Personas
Methodology
We used two primary resources to help guide our persona development: the book About Face 3, by Alan Cooper, Robert Reimann & David Cronin, and Designing for the Digital Age by Kim Goodwin. Goodwin recommends that people create personas not as a list of bullets, but as a narrative that implicitly explains who the persona is and what their motivations, behaviors and ambitions are; we have followed this model and included a list of goals at the end of each persona.
Persona Poster PDF
We examined our users and came up with four persona types, based on their walking habits: those who always walk, those who could walk but choose not to, those who walk sometimes but want to walk more, and those who feel they can’t walk because of distance or physical environment concerns. We mapped our interview subjects to these persona types, and then began to build out demographic information, competencies, motivations, behaviors, and goals for each persona. Each team member was responsible for refining a persona character and then writing the resulting scenario for that persona.
We created three primary personas and an anti-persona; we then created scenarios for all four personas, as we believe our product may help our anti-persona achieve some of his goals as well. We created a persona poster that we presented to our class, and you can also find all four personas below.
Adam Ergen – Lives too far away to walk very much
Kathy Cole – Wants to find more time for walking
Marissa Penfield – Always commutes by walking
Dan Bronson – Could walk but doesn’t (Anti-persona)
Adam Ergen: Lives too far to walk
“I wish I lived closer to work, so I could walk to work like my other colleagues.”
Adam Ergen is a 42 year old business analyst working in the downtown area of Ann Arbor, MI for a real estate agency. Adam graduated from the University of Illinois, with a Master’s degree in business administration. He lives about 10 miles from downtown Ann Arbor, in Dexter MI and uses his car mostly to drive to and from work. He lives with his wife and two kids, a son and a daughter.
Adam’s typical day starts with a workout in the local gym; he wakes up at around 5am and runs his way to the gym. After his workout he runs back home and gets ready for work, which takes him about an hour and a half; during this time he uses the Internet to browse through the day’s headlines, local weather report as the well the live traffic reports of the routes he takes while driving to office. Based on the traffic conditions he makes his decision of the route to take. Also the weather outside or his bag of heavy paperwork and laptop (which he might have to carry to work) makes him decide whether to park at the parking structure close to work or park in the employer subsidized lot, which is a little further away. He prefers the subsidized parking lot since he feels parking is too expensive in downtown – he is trying to put money into his kids’ college fund, so he wants to save money whenever possible. He drops his kids off at school some days. During his drive to work, when he is stopped at stoplights, he uses his iPhone to browse through some stock quotes and also do some investing in the market. If the current route seems to busy he might find and choose another route with the help of his iPhone.
During his workday he uses email continuously to communicate with his colleagues and clients. He has a stock ticker and news feed open on the side of his screen continuously. On an average day he visits professional networking sites once, to accept or make new connections. He usually goes out to lunch downtown somewhere with some coworkers; they have a few favorite places, but they like to discover new places as well. One of his favorite things about downtown Ann Arbor is the restaurant options.
After returning from work, he often takes some time to walk around his neighborhood with his wife and kids; they like to talk about everyone’s day, and he finds this time relaxing. Before going to sleep he uses the Internet to either watch online movies with his family, or just visit some social networking sites and some technology sites, since he is a big technology enthusiast and is looking forward for the apple tablet. He also likes to visit websites that provide deals and discounts.
He is interested in walking more; he feels that if he lived closer to work and had more time he would definitely walk, so next time he and his family are looking for a place to live he will try to live closer to where he works. It’s difficult for him to walk to anywhere except in his immediate neighborhood since the area is not that walkable – there aren’t many sidewalks or walkways, so there aren’t a lot of other people out walking either. He likes to take part in social events and feels strongly about walking when he sees other people doing it as a community.
Goals:
- Keep abreast of information like stock quotes and news.
- Network professionally and socially
- Save money on incidentals
- Release stress and feel fresh and connected with his family
- Be the first to use most of the latest technology
- Stay in good shape physically
Read a scenario in which Adam saves money and stays fit.
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Kathy Cole: Wants to find more time for walking
“It’s hard to find the time, but I try to walk when I can.”
Kathy Cole is a 35-year old paralegal who works regular, 9-5 hours at Dodds & Goodman Associates, located in downtown Ann Arbor. After obtaining her English degree at Michigan State University, she relocated to Ypsilanti with her husband and 2-year old baby. Her stable work schedule allows her to make time child, since her commute is only 3.5 miles – just a 15-minute drive from work to home.
Although Kathy drives her car to work every day, she does not have to worry about parking fees because the company pays for them. Heading out the door is especially hectic for Kathy, because she has to worry about bathing, feeding, and changing her baby’s diaper; she usually barely has time to do a few extra chores, bathe and feed herself before grabbing her keys and rushing out the door. Still, after doing this routine for 3 years, she had become used to it.
On her way to work, Kathy often feels a hint of guilt because she doesn’t have much time for the gym, between the chaos at home and a hectic day at work. She always parks in the designated parking lot, which is paid for by Dodds & Goodman.
Even though she is usually running a few minutes late, Kathy appreciates the 10-minute walk from the parking lot to work. While she is walking, Kathy feels physically healthier but also emotionally ready to take on the day; she uses this time to think over and prioritize what she should do at work throughout the day, such as scheduling meetings, making contracts, and printing out agendas. Also, she feels less guilty about her lack of gym time because at least she feels like she’s getting some exercise on her walk.
Once she arrives to work, the first thing she does is check the company email, then her personal email. After sending an email to the baby sitter to check up on her daughter, Kathy begins to coordinate the lawyers’ meeting times for the day, and starts printing/organizing agendas for each meeting. She walks around the office quite a bit for her job, delivering printouts or walking to various meetings. Otherwise she is at her desk doing work, emailing and occasionally checking friend updates on Twitter. Twitter helps her stay updated on what her friends are doing; even though sometimes it seems like there’s too much ‘junk’ in the twitter feed, with her busy life it’s the best way she can keep up with people without having to connect in real time.
At lunchtime, Kathy has 1 hour of meeting-free time. She usually eats a very quick, 15-minute lunch and then goes out for a half hour stroll. Mornings are usually filled with clerical work and meetings, so this half hour to relax and step outside of a busy environment allows Kathy to relive stress. Strolling up and down different routes during lunchtime allows her to discover new places; she likes to scope out possible dinner places where she could bring her family.
After a busy day, work is over promptly at 4:45pm. Kathy always drives right home, eager to see her baby daughter. When she gets home, she usually spends some time online; she searches for discounts on baby toys and clothes on Amazon or half.com. Also, she keeps track of her points gained from Stop and Shop online to see which coupons she can expect, and what discounts are available in the stores. After 15 minutes of web browsing on various web sites and email, her husband arrives home. For the rest of the evening, Kathy enjoys quality family time. She and her husband would like to take a stroll after dinnertime, but there are not many walkable parks or streets in her neighborhood. Concerned about her family’s general health and well being, she makes plans with her husband on which parks they should walk through during the weekend with their daughter for fresh air and exercise.
Goals:
- Find time to get some exercise
- Find little ways to reduce stress and lead a balanced life
- Keep in touch with her friends
- Get to work on time
- Feel like she is saving money
- Set a good example for her family
Read a scenario in which Kathy dual tasks by saving money on a restaurant reservation while walking.
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Marissa Penfield: Always walks to work
“Walking helps me feel focused when I get to work, and it helps me relax on my way home.”
Marissa Penfield is a 30-year old manager at the Sunrise Community Center in Ann Arbor, MI. She got her degree at the University of Michigan’s School of Public Health three years ago, and she was really happy to be able to stay downtown and work her dream job – health education outreach. Her work is only about a mile from her house, where she lives with her boyfriend James.
Marissa nearly always walks to work, no matter what the weather is like; since she lives just a 20 minute walk from work, it really doesn’t make sense to her to pay almost ten dollars a day for parking. She has to be at work around 9:00 every day, so she gets up by 7:45 to make sure she can be ready to go by 8:30. She tries to plan her morning so she can get to work a little early, but she often finds herself rushing out the door at the last minute. Sometimes she thinks about biking to work, because she knows it’s faster, but she doesn’t like to worry about biking through traffic or pedaling her heavy bicycle up the hill to work. She could take the bus, but she would rather not have to worry about bus schedules. The only time she might drive to work is if she has a very early morning meeting and hasn’t reserved enough time to get there on time by walking; luckily, this happens very infrequently.
On her morning walk, Marissa thinks about what she needs to do in the coming day. She values the walk because it helps her feel more alert, energized, and ready for her day; she also likes the fresh air and natural light because she doesn’t get much of either of those during her regular workday. She likes to think that she’s staying healthy and getting exercise during her commute. She tends to make personal phone calls on her cell phone while she’s walking since she doesn’t have a lot of privacy at work; because of this, she tries to take the quietest route. She doesn’t have Internet on her phone yet; she’s waiting for her contract to finish before she gets a new phone.
At work, Marissa has a lot of face-to-face time with people who come into the community center. She enjoys interacting with people and feeling like a part of her local neighborhood and community. Apart from the computer applications and outlook client she uses as part of her job, she tends keeps her personal email open all day; she likes to be able to respond quickly to her boyfriend or close friends. She also checks her Facebook and twitter accounts a few times throughout the day if she has time, and she makes a point to keep up with some blogs written by other health education outreach workers around the country.
After work, Marissa enjoys her relaxing walk home. She often walks part of the way with a few of her coworkers, and she likes having this low-key social time at the end of her day. At night, she and her boyfriend often will go downtown to eat or see local bands or DJs; because it’s usually later at night, and because of some recent petty crime in their neighborhood, they usually drive. If they don’t go out, they often watch TV or movies online. Sometimes they also go for a walk around the neighborhood because they like to see ‘cute neighborhood things’ like kids playing in the park or old people hanging out at the corner bakery. Marissa usually checks her email and twitter once or twice at night; although she’s not at the forefront of Internet trends, she does like sites that help her connect to others. She always makes sure she has some time offline each day, though, so she’s not over-stimulated.
Goals:
- Be healthy, alert, and refreshed
- Keep up with friends
- Feel involved in her community
- Make sure she is on time
- Accomplish something during her commute
- Use her knowledge to help other people
Read a scenario in which Marissa helps motivate a client to start walking.
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Dan Bronson (Anti-persona): Never walks
“I just want to get there and back quickly.“
Dan Bronson is a 27 year- old young man. He graduated from Eastern Michigan University five year ago and is now working as a help desk attendant at the University of Michigan. Dan is single and living with his roommates in downtown Ann Arbor, about 1.5 miles away from his work.
Dan works a late night shift, from 7pm to 3am, so he normally wakes up at noon. He cooks for both lunch and dinner, and he sometimes run some errands in the afternoon before going to work. He always checks the weather report before leaving for work to see whether it is going to rain or not – this helps him decide how he will get to work. If it is raining he almost always takes the bus. If not, he rides his bike to work as usual. Sometimes he will drive, because he knows parking is free after 6pm near his work. Dan never walks to work – he does like to know he has this option available, but he thinks walking is too slow and it is not worth to waste the time. Also it is too boring for him to walk alone. Besides, he has to carry laptop, and he doesn’t like the physical burden. He prefers to let the bike carry it for him. Another reason he chooses not to walk is that, since he goes to work late at night and comes back at midnight, he is a little concerned about his safety; you never know what type of people might be out on the streets at 3AM, and there have been more crime alerts posted through the University recently. He feels more secure riding his bike or driving home than he does if he’s walking.
At work he usually works alone throughout his shift. He takes calls or emails from people who have questions for the help desk, but he doesn’t have other coworkers who he can talk to. But he likes to communicate with his friends, so he is constantly online during his work shift; he keeps his Gmail account open, and often has many simultaneous chats going at once; he also checks Facebook frequently. Because of his strange work schedule, he finds it easier to keep up with people through these sites than on the phone.
When he gets out of his work, the only thing he wants to do is to get home as soon as he can. He will often watch a TV show or a movie to help him relax. Dan likes new things and new technologies. But he does not own a smart phone. He thinks it is not very useful for him, because he usually brings his laptop with him and his company also provides him a computer for his work.
Goals:
- Keep in touch with friends and family; he doesn’t want to be a loner because of his job.
- Get to and from work quickly
- Feel safe when returning home late at night.