Reflection
thinking back on the work of a quarter
Looking Back
project reflection
When we started this project, we had no idea who our users should be or how the project would progress. As we struggled to decide which user group to choose, we realized the importance of user research and how much it impacts the creation of personas and user journey map. Despite our user research, we found that not all of our paper prototype designs were intuitive to all users when we did usability testing. This made us realize that getting user feedback is essential in designing an interface that is catered to our users and not simply intuitive for the designers.
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Throughout the quarter, the process of receiving feedback on our artifacts and offering feedback to other groups taught us both the art of the critique and how to use feedback in iterations of our design. About halfway through the project, we started sending our artifacts to our teachers to get critique before the deadline, and the feedback we received was very useful to improve our designs.
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Finally, we would have liked to conduct more usability testing throughout all stages of our process. We really enjoyed testing out our paper prototype because it was a physical manifestation of our concept that affected real people in the real world. Our paper prototype gave us something to show people what we’ve been working on based on their input during our user research. Users expressed their excitement about our concept and provided important feedback that contributed to our considerations in designing our final prototype.
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TEAM reflection
Throughout the 10 weeks in which we worked on Harvest, barely a day went by where FreshUX didn’t meet in or out of class. Through late nights and early mornings at Allen Research Commons, we developed collaboration skills that played a critical role in the success of our final product.
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The intensity of FreshUX’s work together led to essential insights on the importance of adapting to different communication and work styles. In reflecting on our growth over these ten weeks, the development of group norms was particularly important in learning how to adapt to our team’s dynamic. By the end of the quarter, we all understood that meet at 9:00 meant meet at 9:15, whiteboards were essential to our brainstorming process, and that we wouldn’t get anything done without snacks.
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While the formal evaluations opened the conversation about taking each others feedback as team members, this practice extended into our growth as researchers and designers. Remaining open to each other’s feedback, especially in exercises where we would ideate separately and come back together to share our thoughts, was a critical tool for achieving what we felt was our cumulative best work.
What's Next
If we could take the next steps in this project, we would like to conduct more usability testing with our high fidelity interactive prototype. In addition, we’d like to extend our collaboration with the Neighborhood Farmers Market Association into creating a vendor-facing version of the Harvest app. This would allow vendors to update information about the availability of their products, providing more accurate information for farmers market shoppers.
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Thank You
It takes a village… to grow a Harvest. We couldn’t have made it through this entire process without the help of many individuals outside of FreshUX, and we are extremely grateful for their contributions.
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To our course instructor, Tyler, and our course TA, Bella -- we wouldn’t even have known where to begin without your knowledge, guidance, and tips. Thank you for providing feedback on our late-night Slack submissions, for playing the best mood music during class work times, and for your dedication to helping each team this quarter produce the best possible result.
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To all the vendors (particularly those at the Ballard Farmers Market), farmers market shoppers, and Ballard Starbucks customers who showed interest in our project and took the time to answer questions, share their experiences, and provide feedback -- thank you for your time and words. Special thanks goes to the Neighborhood Farmers Market Alliance for expressing interest in our project and telling us more about their process, organization, and experience. We were very new to the farmers market experience when we began this project, and you all helped to give us a better picture of the area we were designing for and to better inform our final design.
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To our classmates and peers -- thank you for all the feedback, critique, and for working alongside us on your own projects this quarter. Your opinions were invaluable to our project, and it was inspiring to see the evolution of each of your projects over these 10 weeks. You each created work to be proud of.
Due to the time constraints of this project, our time working together as team FreshUX has come to an end. Through all our hard work in the 100+ hours of whiteboarding, brainstorming, listening to Kermit the Frog, watching Jenna Marbles, “feeling the pears” (inside joke), and simultaneously laughing until we cried, this project could not have come to fruition without the dedicated work of each team member. Go FreshUX!