Top tips to help your field research go smoothly
Entering year 3 of a global pandemic, almost every aspect of our personal and working lives has been impacted. The UX research (UXR) profession is no exception, and whilst this has resulted in some welcome changes, like flexible work and easy access to research participants via video calls, it has meant field research has taken a backseat.
For new UXR practitioners, they may never have had the opportunity to flex their field research muscles. Even for seasoned researchers, this part of the toolkit may have laid neglected for some time.
Recently, I had the opportunity to get back into the field after years of connecting with users only virtually, and my field research skills felt rusty. However, with some review of best practices, and some stellar support from my coworkers, we managed to pull off an international field study with barely a hitch.
Here are my top tips for smooth field research
Firstly, a quick recap on field research techniques.
According to Nielsel Norman group, ‘Field research activities that take place in the user’s context rather than in your office or lab’ . A common field research technique, is a contextual enquiry.
In my experience, a contextual enquiry is one of the best ways to deepen your understanding of your users needs, goals, behaviours and environment in one fell swoop. The richness of insights on offer are significant, and go far beyond what a zoom call can do. But how to make it work?
- Plan, plan and plan some more
- Identify and engage your supporters
- Prepare your equipment and have some backup options
- Remain flexible
- Capture your data in more ways than one
- Rapidly debrief and summarise
Top Tip #1: Plan, plan and plan some more
One of the most striking differences between field research and other technology-led methods (e.g. surveys, usability tests etc) is how much additional planning is required. I have written previously about the importance of planning as a UXR , and field research will require you to double down further. You will need to create not only your typical research documentation, such as a brief, a discussion guide and/or protocol, consent forms and so on, but you will also need to consider;
- A detailed logistical plan if you are moving around locations. How long will it take to get from A to B? How are you getting there? Who is going with you? Be sure to build in some buffer time to account for unexpected delays and ensure you have the right information for your field research locations such as addresses, contact details, entry requirements and anything else you will need to account for
- You will also need to make sure you are clear on how you capture data, and the equipment you will need to do this. Keep in mind, depending on your location you may not have easy access to the internet, so plan accordingly
Top Tip #2: Identify and engage your supporters
Conducting field research alone or only with other researchers may be possible, but if you are an in-house researcher, engaging with other supporters in your organisation may not only make planning your research more successful, but when the time comes to share your findings, you have a ready-made circle of advocates. I like to create a stakeholder map, and corresponding communication plan to help ensure we see the bigger picture and don’t overlook anyone important to the success of our study.
Consider inviting one or two key stakeholders along with you. Not only will they get to understand the method in your madness, but they will likely feel bought into what you’re doing, and can help support later communication of what you learned with their first-hand accounts.
Top Tip #3: Prepare your equipment and have some backup options
Depending on where and how you are conducting your field research, it’s entirely possible your laptop alone may not be enough. To give an idea, with the recent contextual enquiries our team conducted, we had to use a mix of handwritten notes (when audio/video recording wasn’t possible or allowed privacy-wise), smartphones for taking photos and short videos, and laptops for longer-form audio recording. Consider your research protocol, and what will work best for you. Don’t forget the basics like ensuring you have options for internet access (or not) , batteries are fully charged and so on.
Top Tip #4: Remain flexible
Field research will generally throw you some curveballs. Whilst I’ve already explained that planning is key, things will still always crop up that require you to wing it a little. This might mean your data capture method has to be tweaked, your discussion guide is adapted on the fly or you have to account for a last-minute cancellation. Stating the critical elements of your research upfront, vs. the ‘nice-to-haves’ will help you strip things back to what’s most essential if you have to adapt to the unexpected.
Top Tip #5: Capture your data in more ways than one
Field research is generally selected as a research method when you are actively looking for deeper, thicker data than other methods. Accordingly, consider more than one way of capturing what you hear and see. I strongly recommend taking photos and/or videos as part of your field research, with participant consent of course. A picture can say a thousand words, and further, it will help you remember the details of each contextual enquiry or site visit when it’s time to synthesise. I like to take photos of the overall environment, the participant themselves, ideally performing a task we are investigating.
Don’t forget to save all your data (audio, video, photo, handwritten notes) in clearly named folders or locations that will help keep your data separate; this will save a lot of time in the long run, I promise!
Top Tip#6: Rapidly debrief and summarise
It’s incredible how quickly you can forget important details, well I do anyway! To this end, I strongly recommend debriefing with your co-workers as soon as possible after each contextual enquiry. I like to consider reflective questions like:
- What surprised us?
- What appeared to be most important?
- What do we agree were the biggest pain points?
- What made this person/location/situation seem unique?
To document these answers, I like to write a summary card in Miro for each contextual enquiry, along with some basic information about the participant(s), but you could even do this by hand or even a voice note. This helps when you go back to summarise your findings that the key distinguishing information about your participants is readily available before you attempt to wade through all your raw data.
Conclusion
Field research is time consuming, requires a lot of planning and can be expensive, but if done well, it can yield long-lasting, rich and valuable insights that provide the perfect complement to other, leaner evaluative research methods. I truly hope that as we shift toward a new normal post-covid world, that field research once again is given the time and investment it deserves.
Happy researching!
