Kyle Soucy

NH UPA September Meeting: The Total Customer Experience: The Road Ahead

Topic: The Total Customer Experience: The Road Ahead

Speaker: Bill Gribbons, Bentley

When:
Wednesday, September 17th
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00 PM – Food & beverages will be provided.
Meeting: 7:00 PM – 8ish

Where:
Mad*Pow Media Solutions, LLC (Google map: http://tinyurl.com/5aewd4)
40 Pleasant Street
Portsmouth, NH 03801

Parking Map: http://tinyurl.com/ytsuz8 (street parking and free parking behind Mad*Pow at Ocean Bank is also available)

Summary:
Usability professionals are uniquely positioned to take advantage of the radical changes occurring in the marketplace for technology products and services. The competitive advantage in this sector is slowly shifting from one defined exclusively by engineering, to that of simplicity, usability and the total customer experience. What are the implications of such a shift for our profession?

To compete and thrive in the constantly evolving high-tech sector, professionals working in this sector must also evolve. Based on market and hiring data, Dr. Gribbon’s presentation will highlight the challenges and opportunities we face today and how we must prepare ourselves to take full advantage of these opportunities. He will highlight how the emergence of the experience economy has opened exciting opportunities in new sectors such as healthcare, financial services, e-business, gaming, and consumer electronics.

Professor Gribbons is Director of the Human Factors and Information Design programs at Bentley, where he teaches courses in human factors and information design on the undergraduate and graduate levels. The Information Design Programs at Bentley are among the largest and most respected programs of this type in the country. Bill was also founder of the Design and Usability Center. Over the past twenty-five years, he has consulted with hundreds of companies around the globe on issues related to product design, usability, and the user experience as business strategy.

He received his PhD from the University of Maryland. He is an Associate Fellow of the Society for Technical Communication (STC) and was a member of the Technical Communication Editorial Board. He is also a member of the IEEE, the Association for Educational Communications and Technology, the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Usability Professional Association, and the ACM SIGCHI. He is a popular speaker at local and national conferences addressing issues of information design, human factors, and the user experience. He is frequently quoted in the national media on issues related to the user experience and product design. His long-term research interests center on the building of a unified theory defining the user experience.

RSVP:
Please send RSVPs to info@nhupa.org so we have an idea of the head count for the venue and refreshments.

***NH UPA meetings are always open to anyone who is interested in attending. Membership to the UPA is NOT required.***

Hope to see you there!

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Local meeting | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA | UPA
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NH UPA July Meeting: 10 Marketing Myths Usability Experts Need to Know

Topic: 10 Marketing Myths Usability Experts Need to Know

Speaker: Aileen Cahill, Customer Connections

When:
Wednesday, July 23rd
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00 PM – Food & beverages will be provided.
Meeting: 7:00 PM – 8ish

Where:
Chordiant Software, Inc. (Google map: http://tinyurl.com/43le9t)
8 Commerce Drive
Bedford, NH 03110

Summary:
As user experience professionals, we work with marketing teams all the time. Successful collaboration isn’t always easy, but it’s key to creating a superior customer experience that meets the goals of both the business and the customer. Aileen Cahill has helped re-engineer companies into becoming more customer focused for over 20 years. She will share insights from her time on the inside; marketing’s modus operandi, key motivators, organizational metrics, and facilitate an exploration of frameworks and processes where collaboration will deliver a truly remarkable customer experience; both online and offline.

Aileen Cahill co-authored the transformative marketing text used by leading MBA programs, Internet Marketing: Building Advantage in a Networked Economy, which presents a customer-focused framework for integrating marketing both online and offline. She is a classically trained brand marketer from the Fortune 1,000 and Customer Relationship Management pioneer who founded the Pepper + Rogers Group consulting division.  Aileen is currently an Adjunct Professor of Marketing at the University of Southern Maine and is the Managing Partner of the consulting firm Customer Connections.  Her MBA in marketing is from Cornell’s Johnson Graduate School of Management and she graduated Magna Cum Laude with a degree in Experimental Psychology from SUNY Binghamton.

RSVP:
Please send RSVPs to info@nhupa.org so we have an idea of the head count for the venue and refreshments.

***NH UPA meetings are always open to anyone who is interested in attending. Membership to the UPA is NOT required.***

Hope to see you there!

Best,

Kyle Soucy
President, NH UPA

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Local meeting | Locales | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA
Tags: marketing | upa | Usability | user experience | UX
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NH UPA June Meeting: Speed Networking & Topic Discussions

NH UPA is trying a new and fun meeting format for June. We’re calling the meeting format NH UPA Speed Networking - similar to speed dating, but obviously with a different goal in mind!

All those attending the meeting will have the chance to speak with others in a one-on-one or small group format for a short period of time before rotating to meet with others. This will be more than just small talk, though. After a quick introduction, the discussion will focus on specific topics of interest relating to usability and design. We hope the format will help attendees learn about fellow NH UPA members, hear what others are doing, learn different viewpoints on issues, and be inspired by other’s ideas. There is no homework or requirements for the meeting and the discussions will be open to experienced professionals and beginners alike.

Specific Topics for Discussion may include:
Usability in Agile Software Development
Making the Business Case for User Experience Design
Preferred Prototyping Methods
Eye Tracking - Valuable or Hype?
Use of Personas
Favorite IA Methods - Card Sorting, Freelisting, Content Analysis, etc
Inspiring Interfaces
Web Site Navigation Paradigms
Recommended Books and Learning Opportunities
AJAX and Web 2.0 Technology
Others…

When:
Wednesday, June 25th
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00 PM
Meeting: 7:00 PM – 8ish

Where:
PixelMEDIA
222 International Drive
Suite 175
Portsmouth, NH 03801

RSVP:
We look forward to seeing you there! RSVP is required - please send RSVPs to info@nhupa.org so we can plan accordingly.

NH UPA meetings are always open to anyone who is interested in attending. Membership to the UPA is NOT required.

Best,

Kyle Soucy
President, NH UPA

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Local meeting | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA | UPA
Tags: ia | information architecture | nh upa | upa | Usability | user experience | user research | UX
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NH UPA May Meeting: Sneak Peak at Morae 3 and UserVue Demo

Topic: Morae 3 and UserVue Demo!

Speaker: Shane Lovellette, Morae and UserVue Product Manager - Techsmith

When you think of TechSmith Morae, you probably think of testing things on a computer screen—like a software application or Web site. But what about testing the iPhone user’s experience? Could Morae speed up and simplify a whole range of testing methods, from paper prototyping to in-depth interviews to focus groups? Could it enable unmoderated testing? The Morae development team is hard at work to support all these methods and approaches! In this session, we’ll pull back the curtain to give you a peek at what’s coming…and demonstrate specific use scenarios. We hope you can join us!

Shane Lovellette, the creator of Morae and UserVue, will be here from TechSmith to give us a demo and explain the benefits of using the new version of Morae and UserVue for conducting, recording, observing, analyzing, and presenting the results of in-person and remote user research tests.

When:
Wednesday, May 21st
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00 PM – Food & beverages will be provided.
Meeting: 7:00 PM – 8ish

Where:
Chordiant Software, Inc.
8 Commerce Drive
Bedford, NH 03110

Google map: http://tinyurl.com/43le9t

Summary:
The demo will cover how to: collect local and remote test session data, observe test sessions in local and remote environments, and analyze test sessions with the advanced analytical capabilities of the new v. 3.0 of Morae Manager (not out yet!) and UserVue. We will learn about automated and aggregated usability metric analysis, graphing and reporting, as well as creating video highlight presentations.

For those of you who already use Morae and UserVue, Shane will answer any questions you have about the products and give us all a demo of the new version of Morae 3.

About Shane Lovellette:
Shane Lovellette is the product manager for Morae and UserVue. Shane came to TechSmith with over eight years of management and production experience in video and television.

In 2004, Shane helped TechSmith introduce Morae, the first all-digital solution that records and synchronizes user and system data for the analysis of human-computer interaction. In that time, Morae has become the gold standard for usability testing and user experience research.

Shane holds a bachelor’s degree in television, radio, and film production from Syracuse University and an MBA from Michigan State University. Shane resides in DeWitt, Michigan, with his wife and two children.

RSVP:
Please send RSVPs to info@nhupa.org so we have an idea of the head count for the venue and refreshments.

***NH UPA meetings are always open to anyone who is interested in attending. Membership to the UPA is NOT required.***

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Local meeting | Locales | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA | Organizations | UPA | Uncategorized
Tags: morae | remote | remote testing | research | techsmith | user research usability | user test | user testing | uservue
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NH UPA April Meeting

Please join us for our April meeting to take part in an interesting article discussion…

When:
Thursday, April 17th
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00 PM
Meeting: 7:00 PM – 8ish

Where:
Fat Belly’s Grill & Bar (http://www.fatbellysgrillandbar.com)
2 Bow Street
Portsmouth, NH 03801

Street Map: http://tinyurl.com/448pk3
Parking Map: http://tinyurl.com/ytsuz8 (street parking is also available)

RSVP:
An RSVP is not required, but it helps us to have an idea of the head count for the venue. Please send RSVPs to info@nhupa.org.

Topic:
~ Article Discussion ~

For this meeting, we’d ask that you read the selected articles ahead of time (don’t worry, they’re short articles, not books), jot down at least one discussion point about each article, then come prepared to discuss. Your discussion point can be a question, an example from your experience, or simply your perspective. We only ask that you keep your points constructive and not overly critical of the article or the authors. We will have two moderators that will help facilitate the discussion.

Thank you for your votes on the articles to read. The three “winners” are:

“Cultures of Prototyping”, Michael Schrage
http://hci.stanford.edu/bds/10-Schrage.pdf

“Getting the Right Design and the Design Right: Testing Many Is Better Than One”, Maryam Tohidi, William Buxton, Ronald Baecker, Abigail Sellen.
http://www.billbuxton.com/rightDesign.pdf

“Feature Richness and User Engagement”, Jakob Nielsen
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/features.html

NH UPA meetings are always open to anyone who is interested in attending. Membership to the UPA is NOT required.

Hope to see you there!

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Local meeting | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA | UPA
Tags: hci | interaction design | interface design | nh upa | upa | Usability | user experience | UX
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NH UPA March Meeting: Sarah Bloomer (Dover, NH, USA)

Please join us for the NH UPA March Meeting…

Topic: Expanding User-Centered Design in the 21st Century or Why Design Thinking is the Next Big Thing.

Speaker: Sarah Bloomer, Sarah Bloomer & Co

When:
Wednesday, March 26th
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00 PM – Food & beverages will be provided.
Meeting: 7:00 PM – 8ish

Where:
Liberty Mutual
150 Liberty Way
Dover, NH 03820

Parking Directions: Park in the front lot. License and plate number needs to be presented at security desk. RSVP required (see below).

Abstract:
What is design thinking? Why is it important? What does design thinking mean to the field of user centered design?

Take a closer look: it seems design thinking heavily leverages user-centered design…

Stanford University recently set up a new Institute of Design (the d.school), founded by, amongst others, David Kelley and Terry Winograd, big names in interaction design. Its website boldly states “we believe design thinking is a catalyst for innovation and bringing new things into the world”.

Business Week Online includes a section on Innovation, where design is a major theme. And in his book A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink says that the new MBA is the MFA. He claims we are moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age. And people with design thinking will lead the way.

This talk is an overview of how design thinking is finding its place in companies worldwide, and how user-centered design is being applied across many fields, from organizational design to product design.

About Sarah Bloomer:
Sarah Bloomer has designed user interfaces for 20 years. In 1991 she co-founded the interaction design company The Hiser Group. With Hiser, she helped establish the field of user-centered design in Australia. Upon returning to the USA in 2002, Sarah was a senior interaction designer for The MathWorks before starting Sarah Bloomer & Co, a consulting practice focusing on collaborative design facilitation.

Sarah has delivered papers, tutorials and workshops at user interface design conferences in Australia and the USA. Her tutorial, Successful Strategies for Selling Usability into Organizations, became a CHI classic. Sarah also led the conceptualization and development of The Hiser Element™ toolkit, a user-centered design methodology created to help companies rapidly set up usability teams.

Sarah holds an MS from New York University in interactive software design, a BA from Smith College, and served as masters supervisor at The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.

RSVP:
You must RSVP to attend, as security is tight at Liberty Mutual. Please send RSVPs to info@nhupa.org.

NH UPA meetings are always open to anyone who is interested in attending. Membership to the UPA is NOT required.

+ + +

Stay informed about NH UPA meetings and events by joining the NH UPA Yahoo! group at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/nh-upa/.

+ + +

Hope to see you there!

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Local meeting | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA | UPA
Tags: design | design thinking | upa | Usability | UX
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NH UPA February Meeting

Our February 19th NH UPA meeting will be a highly engaging and informative night with 4 different 10-minute talks by 4 different speakers. The “10-minute talk” format is popular because of the pace of the meeting and the variety of topics discussed related to usability and user experience design.

Please RSVP to info@nhupa.org if you plan to attend.

Topics:
Cognitive Biases and the Fundamental Attribution Error in User-
Centered Design by Chauncey Wilson, Autodesk

Words Set the Stage: Modeling Good Behavior for User-generated
Content by Margot Bloomstein, PixelMEDIA

Pros and Cons of Presenting Multiple Options of a Design to the
Project Team by Shannon McHarg, H&R Block

Remote Usability Testing: Best Practices and Lessons Learned by
Rebecca Richkus, Autodesk

Where:
PixelMEDIA
222 International Drive
Suite 175
Portsmouth, NH 03801

Time:
6:00-7:00 PM - Networking (refreshments provided by PixelMEDIA)
7:00-8:00 PM - 10-Minute Talks

About 10-Minute Talks:
Presenter talks are strictly limited to 10 minutes and 6 slides max. Following each presenter, there will be 5 minutes for Q&A. This makes preparation and presentation easy and keeps things moving for the audience.

For usability and user experience practitioners, you will find plenty of tips and tricks you can use in your job. For those who are new to usability, the variety of topics will give you a good idea of what the profession is all about.

We look forward to seeing you there! Please RSVP so we can plan appropriately.

RSVP or questions: info@upa.org

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Local meeting | Locales | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA | Social
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What Makes a Design Seem Intuitive? (Durham, NH, USA)

Please join us for the Inaugural NH UPA Meeting with speaker, Jared Spool! For our first official UPA chapter meeting we will kick off the New Year with special guest Jared Spool, an internationally renowned authority on usability, to discuss what makes a design seem intuitive.

When: Thursday, January 24
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00 PM – Food & beverages will be provided.
Meeting: 7:00 PM – 8ish

Where:
University of New Hampshire (UNH)
Kingsbury Hall, Room N101
33 College Road
Durham, NH

Campus Map: http://www.unh.edu/map/UNHCampusMapcrop.pdf

Directions: http://www.unh.edu/transportation/visitor/directions.htm

Parking Directions: Park in Lot B – See Parking Details below.

Topic: What Makes a Design Seem Intuitive?

Everyone wants an “intuitive” interface: the users, the designers, and the content publishers. But building them is hard. User Interface Engineering’s recent research has given insight into why it’s hard and how to get past major obstacles.

To build an “intuitive” interface, a designer has to do two things: (1) Take complete advantage of what the user already knows, so what they see is completely familiar to them and (2) make the act of learning anything new completely imperceptible to the user. It turns out, if the interface requires the user to realize they are learning something, the “intuitive” label disappears instantly.

In this talk, Jared will show:

• How users need both tool knowledge and domain knowledge to complete their tasks
• How simple problems with designs can cause big problems for users
• What successful teams are doing to create experiences that delight

Jared will show examples from Microsoft Word, MSN, Google Talk, Flickr, Avis, and many more.

RSVP: Seats are limited. You must RSVP to attend, so don’t delay in reserving your spot! Send RSVPs to info@nhupa.org. You will receive an email confirmation once your name has been added to the list of attendees.

NH UPA meetings are open to anyone who is interested in attending. Membership to the UPA is NOT required.

ABOUT OUR SPONSOR: The UNH Department of Computer Science is well-known for sending skilled, adaptable students into the workforce. Part of the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, our undergraduate and graduate curricula encourage students to apply computer science in a broad set of areas, including bioinformatics. Many of our undergraduate and graduate students end up landing internships and jobs at local businesses; while others venture to places like e-Bay in California and Microsoft in Washington State. Our faculty members have wide-ranging interests and research projects, with concentrations in artificial intelligence, bioinformatics, computer graphics and scientific visualization, database and knowledge base systems, operating systems and computer networks, parallel computing and compiler design, and theoretical computer science.

Stay informed about NH UPA meetings and events by joining the NH UPA Yahoo! group at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/nh-upa/

Parking Details: Attendees will be parking in B Lot, which is normally closed to the public until 6 p.m., but they’re going to stop ticketing at 5:30 for the purposes of this event.

To get to B Lot follow 155A, or Main Street, up a hill past the Whittemore Center. Stay straight at the stop light. Shortly after you pass Thompson Hall (building with the clock tower) on the right, Main Street will turn into a one-way street. Once it does, take your first right onto Mill Road. You’ll pass a small shopping plaza on the left and almost immediately after, there will be a parking lot on the right. This is C Lot, but go beyond that lot and take your second right onto McDaniel Drive. Shortly thereafter, B lot will be on your right. Park on the opposite end of the parking lot, closest to College Road. Walk towards College Road and take a left. You’ll pass McConnell Hall on the left, then Parsons Hall, then you’ll come to Kingsbury.

Parking Map: http://unh.edu/transportation/visitor/map.pdf

Hope to see you there!

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Local meeting | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA | UPA
Tags: nh upa
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NH UPA Chapter Approved!

I’m very excited to report that the UPA Board just approved the NH UX group to become it’s newest UPA Chapter!

NH UPA is a group for user experience professionals in the Seacoast and Southern NH regions.

The group’s goal is to foster the growth of the local user experience community, provide networking and professional development opportunities for usability professionals, and provide an environment for members to exchange information on tips, tools, methodologies, and technologies related to usability.

To join the group, please visit: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/nh-upa/join.

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA | UPA
Tags: nh upa | nh ux | portsmouth | Usability | user experience
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NH UX Poster Session/Holiday Social (Portsmouth, NH, USA)

Got a tough design problem to solve? Have something interesting your working on? Are you using a cool new tool or method you want to share? Need to vent about your biggest problem of the week? Here’s a chance for you all to share YOUR big ideas and get to know the work of your colleagues in the NH UX group!

We have a fun night planned for the month ahead…

When:
Wednesday, December 5^th
6:00 PM – 8ish

Where:
AK’s Bar & Bistro (2nd floor)
111 State Street
Portsmouth, NH 03801

Street Map: http://tinyurl.com/2edxky
Parking Map: http://tinyurl.com/ytsuz8 (street parking is also available)

Poster Session/Holiday Social:
This isn’t a typical conference poster session. You don’t need to get elaborate; just have fun and get creative! Bring your poster on an 11×17 piece of paper and we will mount for display. You can print a screen shot of something you worked on, perhaps a before-and-after. Or you can draw up an idea or a unique process that you use in your work. Again, we are not looking for elaborate polished posters, just something simple to demonstrate an idea. All posters will be on display throughout the night while everyone has the opportunity to meet and network with other local UX professionals. If interested, each poster author will be given the floor for a couple of minutes to explain their poster. If you prefer not to participate by bringing a poster, you’re definitely welcome to participate as an audience member and participate in the socializing and networking.

This will be an intimate gathering that offers everybody the chance to present fresh and creative work, ideas or concepts in an informal and fun setting. We invite everyone to come out and share your expertise and get inspired by your colleagues.

Everyone who attends will gain entry into a raffle for a door prize that you won’t want to miss! People who bring posters will be given three raffle tickets, so be sure to bring a poster to have triple the chance of winning.

Note: This is the NH UX version of Pecha Kucha, originally created by Klein Dytham Architecture in Tokyo. Learn more about Pecha Kucha.

RSVP:
You must RSVP to attend, as we need a head count for the venue. Send RSVPs to newhampshire.ux@gmail.com. You will receive an email confirmation once your name has been added to the list of attendees.

+ + +

Stay informed about NH UX meetings and events by joining the NH-UX Yahoo group at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/nh-ux/

+ + +

Hope to see you there!

Posted in Boston, MA, USA | Calendar | Maine, USA | Manchester, NH, USA
Tags: holiday2007
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