directly.
  • If you are working outside of SAP you shouls check, which services your company has to offer.

6. Contacting the Selected Companies

A Resources section is in preparation where you will find sample letters that cover:

  • Initial contact with the customer
  • Agenda for the customer
  • Writing to thank the customer

7. Conducting Site Visits

A site visit consists of three phases: getting to know the customer, interviews with the end users, and the conclusion meeting.

    Getting to Know the Customer
  • In the first round of introductions/interviews you get to know the people involved. They are usually the contact person at the customer, the IT manager at the customer, the department manager(s) of the end users to be interviewed, and the SAP interview team.
  • In most cases the customer gives a short presentation of their business.
  • The SAP team explains briefly the basis for the interviews.
  • Don't make it into a sales event.

    Interview Part 1: Introduction

  • Introduce yourself to the end user and explain your purpose briefly.
  • Assure complete confidentiality of the interview data and keep to that. The interviewee's boss should not find out anything about the content of the interview.
  • Assure the interviewee that he/she can end the interview for anything urgent that requires immediate attention.
  • Make it clear to the interviewee that he/she is not being tested and that you want to learn from him/her. (The end user is the teacher and you are the student.)
  • Never give tooltips during the interview. Leave questions like this to the end of the interview or it immediately reverses the teacher/student relationship.

    Good Interview Questions

    After brief introductions to each other it is up to you to ask the first general questions. For example:

  • How long have you worked with this company?
  • What is your career history?
  • What position do you have?
  • What are your responsibilities?
  • Who do you communicate and interact with?
  • Who do you share information with?
  • Do you have regular meetings? How often? Who is involved?
  • What information/tools do you find indispensable?
  • etc.

    Interview Part 2: Main Segment

  • Make it clear to the end user that you are interested in their daily work and the problems they encounter with that.
  • You don't want a presentation of the things that they like or do best.
  • Keep the focus of the interview at the front of your mind but be flexible enough to also deal with important issues that crop up.
  • Keep to the time schedule agreed in advance.

    Good Interview Questions

    These are the first concrete questions about the area you want to find out about. Questions might include:

  • Can you show me how you do that?
  • Who or what made you start this activity?
  • How did you get this information?
  • What is your next step?
  • How do you know that?
  • Who will your work be passed on to?
  • How do you know that your task has been successfully completed?
  • What are you involved in at the moment?
  • What were you last involved in?
  • etc.

    Interview Part 3: Open Questions

  • Now you can go into specialist application questions or give tooltips.
  • Both the interviewee and interviewer can ask their final questions.
  • Thank the end user for the time they have given you and the valuable information that you have gained.
  • Present a gift as a small thank-you (for example, a Lamy pen from the SAP Shop).

    Conclusion Meeting

  • Thank the customer for his/her time.
  • Present gifts to the participants. Don't forget the bosses! Appropriate gifts can be ordered in the SAP Shop (for example, SAP watches or Lamy pens).
  • Do not make any promises.
  • Do not pass on any confidential interview data.

Typical Schedule for a Site Visit

Activity
Time
People Involved
First meeting
with customer		 15 - 30 min
  • SAP interview team
  • Customer contact person
  • Manager/department manager of the end users to be interviewed
  • IT manager
  • End user (seldom)
Interview part 1
Short introduction to the end user's work place 		10 - 15 min
  • SAP interview team (not more than 2 interviewers)
  • End user (interviewee)
Interview part 2
Main segment of the interview/observation		 60 - 90 min
  • SAP interview team (not more than 2 interviewers)
  • End user (interviewee)
Interview part 3
Concluding segment, time for questions 		5 - 15 min
  • SAP interview team (not more than 2 interviewers)
  • End user (interviewee)
Conclusion meeting
with customer		 10 - 30 min
  • SAP interview teams
  • Customer contact person
  • Manager/department manager of the end users to be interviewed
  • IT manager
  • End user (seldom)

Table 1: Typical Schedule for a Site Visit

8. Evaluating and Consolidating the Extracted Data

The most important aspect of the site visit is the interpretation and consolidation of the findings. For the first time, through a careful evaluation of the end user data, the team obtains a true picture of how the end user works. At the center of this is the information gained on the needs of the users and the problems that they encounter in their daily work. This large volume of information is sorted out in the interpretation session and summarized in the consolidation session.

Some rules should be observed in the interpretation phase:

  • The team should evaluate the interview data within 48 hours.
  • Each interviewer informs the team in chronological order what he/she has written down or observed, without filtering or summarizing the data.
    Then the team filters and consolidates the most important data.
    There is still no discussion on the content of the interview results at this point.
  • The data extracted from all the interviews is represented in different graphic models (for example, in flow models, sequence models, and scenarios).

9. Follow-up Activities: The Next Steps

Drawing up a Product Vision

From the consolidated data from the interviews - which purely reflects the present position of the working environment and its current problems - different visions of a new working environment are created. This can be done through better mapping of work processes, using new technology, and providing missing information and tools.

Each vision is subsequently examined for advantages and disadvantages, as well as technical convertibility. The best vision is translated into reality in the design sessions that follow.

Design Sessions

Different steps are necessary for converting the vision into the end product. The interaction design is defined initially with the help of the end user data that has been processed. The user environment is then created and, finally, the interface display is fixed. An increasingly detailed design implementation is built up step by step this way from the user data. At the end of the design session the team will have a design specification and a tested prototype that can be implemented by the developers.

For further information on design sessions see Design Seesions

 

Estimate of Time Required

Planning takes time, although it depends whether the end users are to be interviewed in Germany, Europe, or the United States.

The number of planned interviews has to be adapted according to the project planned (see Table 2 below).

Activity
Project Aim
Number of Interviews
Improving usability Eliminating the biggest usability problems 2-3 interviews with 2-3 customers
Expanding the project scope Identifying the processes and functions that are important to improve the competitive edge in that market
Identifying how the end user can be supported		 3-4 interviews at 3-5 customers
Defining new markets and new end user groups
Expanding the market 		Identifying the needs of the end user
Identifying the most important requirements to become a market leader 		4-5 interviews at 4-5 customers

Table 2: Expenditure according to interview focus

 

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