August 22, 2023 • 9 mins
Taking notes while moderating user interviews is an important and underrated skill for UX researchers. This episode provides tips on taking great notes during UX research.
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Dan Berlin (00:12):
This podcast is brought to you by Watch City
Research, your user researchpartner. Check out
watchcityresearch.com forinsightful blog posts and to
learn more about our UX researchservices.
Hi everyone and welcome toanother episode of the 97 UX
Things podcast. Dan Berlin here,your host and book editor. This
week I'll be discussing bestpractices for taking notes
(00:33):
during user interviews andusability studies. Thank you to
Ms. Hughes, my eighth gradeEnglish teacher for the title of
this week's episode Notes onTaking Notes. For some reason
that particular lesson stuck inmy mind over the years and it
turned out to be really usefulin my professional and academic life.
With easy access totranscriptions and the advent of
(00:55):
AI that summarizes videocontent. It seems like we're
approaching a golden age ofresearch automation. But at risk
of sounding like a Luddite. I'mhere to tell you that taking
verbatim notes while moderatingresearch is one of the most
important tactical skills aresearcher should learn. With
practice, anyone can take fast,accurate notes while maintaining
(01:16):
eye contact with studyparticipants... while also
coming up with the next questionto ask. These mental and
physical gymnastics are myabsolute favorite part of being
a UX researcher. There's nothingmore satisfying than moderating
a great session and askinginsightful probing questions,
all while the participantsverbatim responses flow from
your fingertips into your notes.
(01:38):
Over the years, I've noticedthat many people tend to take
bulleted summarized notes whilemoderating a session. This
necessarily takes additionalbrain power and shifts your
focus away from what theparticipant is saying. Instead
of summarizing on the fly,taking raw unprocessed notes
frees up your working memory soyou can pay closer attention to
the participant.
(01:59):
Before digging into the tacticalside of good note taking and
perfecting this craft. Let'stake a moment to consider why
it's important and how it canimprove your research. The first
and most important reason isthat the act of taking notes,
whether handwritten or typed,helps put the participants'
responses into your mind, evenif it's the firehose of
information that happens duringa research session. Taking notes
(02:23):
necessarily puts the informationinto your working memory for a
split second, which allows apathway for those important bits
to make it into your longer termmemory, which facilitates
learning and understanding. Whenyou're later reading through
your notes, these will jump outto you more easily and improve
your analysis.
The second reason has to do withanalysis time. If you aren't
(02:45):
taking live notes, that meansyou're probably watching the
session videos and taking notesafter the fact. This necessarily
at least doubles the time ittakes to do the analysis. Since
you first have to go watch allthe sessions in full again,
before you can dig into anyactual analysis. Save yourself
that precious time by learningto take notes during the
session.
(03:06):
The third reason that live notetaking during user interviews is
beneficial is that it showsparticipants you're actively
listening and interested in whatthey're saying. Relatedly, it
also keeps you on your toes andhopefully actively listening. A
researcher has to be "on" duringthe time spent interviewing a
study participant and thatactive engagement while typing,
(03:27):
and not just observing, keepsresearchers in the moment and is
a useful aid to stay "on" forthat entire hour.
A final reason taking live notesis beneficial is you can easily
switch between your notes and aback channel with session
observers without theparticipant catching on. If
you're only sporadically typingand looking at your screen,
(03:47):
participants may pick up thatyou are chatting with someone
else, which could distract themand make them stop talking. If
you are pretty much alwaystyping throughout the entire
session though, participantswill think what they're saying
is interesting to you andcontinue speaking.
Let's now turn our attention tothe technical side of taking
great notes, which all startswith a solid interview guide. To
(04:08):
facilitate note taking that willease your analysis process, your
interview guide should sectionquestions by topic. This not
only ensures a smooth, relevantconversation with participants,
but also allows you to organizeyour notes by topic. Your
interview guide should alsonumber the questions so you can
easily refer back to them.
There's much more that goes intoa solid interview guide but that
(04:28):
will have to wait for its ownpodcast episode.
Once you've structured yourinterview guide, it's time to
prepare your notes mechanism.
The method you use to capturenotes is a highly personal
choice. And there are manydifferent possibilities to
choose from. Microsoft Word,Excel OneNote Google Docs,
qualitative data analysissoftware or even paper and pen.
(04:49):
My suggestion is to trydifferent pieces of software
until you find the one thatallows you to take the quickest
notes with the fewest errors andminimizes the need for mouse
clicks. It's also nice when thesoftware automatically saves
your document. I tend to save mynotes by hitting Ctrl S
repeatedly throughout thesession almost unconsciously.
(05:11):
Personally, I like to keep itsimple and use word for most
studies. Before the study, I'llmake a Word template that has
section headers from theinterview guide for each
participant. When doinganalysis, having section notes
allows you to easily read abouta certain topic across
participants. It also simplymakes reading through your notes
easier similar to how reading achapter book is easier than
(05:33):
reading a giant blob of text.0If using Excel, you can list
each task or question across thetop of your worksheet and start
a new row for each participant.
Just remember to hide theprevious participants as you go
so you don't accidentally writeover their data. This method is
especially useful if you want totrack discrete pieces of data
for each participant such asusability metrics, like pass
(05:56):
fail number of hints provided orease of use scales. To take
notes directly in Excel, youshould become adept at using
carriage return within a cellwhich is Alt Enter for PCs and
option control return for Macs.
Also, keep in mind that cellshave a character limit of just
over 32,000 characters.
(06:16):
Let's move on to some bestpractices for the study
sessions. During the studyintroduction, where you inform
the participant about studygoals and what to expect during
the session, be sure to tellthem that you'll be taking
notes. They may not be familiarwith how research works, and you
don't want the participant tothink that you're sitting there
answering emails. Also, don't beafraid to tell a participant
(06:38):
that you're catching up on yournotes, especially when
conducting remote research. It'ssometimes good to take that
moment to capture a great quote,and it also gives the
participant a moment to thinkwhen conducting in person
research. Keep your laptop at alower level to ensure it doesn't
get between you and theparticipant too much.
Taking fast accurate notes whilemaintaining eye contact with the
(07:00):
participant to keep them talkingis indeed an acquired skill and
takes patience. A component ofthis is learning to touch type.
That is, using the raised nubson the F and J keys on your
keyboard to tell your indexfingers where they should be and
otherwise never looking at thekeyboard while you converse with
study participants. There areplenty of free websites out
(07:22):
there that will help increaseyour words per minute. So keep
practicing and challengingyourself to increase that count
so you can take lightning quick,accurate notes during
interviews. Another way toincrease typing speed is to get
a mechanical keyboard where thekey action tends to be much
faster than typical keyboards.
Yes, these are much noisier, butmost conferencing applications
allow you to set a hotkey tomute yourself. Since getting my
(07:45):
mechanical keyboard I've becomevery adept at quickly hit
hitting Alt A so my mic is onlyon when I'm talking.
Next comes the trickiest part,taking your lightning quick
notes while actively listeningto the participants, watching
what they're doing, and plottingyour next question. The best way
to improve this skill is toconduct many interview sessions
(08:07):
and perform a self critique bywatching some session videos.
While painful, this process canreally help improve your
moderation skills.
Finally, some best practices fortaking actionable and rigorous
research notes. Your goal is tocapture the participants'
important comments as verbatimas possible, while also
documenting where they go in aninterface if you're conducting a
(08:29):
usability study. If theparticipant says something
particularly interesting,capture it in caps or or bold so
you can easily come back to itlater. Also write down the time
that participants say key quotesto make pulling video clips a
little easier. If you ask afollow up question that other
participants didn't get.
Consider writing down at least aportion of the question so you
(08:49):
have the context duringanalysis. When conducting a
usability study, use your ownsystem to document clicks in the
course of capturing verbatimcomments. For example, I'll use
square brackets and all caps toindicate where someone clicked.
Those are all the notes ontaking notes that I have for
y'all. I hope you found thisepisode useful and thanks for
(09:12):
listening to the 97 UX thingspodcast.
The 97 UX Things podcast is acompanion to the book 97 Things
Every UX Practitioner ShouldKnow published by O'Reilly and
all book royalties go to UXnonprofits. The theme music is
Iron Lung by King Gizzard andthe Lizard Wizard, and I'm your
host and book editor Dan Berlin.
Please remember to find theneeds in your community and fill
them with your best work. Thanksfor listening.
This podcast is brought to you by Watch City
Research, your user researchpartner. Check out
watchcityresearch.com forinsightful blog posts and to
learn more about our UX researchservices.
Hi everyone and welcome toanother episode of the 97 UX
Things podcast. Dan Berlin here,your host and book editor. This
week I'll be discussing bestpractices for taking notes
(00:33):
during user interviews andusability studies. Thank you to
Ms. Hughes, my eighth gradeEnglish teacher for the title of
this week's episode Notes onTaking Notes. For some reason
that particular lesson stuck inmy mind over the years and it
turned out to be really usefulin my professional and academic life.
With easy access totranscriptions and the advent of
(00:55):
AI that summarizes videocontent. It seems like we're
approaching a golden age ofresearch automation. But at risk
of sounding like a Luddite. I'mhere to tell you that taking
verbatim notes while moderatingresearch is one of the most
important tactical skills aresearcher should learn. With
practice, anyone can take fast,accurate notes while maintaining
(01:16):
eye contact with studyparticipants... while also
coming up with the next questionto ask. These mental and
physical gymnastics are myabsolute favorite part of being
a UX researcher. There's nothingmore satisfying than moderating
a great session and askinginsightful probing questions,
all while the participantsverbatim responses flow from
your fingertips into your notes.
(01:38):
Over the years, I've noticedthat many people tend to take
bulleted summarized notes whilemoderating a session. This
necessarily takes additionalbrain power and shifts your
focus away from what theparticipant is saying. Instead
of summarizing on the fly,taking raw unprocessed notes
frees up your working memory soyou can pay closer attention to
the participant.
(01:59):
Before digging into the tacticalside of good note taking and
perfecting this craft. Let'stake a moment to consider why
it's important and how it canimprove your research. The first
and most important reason isthat the act of taking notes,
whether handwritten or typed,helps put the participants'
responses into your mind, evenif it's the firehose of
information that happens duringa research session. Taking notes
(02:23):
necessarily puts the informationinto your working memory for a
split second, which allows apathway for those important bits
to make it into your longer termmemory, which facilitates
learning and understanding. Whenyou're later reading through
your notes, these will jump outto you more easily and improve
your analysis.
The second reason has to do withanalysis time. If you aren't
(02:45):
taking live notes, that meansyou're probably watching the
session videos and taking notesafter the fact. This necessarily
at least doubles the time ittakes to do the analysis. Since
you first have to go watch allthe sessions in full again,
before you can dig into anyactual analysis. Save yourself
that precious time by learningto take notes during the
session.
(03:06):
The third reason that live notetaking during user interviews is
beneficial is that it showsparticipants you're actively
listening and interested in whatthey're saying. Relatedly, it
also keeps you on your toes andhopefully actively listening. A
researcher has to be "on" duringthe time spent interviewing a
study participant and thatactive engagement while typing,
(03:27):
and not just observing, keepsresearchers in the moment and is
a useful aid to stay "on" forthat entire hour.
A final reason taking live notesis beneficial is you can easily
switch between your notes and aback channel with session
observers without theparticipant catching on. If
you're only sporadically typingand looking at your screen,
(03:47):
participants may pick up thatyou are chatting with someone
else, which could distract themand make them stop talking. If
you are pretty much alwaystyping throughout the entire
session though, participantswill think what they're saying
is interesting to you andcontinue speaking.
Let's now turn our attention tothe technical side of taking
great notes, which all startswith a solid interview guide. To
(04:08):
facilitate note taking that willease your analysis process, your
interview guide should sectionquestions by topic. This not
only ensures a smooth, relevantconversation with participants,
but also allows you to organizeyour notes by topic. Your
interview guide should alsonumber the questions so you can
easily refer back to them.
There's much more that goes intoa solid interview guide but that
(04:28):
will have to wait for its ownpodcast episode.
Once you've structured yourinterview guide, it's time to
prepare your notes mechanism.
The method you use to capturenotes is a highly personal
choice. And there are manydifferent possibilities to
choose from. Microsoft Word,Excel OneNote Google Docs,
qualitative data analysissoftware or even paper and pen.
(04:49):
My suggestion is to trydifferent pieces of software
until you find the one thatallows you to take the quickest
notes with the fewest errors andminimizes the need for mouse
clicks. It's also nice when thesoftware automatically saves
your document. I tend to save mynotes by hitting Ctrl S
repeatedly throughout thesession almost unconsciously.
(05:11):
Personally, I like to keep itsimple and use word for most
studies. Before the study, I'llmake a Word template that has
section headers from theinterview guide for each
participant. When doinganalysis, having section notes
allows you to easily read abouta certain topic across
participants. It also simplymakes reading through your notes
easier similar to how reading achapter book is easier than
(05:33):
reading a giant blob of text.0If using Excel, you can list
each task or question across thetop of your worksheet and start
a new row for each participant.
Just remember to hide theprevious participants as you go
so you don't accidentally writeover their data. This method is
especially useful if you want totrack discrete pieces of data
for each participant such asusability metrics, like pass
(05:56):
fail number of hints provided orease of use scales. To take
notes directly in Excel, youshould become adept at using
carriage return within a cellwhich is Alt Enter for PCs and
option control return for Macs.
Also, keep in mind that cellshave a character limit of just
over 32,000 characters.
(06:16):
Let's move on to some bestpractices for the study
sessions. During the studyintroduction, where you inform
the participant about studygoals and what to expect during
the session, be sure to tellthem that you'll be taking
notes. They may not be familiarwith how research works, and you
don't want the participant tothink that you're sitting there
answering emails. Also, don't beafraid to tell a participant
(06:38):
that you're catching up on yournotes, especially when
conducting remote research. It'ssometimes good to take that
moment to capture a great quote,and it also gives the
participant a moment to thinkwhen conducting in person
research. Keep your laptop at alower level to ensure it doesn't
get between you and theparticipant too much.
Taking fast accurate notes whilemaintaining eye contact with the
(07:00):
participant to keep them talkingis indeed an acquired skill and
takes patience. A component ofthis is learning to touch type.
That is, using the raised nubson the F and J keys on your
keyboard to tell your indexfingers where they should be and
otherwise never looking at thekeyboard while you converse with
study participants. There areplenty of free websites out
(07:22):
there that will help increaseyour words per minute. So keep
practicing and challengingyourself to increase that count
so you can take lightning quick,accurate notes during
interviews. Another way toincrease typing speed is to get
a mechanical keyboard where thekey action tends to be much
faster than typical keyboards.
Yes, these are much noisier, butmost conferencing applications
allow you to set a hotkey tomute yourself. Since getting my
(07:45):
mechanical keyboard I've becomevery adept at quickly hit
hitting Alt A so my mic is onlyon when I'm talking.
Next comes the trickiest part,taking your lightning quick
notes while actively listeningto the participants, watching
what they're doing, and plottingyour next question. The best way
to improve this skill is toconduct many interview sessions
(08:07):
and perform a self critique bywatching some session videos.
While painful, this process canreally help improve your
moderation skills.
Finally, some best practices fortaking actionable and rigorous
research notes. Your goal is tocapture the participants'
important comments as verbatimas possible, while also
documenting where they go in aninterface if you're conducting a
(08:29):
usability study. If theparticipant says something
particularly interesting,capture it in caps or or bold so
you can easily come back to itlater. Also write down the time
that participants say key quotesto make pulling video clips a
little easier. If you ask afollow up question that other
participants didn't get.
Consider writing down at least aportion of the question so you
(08:49):
have the context duringanalysis. When conducting a
usability study, use your ownsystem to document clicks in the
course of capturing verbatimcomments. For example, I'll use
square brackets and all caps toindicate where someone clicked.
Those are all the notes ontaking notes that I have for
y'all. I hope you found thisepisode useful and thanks for
(09:12):
listening to the 97 UX thingspodcast.
The 97 UX Things podcast is acompanion to the book 97 Things
Every UX Practitioner ShouldKnow published by O'Reilly and
all book royalties go to UXnonprofits. The theme music is
Iron Lung by King Gizzard andthe Lizard Wizard, and I'm your
host and book editor Dan Berlin.
Please remember to find theneeds in your community and fill
them with your best work. Thanksfor listening.
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