In the ever-evolving world of product development and user experience design, understanding and addressing user needs is paramount. This is why user research is important, but it’s not enough to just talk to users; you also need to go through the process of extracting insights from all they’ve told you. Sometimes people don’t really want a more complicated drill; they just want a way to easily get diverse kinds of holes, and if there’s a different, easier, faster way of giving them that, they would appreciate you more.

Starting out, your first goal should be to figure out the root problem from their statements, not just the surface problems or symptoms. One example of a root problem scenario I like is the razor blade in the trouser example. If a person has a blade in their pockets (that they do not know about) and that blade tears up the pocket every time, the user complaint/request would most likely be, “how do I make my pocket untearable,” or “how do I ensure my pockets can get sewn back as fast as possible when they tear,” or, worst case, “how do I entirely remove the pocket since it’s so useless to me.” If you don’t go look in the pocket, if you don’t stop to think what the root cause could be, you would be stuck trying to ideate stronger untearable pockets or even worse, pockets that sew themselves back 😅.

Beyond this, you need to break down the identified root problem into desired functional outcomes and emotional outcomes. Using the drill example from earlier again, the functional outcome might be something like “this person wants to easily make holes,” and the desired emotional outcome could be “he needs to make his daughter happy by building her a treehouse but also wants to achieve this in the most stress-free and swiftest manner possible.” By breaking it down like this, we identify that he is aiming for the emotion he will feel from seeing his daughter happily play in her treehouse and that he also doesn’t want to feel emotions of frustration or time wasting from tools that impede his process.

These three identified things can then be combined to determine the violated heuristic by the presence of that problem, a severity rating can be assigned to it, and then you can give an initial actionable recommendation to someone else, or your future self. Note that this recommendation is not set in stone; it is just your best idea in the short period after the interview. There should also be a last column titled “Implemented Solution.” This column should be filled much later with the idea or solution you eventually implement and ship.

The Methodology Explained

The User Research Document from this method is divided into several key columns, each serving a distinct purpose:

1. User Statement: This column captures either paraphrased or exact statements from user interviews. It serves as the raw data from which insights are drawn.

2. Problem Identified: This column aims to succinctly and accurately define the problem based on the user’s statement.

3. Desired Functional Outcome: This section delves into why users want a particular need addressed or problem solved. It outlines the functional capabilities users expect to gain as a result of solving the identified issue.

4. Desired Emotional Outcome: Here, the focus is on the emotions users are pursuing. It’s about understanding the emotional impact or satisfaction users anticipate upon the resolution of their problem.

5. Heuristic Violated: Utilizing the identified problem, this section determines which usability heuristic is being violated by the current system.

6. Severity Rating: Each identified problem is assigned a severity rating between 1–5, indicating the urgency and impact of the issue.

7. Actionable Recommendation: In this part, preliminary recommendations are brainstormed to address the identified problem while also fulfilling the desired functional and emotional outcomes.

8. Implemented Solution Feature: This section should remain empty until the actual solution is designed. Once the solution is in place, provide a summary of what was built. This step is essential for readers to compare the actionable recommendations with the final solution and track the journey from the user statement to the implemented solution, helping assess how effectively the final solution aligns with the expected user outcomes.

Practical Application

To illustrate the method, consider the following example table:

Conclusion

The User Research Documentation method provides a structured and comprehensive approach to understanding user feedback. By breaking down user statements into functional and emotional outcomes, identifying problems, and brainstorming solutions, you ensure that user needs are at the forefront of product development, paving the way for informed and user-centric decision-making.