Love your respondent
Purpose
The purpose of love your respondent is to get to know your user on a more intimate level. This “method” is more to describe a way of communicating and acting with a user while doing field work than it is a specific method. It gives guiding tips on how to gain trust and build up a different layer of empathy than simply performing a regular user interview.
Accomodate participants who are not able to:
Keep the conversation simple and dont rush the participant
Include a translator or use paper, pens and body language to communicate
Include a translator or use paper, pens and body language to communicate
Keep the conversation simple and dont rush the participant
Input
Basic knowledge about the user
Output
Empiric data
Complexity
Moderate
Time
1-3 hours+
No. of participants
1-2
Activity required
Core abilities:
- Communication
- Reflective thinking
Step by Step
| 1 | Find and meet up with your user | 4 | Use encouragement to emphasize that the user should just say whatever they have in mind. |
| 2 | Ask compassionate questions to try to understand the disconnections between what we believe, what people say, and what they do. | 5 | Use judgement as a way to reflect, without letting it influence the direction of the interview. Whenever judgement occurs, reflect and think of the gap between your perception/values and theirs. |
| 3 | Show excitement to talk to the user, and ask questions like if you were to get to know a date or a long lost friend. | 6 | Do not be afraid to expose your vulnerabilities and show your flaws. That way, people will be able to relate to you more and less reluctant to open up. |
When doing this method you should consider
- Once you have established trust, they will be much more open to share things.
- Do not push to hard for information the user is not comfortable with
- If the user is not ready to open up try breaking the ice with your own experiences
Materials needed
