[IxDA Discuss] Pointers for international customer visits

[Daniel Szuc]

Hi Pamela:

This may interest - 

Chinese Home Site Visits - Tips & Hints -
http://www.apogeehk.com/articles/tips_for_chinese_home_visits.html

Rgds,

Daniel Szuc
Principal Usability Consultant
Apogee Usability Asia Ltd
www.apogeehk.com
'Usability in Asia'

The Usability Toolkit - http://www.sitepoint.com/books/usability1/

-----Original Message-----
From: discuss-bounces at lists.interactiondesigners.com
[mailto:discuss-bounces at lists.interactiondesigners.com] On Behalf Of Pam
Migliore
Sent: Tuesday, March 27, 2007 2:18 AM
To: discuss at lists.interactiondesigners.com
Subject: [IxDA Discuss] Pointers for international customer visits


Greetings -

I'm looking to the group for advice, warnings and best wishes...details
below.

Next week, I am embarking on a 4-week world tour to visit customers (and
potential customers) in the US, Asia (India & China) and Europe (Turkey,
Poland, France, UK and Germany.)  While originally slated as a market
research trip concerning concepts for a new product, I have worked my way on
to the agenda in order to conduct user research and collect feedback to
early concepts for the user interface and industrial design.

We have a lot of different tasks we are trying to accomplish at each site
(contextual inquiry, GUI & Industrial design concept review, Icon usability
study plus all the product marketing activities.) I'm sure we are biting off
more than we'll be able to chew, but we are looking to make the most of this
trip as we aren't sure when we'll get the funding to do something similar in
the future.  Also, we have a lot of visibility to our senior management to
see how this exercise goes (this is the first time that I am aware of that a
UI/UX person has had access to customers in countries other than US or
limited Europe.)

I think I've got all of my ducks in a row as far as discussion guides,
prototypes, surveys, etc., but am looking for advice from anyone who has
taken on a similar exercise.  In particular, I'd appreciate any warnings or
war stories of things that worked well and things to avoid.  I'm based out
of the US but have facilitated usability tests in Western Europe before for
a different company and have traveled to India for other business reasons,
but I have never interfaced with end users in most of these countries.  Are
there any cultural "gotchas" I should be aware of/be sensitive to?  Or
anything else that may prepare me for a successful trip?

Thanks in advance for your help!
-- 
Pamela Migliore
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