Universal Methods of Design
100 Ways to Research Complex Problems, Develop Innovative Ideas, and Design Effective Solutions
Universal Methods of Design is a collection of user research techniques and strategies for synthesizing and presenting findings. If you’re stuck repeating the same methods over and over (like contextual inquiry or usability testing) and want to try something different, this book is for you.
User research is at its best when multiple techniques triangulate the truth. Even better is when both quantitative and qualitative techniques are used to discover both behavioral and attitudinal findings.
Within this framework, the book introduces techniques, both familiar to me (card sorting, design ethnography…) and unfamiliar (touchstone tours, business origami, the KJ technique…) Not an exciting book, but it did successfully expand my UX vocabulary and arsenal of research methods.