Special thanks for brilliant flash work
How lucky we were that it was a beautiful day — in fact, perfect day to go out into a city and meet people.
We wanted to meet people who we could watch vote on two different ballots and then ask them questions about their experiences. A pretty simple thing on its face. But we wanted volunteers to gather that data.
The call went out over Twitter and Facebook and emails and Google+ and networks I don’t even know about.
And who would have guessed that amazing, smart, fun people (many of whom are very seasoned professional researchers) would give up their Saturday — a gorgeous San Francisco Bay Area Saturday — to volunteer their time to conduct a usability test.
Not only did we ask them to give up their Saturday, we also asked them to
- get 20 minutes of briefing before going out into the field
- use a standard script and note-taking form to gather the data
- approach perfect strangers in public places to invite them to take part in the study
- do as many sessions as they could in just a few hours
- bring the data back to a central location
- share their observations and insights with one another and local election officials
… all in one day. There were 6 teams. Among them, they got 40 people to vote 2 ballots. We all learned a lot. (Not only about where in the design people had questions about the ballots.)
So, these are the people who deserve the credit for doing this amazing flash usability test of ranked choice ballots:
Rick Bond, Callie Wheeler, Ghelsey Glasson, Sara Cambridge, Laura Paajanen, Ethan Newby, Beth Lingard, Beth Pickard, Jared Spool, David Cary, Rebecca Sherrill, Cyd Harrell, Frank Castro, Sandy Olson, Nancy Frishberg, Yelena Nakhimovsky.
If there’s any blame to be handed out, it should come to me.
- Dana Chisnell