A simple matrix can be used to help ensure that all user groups are properly represented in pertinent usage scenarios.
This page replaces persona-scenario matrix.
The Persona-Situation Matrix (PSM) is a chart that indicates which personas occur in which Situated Use Cases (SUCs).
In real life, many different (types of) users may interact simultaneously with a product or intervention. Designing an intervention one user at a time ignores the interactions between multiple users. Those ignored interactions can cause problems and failures, harm to users, and loss of effectiveness and efficiency. Conversely, ignored interactions can also be missed opportunities to create new functionalities that would serendipitously improve the users' experience.
Key to capturing those interactions between different types of users is to actually recognize which types of users are likely to interact together with your design intervention. The Persona-Situation Matrix serves the purpose of helping you create Situated Use Cases with all the appropriate user groups represented.
You have already developed personas and usage scenarios. If you haven't done that yet, go do that now.
Create a table or chart. List each persona's name on a separate row. Each SUC will get a column in the table.
Think of a typical circumstance under which your design intervention will be used. Which of the personas will take part in that scenario? What would be an appropriate SUC for that circumstance?
Once you've accounted for all the SUCs you think you need, look at the PSM as a whole.
As you discover problems in the PSM, you may have to go back and revise your personas, or perhaps add new ones. Similarly, you may need to adjust your SUCs or create additional ones to account for likely circumstances you have forgotten about.
A basic PSM might look like this:
SUC 1 | SUC 2 | SUC 3 | |
---|---|---|---|
DON | u | ||
FILOMENA | u | u | |
AISHA | u | c | |
ALEJANDRO | u | ||
DANTE | c | c |
Each row represents a different persona, and shows the scenarios in which they participate and interact in that scenario, as either a user or a co-user. Here are some general examples for the three scenarios in the PSM above:
For any of these situations, changing even one persona can change almost everything about the interactions that your design intervention will have to support, so you have to think through which personas are most likely to interact, and in which situations those interactions will occur.
Exercise for the reader: There's a lot missing in the example above. Can you identify the missing elements? Can you explain precisely why the example above is generally inadequate?
You have been tasked with designing a way to sharpen pencils for elementary school classroom use. Having conducted appropriate background work, you have found the following key issues pertain:
Some obvious personas might include the following. (Please note that these personas are highly abbreviated; actual personas would be //much// more detailed.)
Some reasonable SUCs might include:
Here is a possible PSM for the this case.
Day 1 | Will it sharpen? | Oops! | Better get a bucket | Helping out | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Sally | u | c | c | u | |
Ahmed | u | u | |||
Mirela | u | u | |||
Bob | u | u | |||
Gary | u | u | |||
Anne | c | c | u | ||
Stan | u | c | u |
Exercise for the reader: Do you see any shortcomings in the PSM? Does it fairly represent all the information as given? Does the PSM highlight any shortcomings in personas or SUCs?
Deliverables of this task include:
TODO Describe consequences and counter-indications.